We have heard reports before Apple plans to include a periscope lens in future iPhones, and a new report by Ming-Chi Kuo suggests that this will come in 2022.
But what exactly is a periscope lens and what would it mean for future iPhones?
For something that Huawei and Samsung are launching as the latest in high-tech smartphone camera technology, there’s really nothing new about them …
There have been suggestions that the first periscope lens used in a smartphone was in 2004.
In 2004 the Sharp 902 appeared. Vodafone had just launched its 3G network in the UK and claimed that this is the first phone with a 2MP camera in Europe. Even more interesting, it featured 2x optical zoom.
Better yet, he zoomed in with a single camera instead of switching from a panoramic camera to a TV like modern phones do. Time has buried much of the evidence, but it is quite possible that it was a periscope design, that the square lens is quite revealing.
And they were used on separate cameras long before that. A trend for ultrathin pocket cameras in the 1990s saw periscope lenses being used to eliminate the need for motorized lenses that extended far from the body. Those early ones were pretty low quality in terms of their optics, but Apple of course wouldn’t use one until it could meet the company’s very high photo quality standard.
To understand the benefits of a periscope lens, we must first understand how optical zoom lenses work.
How does optical zoom work?
To avoid ambiguity, the term “lens” generally refers to the complete construction of a lens, while the individual glass lenses within it are called elements.
Actual zoom lens construction can involve a large number of components, including multiple glass elements, with multiple moving components. But in its simplest form, a zoom lens requires three elements: front, center, and rear. The front and rear elements can be fixed, while the central element moves between them.
This one minute video is a really simple illustration of how this works (complete with cheesy music!).
The problem with zoom lenses is that the front and rear elements must be separated by a certain distance. In general, the higher the zoom factor, the greater the distance.
This is a problem when you want to have a high optical zoom inside a very thin device like an iPhone. Apple partly fixes it with the infamous camera bump, which makes the lenses protrude beyond the rear case, but this is not an ideal solution and there are still limits to how far the lens can extend before it look silly. That is why current iPhones are limited to 2x optical zoom.
You can, of course, zoom in further, but this is based on digital zoom, which is only cropped on the image and sacrifices resolution and quality.
What is a periscope lens?
You may not be familiar with periscopes unless you’re a fan of submarines or old enough to own one as a children’s toy. Essentially it is a tube with two 45 degree lenses mounted on each end of them. You look at one end and you can see a mirror image from the other end.
A periscope lens uses the same principle, but with a single mirror, to bend the light 90 degrees. You can see the idea here in this Oppo image.
On the left is a conventional zoom lens, which requires all elements to be adjusted to the depth of the smartphone (plus a small bump). On the right, there is a periscope lens, which allows the length of the lens to be much longer, as the depth of the phone is no longer an issue.
What would a periscope lens mean for future iPhones?
The simple answer is: greater optical zoom.
How much Optical zoom is an open question. Although the periscope design means Apple doesn’t have to worry about the thickness of the iPhone, it still has to find space inside the case for any length of physical lens the company chooses. Component spacing is very important inside the box, so there are still limits.
However, Samsung’s Galaxy S20 Ultra uses a periscope lens to provide 10x optical zoom, making it clearly practical on a modern smartphone. Business Insider provided a good illustration of what that looks like in practice. Here is the same photo taken on that phone without zoom and with 10x zoom:
The piece also shows the difference between a 10x optical zoom and a 10x zoom on the iPhone 11 Pro Max, which uses a 2x optical zoom and then the rest as a digital zoom. The sample photos are small, so it’s not a great illustration, but look at the vehicles on the bridge and the trees at the bottom right of the River Cafe for the basic idea.
Cars are trees that are noticeably leafier and blocker in the iPhone image, correct.
So I think it’s reasonable to expect a 10x optical zoom, or close to it, on the first iPhone with a periscope lens. How useful would it be and when would you use it? Please let us know in the comments.
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