Well, most of the zoom calls I'm on have to be recorded for the pubic record, so I went back to watch them to see, and yes, my 720P camera looks better than those using PCs, and the 4 Mac users look great, even if one is dimly lit.
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Are we over-criticizing the 720p webcam?
- Thread starter ian87w
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Should the iPhone be as thin as the MacBook Pro’s lid?
Did you watch the video? Sometimes there are things other than pure resolution spec alone.
Did you watch the video? Do you still think the MacBook webcam is bad amongst its peers?
It can simultaneously be true that 1) apple probably should be on to a 1080p webcam, but also 2) it's not that big a deal.
I have the new M1 and I had the previous version of the intel MacBook, what you are seeing in the video is under ideal studio lighting, which you don't normally have. What I will say is that it is much better than the Intel Mac, but not as good as on the iPhone. It is now usable where as before it was poor. I will also add, the video experience on the Pro will be better than on the Air, because of the screen brightness, at least that was my experience with the previous Air & Pro
It's better than the previous one in good lighting for sure, but not as good as on the iPhone, and one little anomaly don't get light bulbs which emanate Cool White lighting, you get slight flickering effect like on the very old black & white TV's, no remedy for it from Apple, I had to change my light bulbs (normal & warm white) is ok
No, no we are not overcritizing the 720p webcam. It’s 2020. Enough of that crap
The iMac is also thicker than the lid of the MacBook. Why wouldn't thickness be relevant?
What were you expecting when joining an Apple oriented forum? This is the case for any Google/Microsoft community too. That in itself is an overreaction too. An overreaction which isn't worth bickering about.
Companies don't just randomly throw resources at something that isn't important (in this case, resolution).
The average consumer isn't making decisions based on webcam resolution. It might be a factor for us enthusiasts, but the average consumer doesn't care. Again, the current 1080p webcam that Apple uses in the iMac cannot fit in a MacBook.
Have you factored in how they could put it in there? Why is resolution so important over other factors?
Other than video calls, what are you doing with your iPhone camera that you're doing with your MacBook? Photo Booth?
Yeah, no way would I want that to happen. Oh god...
Are there any other MacBook parts that weren't necessary to change in a decade? I certainly don't think resolution factors in for everything.
I'm in the latter camp.
We know that for a fact?
Okay then. Give us solid reasons. Out of curiosity, do you have nothing else to complain about? Personally, if I didn't, I would get mad over this too. What else would I have to pointlessly get mad about?
Here's a great laptop webcam comparison from Joanna Stern of the WSJ:
www.wsj.com
I get that some people may not want the highest resolution for video calls! [Plus Zoom's default is only 720p anyways.] But I think they'd at least want decent lighting compensation and less noise, which the Apple laptop webcams could be better at (though they are much better than that on the Dell XPS).
One technological solution to improve both lighting compensation and noise would be to use a module consisting of a row of three 720p webcams (doesn't require any more thickness than a single 720p webcam), and combine their signals digitally. This would provide a higher dynamic range, and less noise, than one webcam alone. But it does increase cost and complexity.
As for resolution, it is possible to put a 1080p webcam in a laptop, e.g., that in the Pixelbook Go. At 13.5 mm, the overall thickness of the Pixelbook is less than the MBP's 15.6 mm. But of course it's the thickness of their lids that matters when it comes to fitting a camera, and I don't know how those compare.
According to this article, smaller bezels do create technological challenges for fitting higher-resolution cameras. However, miniaturization is possible—e.g., also according to this article, the front-facing 4k camera in the iPhone 11 Pro is small enough to fit into a laptop screen; so it may simply come down to cost:
onezero.medium.com
Laptop Webcam Showdown: MacBook Air? Dell XPS? They’re Pretty Bad
In our coronavirus-tainted world, we’re realizing that we depend a lot on our laptop webcams… and they’re not good. WSJ’s Joanna Stern compared the new MacBook Air to the Dell XPS 13, Google’s Pixelbook Go and Microsoft’s Surface Laptop 3.
www.wsj.com
I get that some people may not want the highest resolution for video calls! [Plus Zoom's default is only 720p anyways.] But I think they'd at least want decent lighting compensation and less noise, which the Apple laptop webcams could be better at (though they are much better than that on the Dell XPS).
One technological solution to improve both lighting compensation and noise would be to use a module consisting of a row of three 720p webcams (doesn't require any more thickness than a single 720p webcam), and combine their signals digitally. This would provide a higher dynamic range, and less noise, than one webcam alone. But it does increase cost and complexity.
As for resolution, it is possible to put a 1080p webcam in a laptop, e.g., that in the Pixelbook Go. At 13.5 mm, the overall thickness of the Pixelbook is less than the MBP's 15.6 mm. But of course it's the thickness of their lids that matters when it comes to fitting a camera, and I don't know how those compare.
According to this article, smaller bezels do create technological challenges for fitting higher-resolution cameras. However, miniaturization is possible—e.g., also according to this article, the front-facing 4k camera in the iPhone 11 Pro is small enough to fit into a laptop screen; so it may simply come down to cost:
Why Your Laptop Webcam Is Still a Piece of Junk
Thinner isn’t always better for computers
onezero.medium.com
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For WebEx, Zoom, Teams etc - it's fine.....just....fine - only just fine....but fine.. But for recording anything more substantial than that - it's a disgrace. They can and should be doing better.
A long time ago I didn't know I needed glasses. When I got my first pair the first thing I noticed were all the imperfections. People have lots of imperfections. Ask any teenager you see at the drug store buying Neutrogena. The benefit of 720P is like having never discovered you needed glasses. Everything and everyone is beautiful - always.
Yup. Was waiting for this justification thread to pop up. Such justifications are why Apple shows us the courage to remove 3.5 mm jacks from the iPhones, remove SD card slots from the notebooks (I was always happy about USB-C but lack of SDXC slot, no), hype up 20W charging from MagSafe and then not deliver (where people begin to justify that they'd be happy with 10W even from a 20W charger) or deliver with riders and conditions. People are somehow simply afraid to call things for what they are - that the new notebooks are great in all other aspects but the camera could have and should have been upgraded to 1080p by now. Saying that is not going to make the notebooks look bad. It is just going to make them look how they are - vastly improved at some things, less improved in another, and passable at a few other.
Are iPhones as thin as a MacBook lid? Technology and physics != magic
Did you watch the video? It’s showing how the 720p webcam still produces better result than an equivalent highly praised windows laptop. I was poo pooing the MacBook webcam as well previously just by looking at the spec, but the video showed that it’s actually better than the competitors.
How? I mean are you expecting Apple putting a DSLR into the thin MacBook lid? Most professionals that do actual video recording will use an actual separate camera anyway, not the webcam. And the video showed that the competitor is actually worse.
Okay, at the risk of getting banned, people who want 4k cameras on their laptop are probably making videos for their OnlyFans or something. Couldn't be anything else.
lol @ someone thinking thickness doesn't matter.
To get cameras that don't suck the lids need to get thicker or we get a bump. The only Mac I can see escaping this is the rumoured redesigned iMac, because (just like iPads) its internals will be behind the display and therefore will increase the thickness of the computer compared to laptops.
To get cameras that don't suck the lids need to get thicker or we get a bump. The only Mac I can see escaping this is the rumoured redesigned iMac, because (just like iPads) its internals will be behind the display and therefore will increase the thickness of the computer compared to laptops.
