Technical Camera 1.4 : Exposure Simulation

Technical Camera did support longer exposures (up to a given device’s capabilities, which is usually in the 0.5s-1s range) from day one. And live view frame rate followed the exposure time, resulting in substantial lag when longer exposures were used.

To resolve this issue, version 1.4 introduces exposure simulation.

It works exactly the same way your regular camera’s live view does: we simulate the brightness of longer exposures by increasing ISO instead of dropping the shutter speed. The result is a fluid, high frame rate live view feed under all circumstances.

There’s a limitation, though, that you should be aware of. When light levels drop, simulation may end up showing a darker image when the actual (non-simulated) exposure would also use a very high ISO. Practically this isn’t a big deal, since very high ISOs are unusable on a phone.

Update 10/2/2019: While it’s a version 1.5 feature, the exposure simulation warning should also be mentioned here. It appears when the simulation can no longer show the actual exposure, because it hit the high ISO limit.

In this case an orange dot starts to blink once a second.

Exposure simulation is always on, no way to disable it.

Version 1.4 is a free update for existing Technical Camera owners. New users can purchase the app in the App Store.

Technical Camera 1.4 : Optical Image Stabilization

The latest update to Technical Camera is now available on the App Store. Version 1.4 fully supports iOS 13, so anybody upgrading tomorrow to Apple’s newest operating system will be able to continue to use the app. This includes support for Dark Mode in the menu.

But there are two other prominent features in this version, one of which is the ability to utilize optical image stabilizers found in newer iPhone cameras.

We’ve added a new Optical Only option to the Image Stabilization preference. Honestly, I was never a big fan of Apple’s digital image stabilization (used when Auto is selected), so that’s why we have this option now.

Optical stabilization is available at any shutter speed, as well as when shooting RAW. I routinely shoot one second long exposures handheld at ISO 25 with the wide angle camera on my iPhone XS Max, and the results are pretty good.

Auto stabilization has also been updated. By default it tries to use the digital/optical combined stabilization you are familiar with. But in cases where digital stabilization is not available (such as in case of RAW captures or at shutter speeds longer than 1/20s) it will switch to optical only stabilization. Well, if the currently selected camera supports it.

Starting with this version, manually set ISO and shutter speed values are retained when you exit and relaunch the app. So you can now set ISO 25 and optical only stabilization to have the highest quality RAW captures, and forget about it. Only increasing ISO when needed. This elevates image quality by a huge margin compared to higher ISO captures, and is exactly what I do.

The update is free for existing Technical Camera owners. New users can purchase the app in the App Store.

Technical Camera : What’s Coming?

Technical Camera is available for a few days now, and I’m exceptionally glad to see how much people like it. Feature requests and questions also began pouring in, so I think it’s time to talk about what’s coming (and what’s not).

But first let’s talk about the concept. Technical Camera is designed to be a sleek, efficient (dare I say minimalistic?) app, and we absolutely want to keep it that way. That’s why people immediately fell in love with it. We carefully design, evaluate, prototype each feature that goes into our apps. And most of the time do it several times to find the best approach. This is how we always did it. With the Mark II Artist’s Viewfinder, Kuuvik Capture, and now with Technical Camera. But this means that we have to draw a line for each release, otherwise we’ll eternally develop something that never sees the light of day.

The very first release of Technical Camera contains what we and our beta testers found essential for professional use. Of course the planned and working-on-it feature list is much longer, but had to draw that line. And now we’re listening to you, and asking you to let us know what’s missing that is important to your work.

So while in general we do not comment or make promises on future features, I’m going to mention what are the most requested features (in order of number of requests) that we plan to add into future (free) updates of Technical Camera.

1) Flash is number one by a huge margin. And while we still feel that the best way to improve mobile photography is to avoid using flash, there are numerous technical uses where we also feel the need. So it’ll come!

2) White balance control.

3) Self timer. This is actually a part of a broader feature group we’re working on, but let me keep it as a surprise.

4) Exposure sequences. We are working on a new exposure sequence controller that is destined to go into all our future photography apps. Technical Camera is one of those waiting for that module to get completed.

It is equally important (if not more important) to talk about what’s not coming. There are two sub-categories here: “never gonna happen” and “undecided”.

While one should never say never, this category is where we feel that a feature clashes with the concept and core principles of the app. Or with our opinions on the world. Selfies, video, live photos, fancy filters, editing, AI-servants-doing-what-one-should-learn are in this group. So don’t ask for these. There are other apps out there doing these very well. Especially professional video capture.

We are undecided on HDR and pano mode.

There’s one more thing I should mention. Some people even asked to replicate functionality X from app Y. That’s never ever gonna happen. Under no circumstances. First, because we respect the intellectual property of other developers, and second, because we strongly believe that we can do it better for our users.

So let us know what you miss, and what problems you face in your photography workflow to be able to make Technical Camera an even better fit for your needs!