Much like the new Stage Manager for the Mac (see “ First Impressions: Stage Manager on the iPad and Mac,” 18 July 2022), it is a feature I suspect I’ll continue to use long after I have stopped experimenting with it in my tech writer role.
I’ve been testing Continuity Camera for the past few weeks. Familiar iPhone and iPad camera features such as Center Stage, Studio Light, and Portrait Mode are built into Continuity Camera, making it more than just a better camera. It’s one of the new features in the still-in-beta iOS 16 and macOS 13 Ventura and is a potentially compelling video conferencing enhancement for several reasons: it’s free, easy to set up and use, and provides advanced capabilities without being overwhelming. Now Apple has its own take, called Continuity Camera (see “ Ten “It’s About Time” Features from WWDC 2022,” 6 June 2022). Similarly, Reincubate provides the ingenious Camo virtual-camera system (see “ Turn Your iPhone into a Powerful Webcam with Camo,” 24 July 2020), but the product’s complexity and cost-beyond a basic free tier-will scare some Mac users away. Elgato offers Epoccam software to pull this off. It’s unclear if Apple plans to improve webcam specs in future models, but there’s an alternative that works now-repurposing the iPhone’s optically superb cameras as a Mac webcam. The same goes for Apple’s Studio Display external monitor, which has its own built-in camera. Apple has finally bumped the webcams in the latest Mac models from the laughably old 720p resolution to 1080p, but they still yield disappointing image quality. This is partly due to the historically subpar quality of computer webcams like the FaceTime HD cameras built into Macs (see “ The 2020 MacBook Air’s FaceTime HD Camera Is Still Lousy,” 8 April 2020, and “ Why Are Webcams So Lousy?,” 25 January 2021).
#1645: AirPlay iPhone to Mac for remote video, Siri learns to restart iPhones, Apple's Q1 2023 financialsĬontinuity Camera Turns an iPhone Into a Mac WebcamĪs someone with relatives on multiple continents and a day job I will do entirely from home for the foreseeable future, I engage in a lot of video conferencing.1646: Security-focused OS updates, Photos Workbench review, Mastodon client wishlist, Apple-related conferences.1647: Focus-caused notification issues, site-specific browser examples, virtualizing Windows on M-series Macs.#1648: iPhone passcode thefts, Center Cam improves webcam eye contact, APFS Uncertainty Principle.#1649: More LastPass breach details and 1Password switch, macOS screen saver problem, tvOS 16.3.3 fixes Siri Remote bug.
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