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5x Digital Zoom Is Terrible!

DaGreat01

DaGreat01

macrumors 6502a
Original poster
Jun 11, 2009
894
0
Atlanta, Georgia
So I have the iSO4 GM on my 3G and was using the 5x digital zoom and I realized that every iPhone since the beginning have had this digital zoom. All you have to do is take a picture, go to it in the library, pinch to zoom the picture, then take a snap shot. I took two pictures each using the two different methods and got the same exact photo. (I would post picture but I'm posting this from my phone)

Yo me, it feels as if Apple just add this to make this people wanting this to shut up already. I really see no point in digital zoom. If you go to your liberty and zoom a picture, that will be the same quality picture you will get with the 5x zoom.

Any thoughts?
 
That is all that Digital Zoom is and always has been, there are no zoom optics in any camera phone that I'm aware of so you'll never get a good 'zoom' on a smartphone, at least not anything worthwhile. All they may do is run it through some messy sharpening scripts to make it look better, but it'll still look like garbage. Also, you're only working with a 2MP camera sensor, so that's not helping out much either.
 
DaGreat01 said:
So I have the iSO4 GM on my 3G and was using the 5x digital zoom and I realized that every iPhone since the beginning have had this digital zoom. All you have to do is take a picture, go to it in the library, pinch to zoom the picture, then take a snap shot. I took two pictures each using the two different methods and got the same exact photo. (I would post picture but I'm posting this from my phone)

Yo me, it feels as if Apple just add this to make this people wanting this to shut up already. I really see no point in digital zoom. If you go to your liberty and zoom a picture, that will be the same quality picture you will get with the 5x zoom.

Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

DIGITAL zoom.
 
Optical zoom is the only way to go but it requires moving lens elements which is too expensive and large for the iPhone. Digital is just to appease and impress people who want a zoom and don't understand (most) what it is.
 
yes optical is far better this is why I will always own a camera. digital zoom is better then nothing, similar to auto cropping. but as said no cell phone I know of offers optical zoom. I'm more excited about 5 megapixel. the led flash will help to and HD video. all nice stuff to have but a iPhone will never replace my camera!
 
It's a phone, how much do you expect????

Why, WHY with every iPhone revision do people get less and less impressed with the product and start nitpicking at what it doesn't do well?

it shoots 720p video, what did you want it to shoot....1080i?
it has a front facing camera, what did you want....2 of them?
it has a high resolution display, what did you want....2 of them as well?
 
DaGreat01 said:
So I have the iSO4 GM on my 3G and was using the 5x digital zoom and I realized that every iPhone since the beginning have had this digital zoom. All you have to do is take a picture, go to it in the library, pinch to zoom the picture, then take a snap shot. I took two pictures each using the two different methods and got the same exact photo. (I would post picture but I'm posting this from my phone)

Yo me, it feels as if Apple just add this to make this people wanting this to shut up already. I really see no point in digital zoom. If you go to your liberty and zoom a picture, that will be the same quality picture you will get with the 5x zoom.

Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

Well, if you were expecting anything else from digital zoom on ANY device, then you're living in cloud cuckoo land.
 
I never said that I wanted better zoom. I was just making the point that you could do the same thing that the 5x zoom does without the update and that there is no point to it. I don't really care that it's crappy because I'll never use it nor did I want it.
 
DaGreat01 said:
So I have the iSO4 GM on my 3G and was using the 5x digital zoom and I realized that every iPhone since the beginning have had this digital zoom. All you have to do is take a picture, go to it in the library, pinch to zoom the picture, then take a snap shot. I took two pictures each using the two different methods and got the same exact photo. (I would post picture but I'm posting this from my phone)

Yo me, it feels as if Apple just add this to make this people wanting this to shut up already. I really see no point in digital zoom. If you go to your liberty and zoom a picture, that will be the same quality picture you will get with the 5x zoom.

Any thoughts?
Click to expand...

No, you don't end up with the same picture. Whenever you take a screenshot on the iPhone you get a picture that's limited to the phone's display resolution. If you were to zoom in to a picture 5X with the camera, the resolution would be higher (especially with the new 5MP camera in the iPhone 4) than a simple screenshot of a pinched picture.
 
as much as I hate digital zoom, it's hard to really judge the quality using older generation hardware with a lower res camera. it might be passable on iPhone 4... but yea, don't use digital zoom.... please.
 
Well, that's the iPhone 5 feature we can hope for. Apple reinvented the mobile phone... maybe they could get busy on an optical zoom/lens system that is low profile and doesn't consume as much power as a full version would. I'm sure they could think of something. Maybe a 2X optical zoom. Maybe manipulate the thickness of glass in such a way, they require very little space and very little lens movement to zoom.
 
Although digital zoom is basically what everyone has stated it to be, Apple IS using some software tricks to smooth out the image. I've tested it. So it's not just the same as pinching in on a picture in the camera roll and taking a screen shot.
 
:eek: Whaaaaaat! Digital zoom sucks? I don't believe it. /sarc


C'mon digital zoom has been the phoniest of all camera marketing inventions since it's introduction. If it's not optical it's not zoom. Might as well just blow it up 500x in Photoshop. The first thing I do when I buy a new camera is make sure digital zoom is off. I'd pay extra if a camera didn't have the "feature."
 
wheezy said:
That is all that Digital Zoom is and always has been, there are no zoom optics in any camera phone that I'm aware of so you'll never get a good 'zoom' on a smartphone, at least not anything worthwhile. All they may do is run it through some messy sharpening scripts to make it look better, but it'll still look like garbage. Also, you're only working with a 2MP camera sensor, so that's not helping out much either.
Click to expand...

Agreed, digital zoom sucks.
 
Julien said:
Optical zoom is the only way to go but it requires moving lens elements which is too expensive and large for the iPhone. Digital is just to appease and impress people who want a zoom and don't understand (most) what it is.
Click to expand...

This puts it perfectly. I honestly don't think apple cared to put this in but just did it because so many people "wanted it" (Don't think they realize how "terrible" digital zoom is.) The reason I say I don't feel they cared to put it in is because you know that Apple doesn't want to do or impement something unless it's done right, and to be honest, the zoom is ******, but I would not have expected anything more because this is how majority of phones are.
 
palmerc2 said:
it shoots 720p video, what did you want it to shoot....1080i?
it has a front facing camera, what did you want....2 of them?
it has a high resolution display, what did you want....2 of them as well?
Click to expand...
I suppose a dish washer is too much more to ask for?
 
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