Apple predicted a new version of Filmic Pro operating on the iPhone 11 Pro at its case last week. It was a convincing demo, with the app capable of recording simultaneously from various cameras, such as recording together the front and back camera, or filming for extra coverage using the new ultra-wide and standard broad cameras.
The excellent news, however, is that multi-cam sessions are not only available on the iPhone 11 at the same time. The iPhone XS, iPhone XR and the 2018 iPad Pro also support the function.
Multi-cam recording is based on the latestiOS 13 API. At the WWDC meeting on the topic, Apple emphasized that this needed substantial reworking of their devices ‘ hardware pipeline, but that the necessary modifications were made in the iPhone XS, iPhone XR, and new iPad Pro models.
The new APIs enable designers to start multi-cam sessions while being aware of the cost of power and efficiency.
For potential iPhone 11 customers and current iPhone XR / XS owners, this is excellent news. You will be able to take advantage of the latest multiple camera apps that hit the shop in the coming months if you own the 2018 flagships.
This app ecosystem should be strong, as Apple announced the API back in June, allowing developers to work throughout the summer to incorporate the feature into their camera apps, so it shouldn’t be long before iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 customers can begin attempting it for themselves. Filmic Pro, for its part, said they will launch their multi-cam app update later this year.
Recording from various cameras, however, is strenuous, and some constraints are imposed. Only certain combinations of cameras can be activated concurrently for iPhone XS and iPhone XR. Developers may also need to use camera feeds of lower quality, depending on how much work they want the rest of their own app logic to do.
As you can see from the compatibility matrix, the iPhone XS can record (or take photos) together from the back broad and front camera, or back broad and back pictures from the front camera. There is no support for three-camera recording. It is not yet evident what combinations the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Pro will be capable of with simultaneous camera streams. However, in the Filmic demo, the preview screen appeared to simultaneously demonstrate live feeds from all four cameras of the iPhone 11 Pro.
The multi-cam API is an iOS 13 function that will be launched on September 19th publicly. In the iPhone 11 and iPhone 11 Camera app, Apple utilizes multi-cam technology to display image data from the wider scene in the viewfinder interface toolbar fields. However, the Camera app does not support various stream recording directly. For now, for this feature, iPhone users will have to depend on the third-party app ecosystem.
