Apple's iOS 14 will make older iPhones take better photos

Apple brings a giant list of improvements to the iPhone camera in iOS 14, with features coming to the main Camera app previously reserved for pro-level apps.

Following the debut of iOS 14 at the 2020 WWDC earlier on Monday, Apple has published a resource listing the major improvements in the new operating system. One specific focus Apple applied during development was on the default Camera app, and what it can do.

Specifically, Apple says that iOS 14 has "improved shot-to-shot performance." Apple claims that users can shoot photos up to 90% faster, at up to 4 frames per second. Additionally, Portrait shot-to-shot is up to 15% faster.

In Night Mode, on iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro, the camera will use the gyroscope to provide a guidance indicator to help photographers stay steady throughout the capture. There will also be an option to cancel a shot in mid-capture rather than waiting for the capture to finish.

With iOS 14, users can lock an exposure compensation value for photos and videos for an entire camera session. At the same time, camera focus and exposure for a specific shot can be locked as well.

A new option allows you to capture burst photos by pressing the Volume Up button. The Volume Down button allows for QuickTake video captured on a wider array of supported devices, including the iPhone XR, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max.

Additionally, likely to assist App Clips, Apple has made improvements to QR code reading. Improvements to QR code reading make it easy to scan codes, even if they're small or wrapped around objects.

6 Comments

melgross 33620 comments · 20 Years

About 4 years ago

One feature I’d like to see is a way to turn off, and keep off, those annoying motion photos. I forget what Apple calls them. Rarely, I’ll want one. But despite Apple having a button allowing you to keep the setting you last had on the camera, this turns on every time. If I don’t remember to turn it off, I’m stuck with it, until I notice it’s yellow, and turn it off.

mc1rmutant 8 comments · 10 Years

melgross said:

One feature I’d like to see is a way to turn off, and keep off, those annoying motion photos. I forget what Apple calls them. Rarely, I’ll want one. But despite Apple having a button allowing you to keep the setting you last had on the camera, this turns on every time. If I don’t remember to turn it off, I’m stuck with it, until I notice it’s yellow, and turn it off.

The setting you're looking for already exists in iOS 13.

Settings -> Camera -> Preserve Settings -> Live Photo

Toggle that on and the Camera app will remember your Live Photo setting until you change it again.

M68000 885 comments · 7 Years

This is interesting. But, it’s not clear if it means every phone that can run iOS 14 OR only certain older phones with specific hardware?

mc1rmutant said:

melgross said:

One feature I’d like to see is a way to turn off, and keep off, those annoying motion photos. I forget what Apple calls them. Rarely, I’ll want one. But despite Apple having a button allowing you to keep the setting you last had on the camera, this turns on every time. If I don’t remember to turn it off, I’m stuck with it, until I notice it’s yellow, and turn it off.

The setting you're looking for already exists in iOS 13.

Settings -> Camera -> Preserve Settings -> Live Photo

Toggle that on and the Camera app will remember your Live Photo setting until you change it again.

And I said it doesn’t work. I’ve tried it any number of times.