My iPhone 4 takes pictures by itself!

[thewitt]

My iPhone 4 takes pictures by itself once or twice a day when I pull it from my pocket, flip back the cover on the case and press the Home button. Click, it takes a picture as it wakes up.

Anyone else see this behavior?

The camera button does not appear, so I'm not pressing that by accident.[

 

[Zcott]

My iPhone 4 takes pictures by itself once or twice a day when I pull it from my pocket, flip back the cover on the case and press the Home button. Click, it takes a picture as it wakes up.

Anyone else see this behavior?

The camera button does not appear, so I'm not pressing that by accident.[

Is it taking a picture or taking a screenshot? If the power button is depressed slightly, pressing the home button results in a screenshot being taken.

 

[thewitt]

Hmmm. That's a good question. I think the pictures are always black. I thought it was because I had flipped the cover back over the lens, but I wonder if it's somehow taking a screenshot of the black screen. I cannot recreate it by playing with the buttons either. The screen always wakes up or goes to the shutdown screen.

 

[AlphaVictor87]

Well i may have had this happen. I was looking through my pictures last night and found a picture of the lower portion of my computer screens at work. I never took a picture and now that i'm back at work i'm holding my phone in the position where i normally hold it, and it would be a perfect duplicate.

So i guess it has randomly taken a picture by it self. But thats the only one i can tell its taken on its own.

I have a 3gs btw, not a 4.

 

[JohnnyRoaster]

I know this thread is a couple months old but I am having this same issue. Did you ever figure out what the issue is? I just started having this problem on my iPhone 4. I just got a new flip case made by Vaja and I think this may be the problem. It takes a blank picture every once in while when I wake it. I think I am taking a screen shot that is blank because the screen has not populated yet.

 

[ideal.dreams]

I've had a problem once or twice where my 4S would take a screenshot as I unlocked it. Can't figure out why but it doesn't happen nearly as often enough for me to want to find out.

 

[The General]

Hmmm. That's a good question. I think the pictures are always black. I thought it was because I had flipped the cover back over the lens, but I wonder if it's somehow taking a screenshot of the black screen. I cannot recreate it by playing with the buttons either. The screen always wakes up or goes to the shutdown screen.

put the images on your computer or use an app to see their resolutions. if they're 960x640 then they're screenshots, if they're 640x480 or 5 megapixels, then they're photos.

 

[Sankersizzle]

Just to add some fuel to this mystery, if the case was depressing the sleep button while he opens the case and before he presses the home button, wouldn't the phone take a screenshot of the lock screen and not a black screen?

I just tried with my 4S press the lock and home buttons at the same time while the phone is asleep, and no matter how many times I tried it took a picture of the lock screen.

 

[vitzr]

Nothing to worry about. That just happens to be one of the iPhones with Apples hidden facial recognition beta. They are capturing your face for their secret database.

Soon it will be a "Feature" that Apple will brag about. Most likely explained as "Magical & Revolutionary. It's all simply to insure your safety...

 

[Lukeyy19]

Just to add some fuel to this mystery, if the case was depressing the sleep button while he opens the case and before he presses the home button, wouldn't the phone take a screenshot of the lock screen and not a black screen?

I just tried with my 4S press the lock and home buttons at the same time while the phone is asleep, and no matter how many times I tried it took a picture of the lock screen.

I just tried it with my iPhone 4, pressed the home and power buttons while the phone was asleep, and i got a screenshot of just blackness.

So it would appear the case is pressing on the power button.

 

[thewitt]

I cannot force the black screen capture, even when the phone is sleeping. I always get the lock screen.

My phone still does this about once a week.

 

[SDub90]

I've noticed for the past few months that my phone 4 will not respond to the home button for a few seconds then when it finally responds, it's taking screenshots.

I think one of my friends had the same thing happen on his iphone 4S.

 

[dr.rosenrosen]

I just tried it with my iPhone 4, pressed the home and power buttons while the phone was asleep, and i got a screenshot of just blackness.

So it would appear the case is pressing on the power button.

I just tried this as well with my iPhone 4 and was also able to get a screenshot of the black screen.

 

[isashach]

I wasn't able to replicate this on my iPhone 4, however I think I may have seen such pictures in my camera roll once or twice.

If your home button gets jammed physically or the software bugs, sometimes the iPhone takes a picture after you try to wake it up using both the home and lock buttons.

@AlphaVictor87
I think that this may have been caused by the fact that in iOS 5, you can take pictures by pressing the volume key... so maybe by some weird coincidence you were able to do so whilst you took it out of your pocket.

 

[ayeying]

Same issue. Sometimes it'll take a picture of my lock screen, sometimes it'll actually take a picture of my pocket, but it only happened 4 times since I got the phone which isn't something that's too concerning for me.

 

[JohnnyRoaster]

I just tried it with my iPhone 4, pressed the home and power buttons while the phone was asleep, and i got a screenshot of just blackness.

So it would appear the case is pressing on the power button.

This.

I sent myself the black picture and it was 960x640. I think it is taking a screen shot but it happens before the screen has anything on it. I just got a new vaja case and i think it is pressing the power button when I open the phone. Unfortunately it happens at least three times a day for me. It is becoming a pain to go in and delete the black screen shot each time it happens.

 

[kolax]

I've noticed this too - just random black photos in the camera roll. Never thought anything of it, just assumed that I must have taken a photo with my finger covering the lens, then taken another one.

Only with iOS 5 however.

 

[callum23]

Just tried it 7 times and 1 out of 7 was black, I think it's just coincidence

 

[JohnnyRoaster]

My phone will do it 100% of the time. It just has to have been asleep for a while for it to happen. Maybe it is related to some sort of "deep sleep" to save battery life in the iOS5 update?