Crooked FaceTime camera M1 iMac

[cookiemonster89]

The first thing I check with my new iMac has been whether the display is leveled out or not. Luckily it is even but when I check out the webcam it looks like the camera itself is not leveled properly. Is this a common problem with FaceTime cameras?

I have some shelves in the background with are properly leveled out.

See the picture included. I draw some lines with powerpoint.

 

[The_Croupier]

Looks like your imac is more perpendicular to the chair and not to your back wall. Hence the chair looking straight and the back wall shelves looking crooked.

Pivot your imac until your shelves looks horizontal.

 

[wilberforce]

This does look tilted.
Note that the camera is actually angled downwards (so that your face is roughly in the middle of the field of view), so due to perspective distortion vertical lines will not appear vertical (except at the exact center). This is normal.

Horizontal lines should, however, appear horizontal - assuming the iMac is exactly parallel with the wall behind you. If the iMac is not parallel to the wall, then perspective distortion will also cause horizontal lines to not appear horizontal.

Note that these type of wide angle lenses actually have extreme barrel (fish-eye) distortion, which is then corrected by software to appear rectilinear. However the distortion correction software is usually not perfect, so straight lines do not always appear exactly straight.

Nevertheless, if you are seeing horizontal lines tilted this much, you should request it be repaired/replaced under warranty.

 

[cookiemonster89]

I did some further testing. Lifted up my desk and tilted the iMac until the vertical line lined up with my corner. Afterwards als shelfs are displayed correctly. So like wilberforce wrote it looks like the correction software didn’t do the best job.