New APIs in iOS 7 Allow Developers to Detect Blinking and Smiling in Photos

[MacRumors]

In addition to a complete redesign and a slew of new features, Apple's iOS 7 offers a number of APIs for developers, including several camera improvements like zoom capabilities for video.

According to 9to5Mac, iOS 7 beta 2, which debuted yesterday, added a new function that allows developers to access image detectors to locate facial expressions within photos.

While face recognition was originally introduced with iOS 5, the new APIs can detect distinct expressions like smiles and blinking, functionality that is found in several basic point-and-shoot cameras.

Since the iPhone's debut, Apple has worked hard to improve both the camera hardware and software of its devices, so it is no surprise that iOS 7 will offer multiple camera enhancements for developers. Each iteration of iOS has included new features, such as the volume shutter controls that debuted with iOS 5 and the panorama capabilities added with iOS 6.

Apple's camera expansion efforts have largely paid off, with the iPhone 4, 4S, and 5 ranked as the three most popular cameras on photo sharing site Flickr. The iPhone's camera was also the highlight of a recent Apple advertising campaign.

Along with software improvements in iOS 7, Apple's next generation iPhone is also expected to feature several photo-focused enhancements. The iPhone 5S is rumored to have a higher megapixel camera and a dual LED flash that was revealed in device photos earlier this week.

Article Link: New APIs in iOS 7 Allow Developers to Detect Blinking and Smiling in Photos

 

[MickeyAlexander]

What crazy technology!

 

[Dominicanyor]

That's awesome!!

 

[coder12]

Sweet! It's nice to see facial recognition becoming more advanced in the API itself; there are a ton of cool potentialities that this brings forward, but it will still keep usage consistent.

 

[SAIRUS]

I really hope they don't make this a 5S feature only. Guess it's time to start coding and see if the 5 can pull it off.

 

[Lee-K]

Would be nice if they finally introduced true a exposure compensation slider, even if an "advanced mode" needed to be enabled in settings or something.

I'd take that over a digital zoom slider any day. This is the one fatal flaw of the iPhone camera for me.

 

[Porco]

iOS 7: Now suitable for post-Blu-ray-release Ewoks!

 

[pmau]

WarpCore API

*/
CF_EXPORT
CFWarpDriveRef CFWarpDriveCreate(CFSpaceTimeRef dimension, const void **darkness, const void **eternity, CFIndex numHops, const CFWarpCallBacks *warpCallBacks, const CFSpeedCallBacks *speedCallBacks);

Look, I found a new Warp Drive API in CoreFoundation, near WarpCore.
You can create a EWarpDrive instance, define the dimension, darkness and eternity parameters and the number of hops you want to travel.

Each hop will cause a warpCallback into your App and the speedCallbacks let you place pins on the new 3D galaxy map API.

Use carefully.

 

[lotzosushi]

Well as long as they don't pull an S4 gimmick and market eye-tracking as a huge feature. Cause it's not.

 

[D.T.]

*/
CF_EXPORT
CFWarpDriveRef CFWarpDriveCreate(CFSpaceTimeRef dimension, const void **darkness, const void **eternity, CFIndex numHops, const CFWarpCallBacks *warpCallBacks, const CFSpeedCallBacks *speedCallBacks);

Look, I found a new Warp Drive API in CoreFoundation, near WarpCore.
You can create a EWarpDrive instance, define the dimension, darkness and eternity parameters and the number of hops you want to travel.

Each hop will cause a warpCallback into your App and the speedCallbacks let you place pins on the new 3D galaxy map API.

Use carefully.

Nice.

 

[unlimitedx]

Well as long as they don't pull an S4 gimmick and market eye-tracking as a huge feature. Cause it's not.

I've used the eye scroll feature on my friend's s4. Truly gimmicky!!

 

[TMar]

Really? Complete redesign? This site has jumped on that completely false selling point catchphrase too?

FYI the latter 'complete' in that is the correct use of the word...

 

[donutbagel]

Let's hope that it doesn't end up making people think that Apple is racist.

 

[Frisco]

I don't know how I lived my 50 years of life without this technology. It makes my 50 years seem meaningless.

 

[Stack Overflow]

The code says something about a minimum OS X requirement. More artificial limitations? "The older iMac cannot provide the processing power required for blink detection."

It's not limiting it based on the hardware, it's limiting it based on the APIs the version of OS X contains. Only 10.9 has this (according to the code snippet).

You can't use a software feature that isn't contained in the software in question.

 

[lolkthxbai]

Would be nice if they finally introduced true a exposure compensation slider, even if an "advanced mode" needed to be enabled in settings or something.

I'd take that over a digital zoom slider any day. This is the one fatal flaw of the iPhone camera for me.

Since the introduction of HDR I don't think Apple would introduce an exposure manipulation feature in iOS ever. I would think it goes against what they believe in: making things "just work". There's always going to be a third-party app or tool that will have an exposure manipulation feature. From what I can tell, most people don't even really use the exposure control even if it's included. Some people don't even know it exists even though it's icon has always been present in their camera/camera app! I find this especially true for android users.

 

[donutbagel]

It's not limiting it based on the hardware, it's limiting it based on the APIs the version of OS X contains. Only 10.9 has this (according to the code snippet).

You can't use a software feature that isn't contained in the software in question.

Yes, but 10.9 won't support older Macs... but that could also be for other reasons. OK, I guess it's not really an artificial hardware limitation like turn-by-turn on Maps (not supported on iPhone 4) unless they disable blink detection on Macs that can run 10.9 but are somewhat old.

 

[Smartass]

magical technology!
totally worth the upgrade!

 

[CodexMonkey]

Is there something preventing Apple from putting a timer on the camera app? Camera plus has it, but no HDR.

 

[inkhead]

So Apple is finally catching up with every single 3rd party facial recognition API available for free on the web? Most of these free APIs can also guess a gender, and if the user is wearing glasses.

 

[Mr.Dave]

Sounds like typical Apple fashion here-taking an existing technology but delivering it in such a way that it appears new, seamless, and more polished than what competitors are doing. Nonetheless a minor but still cool feature to look forward to.

 

[xcodeaddict]

I'm smiling and blinking, because I'm trying to work out where the attached image is...

 

[Lee-K]

There's always going to be a third-party app or tool that will have an exposure manipulation feature.

There isn't a single one with a REAL exposure compensation. They only simulate it via live levels post processing.

 

[captain kaos]

Well as long as they don't pull an S4 gimmick and market eye-tracking as a huge feature. Cause it's not.

I agree. I had an S3 and never used any of the fancy camera options. I found finding and selecting the options from the side menus slow and painful, you spent so much time faffing around and not taking the shot. For me i'd like basic colour filter options (which we are getting) and the same separate exposure and AF lock option you get on the CP Pro app. Face/smile/whatever detection i can do without.

 

[Menneisyys2]

Speaking of other enhancements, I've written three articles with never-before-published info on the new Camera features of iOS7 for both casual users and programmers. (Note that the first part of all these articles are meant for casual users and the second one for programmers.)

- Image Stabilization (how / why you may want to dis/enable it and why programmers are supposed to make it configurable on a fully-fledged AppStore camcorder app): https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1600908/

- (lossless) zooming: iOS7 supports lossless zooming (to a degree), which produces far better quality than the old, crop-based zooming. In this article, I compare its actual quality to that of crop-based solutions (e.g., the stock Camera app) and also show the API: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1601763/

- 60 fps video recording: this article, in addition to teaching everything not only 60 fps-related, but also parsing all properties of the new "AVCaptureDeviceFormat", also shows little-discussed areas of video recording, for example, getting the actual resolution of a video mode: https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1602171/