Hands-On: iOS 11 Brings Major Updates to the Camera and Photos Apps

[MacRumors]

Apple's upcoming iOS 11 update, designed for the iPhone and the iPad, brings improvements to the way you capture, edit, and view photos on Apple's latest devices. Portrait Mode photos are better than ever, there are new ways to manipulate Live Photos, and photos and videos take up less space.

In the video below, we've outlined all of the new features you can expect to see in iOS 11 when it's released to the public this fall.

Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.​

First and foremost, Apple is adopting new photo and video formats (HEVC for video and HEIF for images) that will shrink the size of the photos and videos you take by up to 50 percent. That's going to save valuable storage space on your devices, but the new formats are limited to Apple's most recent iPhones and iPads.

On the iPhone 7 Plus, Portrait Mode now supports optical image stabilization and HDR for better low light performance, and on all iPhones, there are new filters to choose when editing a photo.

When working with Live Photos on a compatible device, there are several new editing options. You can choose a key photo, which lets you select the portion of the Live Photo that looks the best, essentially making it impossible to take a bad photo. Since Live Photos are more or less short videos, it's a lot like taking a still from a video.

Live Photos can now be cropped, much like a video, and there are new Loop, Bounce, and Long Exposure options. Loop causes a Live Photo to loop over and over like a GIF, while Bounce does the same thing, but forwards and then backwards. Long Exposure combines the Live Photo video into a single shot to introduce a unique blur effect.

In the Photos app, there's now dynamic support for viewing Memories videos in portrait or landscape mode, and more kinds of Memories videos are automatically generated thanks to machine learning improvements. New categories include pets, babies, outdoor activities, performances, weddings, birthdays, and sporting events.

The People album, which uses facial recognition to recognize people in images, also now syncs across devices, so it doesn't need to be set up on each individual device.

For a complete overview of all of the new features included in iOS 11, make sure to check out our iOS 11 roundup. Over on our YouTube channel, you can also find other iOS 11 overviews highlighting the iPad features, the new App Store, the Control Center, and more.

Article Link: Hands-On: iOS 11 Brings Major Updates to the Camera and Photos Apps

 

[Chazzle]

I feel the Live Photos' key photo choice is very welcome. Always bothered me that I couldn't do this prior.

 

[44267547]

Portrait mode is receiving a nice update with the low light and camera flash. To many times the camera requires additional light. Hopefully this will improve it.

 

[crazyroo1]

Photos app in 11 supports gif playback w/ automated sorting of gifs into a folder (like with screenshots)

 

[tbayrgs]

How about the ability to change camera settings in the actual Camera App? Why Apple buried these inside the Settings app is bewildering. Please tell me they moved them to the app.

 

[Sethal]

What about the ability to view, edit, and add keywords/locations? That's what I'm wanting.

 

[jclo]

Being able to pick a key photo from a Live Photo is easily one of my favorite iOS 11 features. Before this was possible, I got rid of so many Live Photos that were awesome but flawed because the main photo was blurry. Wish this had been available from the beginning.

 

[scarecrowmac]

Really looking forward to this.. Finally, I don't have to set up faces on EACH device. I hope the low light portrait mode is improved a lot, currently it’s pretty grainy when theres not much light. I’m really looking forward to so many of the iOS 11 features!

 

[dorsal]

When Photos makes the full screen map with pins at photo locations like iPhoto did, I'll switch to Photos.

 

[KittyKatta]

I thought they were going to do a lot more with Edit features but they really didn't do anything on the iOS side.

The new media format is awesome though. Changing key photos without losing quality, bounce and better Live Photos is great. I have the the beta on my SE and it's now my preferred phone camera (over my iOS 10 7+) because of these improvements.


Unfortunately, it's been years since MacOS Photos.app got an update but now we finally got something and photos still stinks There are tons features missing that could even make it on par with iPhotos (let alone, Aperture) So it doesn't look like Apple will be putting much effort here.

 

[JonneyGee]

I'm a little concerned about the A9 chip requirement for the new image and video formats. I have an iPhone 7 and an iPad Mini 2 (thanks, Apple, for again ignoring the Mini in this year's iPad updates!) so will this update mean I can't sync my photo and video library to my iPad?

 

[mtneer]

How about adding Focus Peaking in the camera app?

 

[Eorlas]

First and foremost, Apple is adopting new photo and video formats that will shrink the size of the photos and videos you take by up to 50 percent.

...are you able to share what those formats are...?

 

[jclo]

...are you able to share what those formats are...?

HEVC for video and HEIF for images.

 

[err404]

I feel the Live Photos' key photo choice is very welcome. Always bothered me that I couldn't do this prior.

I'm curious how this is implemented. The original Live Photos was just a short video file paired with a full detail photo. While I love the idea, simply pausing the video at a different frame would have far more artifacts than the photo. Still, I'm excited to try it out.

 

[Mtmspa]

...are you able to share what those formats are...?

Did you even read the article?

 

[Applestock]

I'm pretty sure live photos taken with iOS11 devices will be captured differently than old live photos. HEIF/HEVC will allow for more if not all of the frames to be captured at full resolution without much additional size to the overall file. Bottom line, this will likely only be useful for new live photos.

I'm curious how this is implemented. The original Live Photos was just a short video file paired with a full detail photo. While I love the idea, simply pausing the video at a different frame would have far more artifacts than the photo. Still, I'm excited to try it out.

[doublepost=1497314922][/doublepost]I really want to see a side by side comparison of the portrait mode in iOS 10 and 11 in low/med/good lighting conditions.

 

[EximiusVir]

Apple's upcoming iOS 11 update, designed for the iPhone and the iPad, brings improvements to the way you capture, edit, and view photos on Apple's latest devices. Portrait Mode photos are better than ever, there are new ways to manipulate Live Photos, and photos and videos take up less space.

In the video below, we've outlined all of the new features you can expect to see in iOS 11 when it's released to the public this fall.

Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos.​

First and foremost, Apple is adopting new photo and video formats (HEVC for video and HEIF for images) that will shrink the size of the photos and videos you take by up to 50 percent. That's going to save valuable storage space on your devices, but the new formats are limited to Apple's most recent iPhones and iPads.

On the iPhone 7 Plus, Portrait Mode now supports optical image stabilization and HDR for better low light performance, and on all iPhones, there are new filters to choose when editing a photo.

When working with Live Photos on a compatible device, there are several new editing options. You can choose a key photo, which lets you select the portion of the Live Photo that looks the best, essentially making it impossible to take a bad photo. Since Live Photos are more or less short videos, it's a lot like taking a still from a video.

Live Photos can now be cropped, much like a video, and there are new Loop, Bounce, and Long Exposure options. Loop causes a Live Photo to loop over and over like a GIF, while Bounce does the same thing, but forwards and then backwards. Long Exposure combines the Live Photo video into a single shot to introduce a unique blur effect.

In the Photos app, there's now dynamic support for viewing Memories videos in portrait or landscape mode, and more kinds of Memories videos are automatically generated thanks to machine learning improvements. New categories include pets, babies, outdoor activities, performances, weddings, birthdays, and sporting events.

The People album, which uses facial recognition to recognize people in images, also now syncs across devices, so it doesn't need to be set up on each individual device.

For a complete overview of all of the new features included in iOS 11, make sure to check out our iOS 11 roundup. Over on our YouTube channel, you can also find other iOS 11 overviews highlighting the iPad features, the new App Store, the Control Center, and more.

Article Link: Hands-On: iOS 11 Brings Major Updates to the Camera and Photos Apps

Question about the file formats: HEVC and, specifically, HEIF...

I'm clear on HEVC, as I already use it for transcoding my own videos. I've got questions about HEIF...

This is great news for storage space and for *new* photos, but what about existing photos?

Does anyone know if the macOS High Sierra Photos app will provide an option to upgrade your photo library to the new format?

Will there be a server side (iCloud) upgrade option for non Mac users?

If I send a photo to my mom's Android device, will it be sent in JPEG or HEIF format? (I assume it will be an automatic process the end user will not need to worry about?)

 

[mark-vdw]

Has anyone tried using the face sync on devies which don't have the full library on them?

 

[vngannxx]

It would great if they can implement 4K Live Photos. Extract a 4K frame from the live photo.

 

[kmm333]

This is great news for storage space and for *new* photos, but what about existing photos?

Does anyone know if the macOS High Sierra Photos app will provide an option to upgrade your photo library to the new format?

Will there be a server side (iCloud) upgrade option for non Mac users?

I have the same question. Sounds like it is only for new photos, as the post mentions that it only works for newer devices (implying that it isn't retroactive).

 

[newdeal]

there is really only one question...can I finally delete photos without having to select each one individually?

 

[citysnaps]

there is really only one question...can I finally delete photos without having to select each one individually?

You can do that now.

 

[canesalato]

there is really only one question...can I finally delete photos without having to select each one individually?

you can already do this in 10

 

[DoctorDoctor]

Facial recognition syncing. If that was the only added feature to Photos that would have been enough. Was so frustrating having to process faces on 4 devices. Now I can drop Google photos since Apple Photos has so many more useful features.
[doublepost=1497323053][/doublepost]

A new format! I think it may be time to try Google Pixel, at least it has a headphone jack and uses USB-C.

Better get one now although almost everyone will suggest you don't. The rumor is the next Pixel will be dropping the headphone jack. But then again its just a rumor.