Photography

Periscope aka folded lens: What it is, how it works and why it’ll boost iPhone photography

A scene from Apple's showing Selena Gomez posing for a selfie with her iPhone 6s camera with a bunch of reporters in the background photographing her

A dedicated telephoto lens (aka zoom lens) found on some iPhones boosts iPhone photography with optical zoom capabilities. Future iPhones are rumored to allow for even deeper zoom by adopting a periscope lens (or foldable lens as it's sometimes referred to). At its core, this technology diverts light through a prism and into a telephoto lens set at a ninety-degree angle to a rear-facing lens and buried deep inside the chassis.

iOS 15.2 beta 2 adds a Macro mode toggle in the iPhone 13 Pro’s Camera app

A still image taken from Apple's iPhone 13 Pro introduction video on YouTube, showing a closeup of the three cameras on the back.

With the launch of iOS 15 and the iPhone 13 Pro, which includes support for macro photography, Apple made a bold decision. That was automatic switching, which could be pretty aggressive sometimes. That meant that some users were unable to avoid automatically switching to Macro mode for snapping a photo, even when they didn't want it. The good news, Apple was quick to fix it with the wide launch of iOS 15.1.

Some of the best jailbreak tweaks for Photography on iOS 14

If you own an iPhone, then a substantial part of the user experience would be tinkering with the powerful camera systems that Apple invests millions of dollars into improving year after year. This holds true even for jailbreakers since they can enjoy even more convenience and performance out of their iPhone’s camera than basic iPhone users thanks to being free of Apple’s software limitations.