Why the iPhone shoots 4K 60fps but your camera doesn’t
Sep 14, 2017
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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For video lovers, the biggest point about the new iPhone 8, 8 Plus and X is the ability to shoot 4K UHD video at 60fps. They also all shoot 1080p at up to 240fps. 4K UHD at 60 frames per second is starting to become more common, though. the YI 4K action camera has been able to do it for over a year now. So why can’t our regular cameras?
In this video, video tech YouTuber, Max Yuryev explains the answer to that question. There are a number of contributing factors, but the main cause of them is that the processors inside most DSLRs and mirrorless cameras just aren’t good enough.
The single biggest issue with shooting video on DSLRs or mirrorless cameras is heat build up. Regularly we hear complaints about various cameras overheating. And it’s a common reason from manufacturers as to why they don’t allow their cameras to do this or that feature. But the causes of overheating aren’t all just down to the sensor or batteries. Typically it’s the processor.
There are two main problems with the processors inside most DSLRs and mirrorless cameras. The first is that they’re simply not fast enough. They don’t have the speed to process all the data from a 4K 60fps stream quickly enough. The other is that they’re not very efficient, so they build up a lot of heat over a relatively short space of time (as well as the sensors). As described by this Canon rep, the design of most DSLR and mirrorless cameras does not allow that heat to dissipate quickly enough.
Of course, Panasonic have started to solve this problem with the GH5, which shoots 4K at 60fps, and 1080p at 180fps. But the GH5 uses a much smaller sensor than APS-C and full frame DSLRs and mirrorless cameras.
The logical question then, is why does a phone have such a powerful and efficient processor that it can handle it where “real cameras” can’t? In short, Max suggests that it comes down to having a much larger pool of funds for research & development. Which makes sense.
The global smartphone market is vastly larger than the camera market. So, there is much more money to invest in new technology. New technology that’s faster, and doesn’t build up anywhere near as much heat. Smartphones also serve a higher purpose than simply processing photos or video. And Max says that the processor in the iPhone X is going to be even more powerful than that found in the new 2017 13″ i7 MacBook Pro.
Of course, the sensors themselves build up heat, too. And they need the throughput to send out a whole lot of data in a very short amount of time. This is why the super fast stacked BSI CMOS sensors are starting to appear in more cameras, like the Sony A9. But cameras may also need some design tweaks, too, in order to allow heat build up to dissipate more quickly.
DSLRs and mirrorless cameras will catch up eventually, for sure. It just may take a while.
The declining sales of cameras certainly doesn’t help the situation, though.
John Aldred
John Aldred is a photographer with over 25 years of experience in the portrait and commercial worlds. He is based in Scotland and has been an early adopter – and occasional beta tester – of almost every digital imaging technology in that time. As well as his creative visual work, John uses 3D printing, electronics and programming to create his own photography and filmmaking tools and consults for a number of brands across the industry.
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20 responses to “Why the iPhone shoots 4K 60fps but your camera doesn’t”
Oh, but gh5 does! :)
Kitten video creators need this.
My $500 drone does!
No
Uhm, oneplus 5 does, and also, greater specs.i’m out!
the size of the sensor on a iphone is much smaller so the processing need for that is also much less
yes processor is much better, but , as sony has pointed out with its 3-layer sensor’s memory, is not the only reason how u can achieve such numbers.
Good points. There’s a little more than “well, an iPhone can”. (A few Android phones, too.) This is the kind of thing that ramps up “cameras are dead, we’re all going to be shooting with phones!” Not any time soon. There’s a lot more to it. Yes, a smartphone, on paper, has a lot of computing horsepower. It needs it to run all the functions, like communications and apps. A camera needs just enough horsepower to be a camera, not a multi-purpose device
Just my opinion (and experience), but, if you work with a lot of video, get a video camera. They’re optimized for video. The cost of kitting out a SLR or mirrorless camera to get anywhere near the capabilities and handling of a video camera is close enough to the cost of a video camera. Sometimes a dedicated video camera costs less.
The question could be reversed: why can’t a video camera be used as a still camera? They can, but they’re not optimized for it.
That’s really the key point: optimization for a task. First and foremost a smartphone is a smartphone, a still camera is a still camera, and a video camera is a video camera. They’re optimized for those tasks.
The article states that the GH5 does it, because of a much smaller sensor… so, the iPhone now has a FF sensor? Otherwise that would be an indication why it works, not only processor speed
smaller as in when it dithers the pixles down to the 4k res (12mp) it’s not having to read a 22-36mp sensor worth of data and compound that down to 4k. That process is very cpu intensive and why cameras can’t do it, look at the res of all the camera phones that shoot 4k, they are all 12mp, hummm wonder why! Same as the action cams.
..or you can bus a real camera and travel to destination ,you always deram about
For the best answer to this question would be competitive market .for mobile phones there is waste majority of competition .
Camera companies don’t have competition at all .
Second instead of making it easy camera companies make their software tricky complicated .imagine tiny sensor can record 4k 60 p why can’t apsc or super 35 .answer is simple they don’t want .
Recently canon announced 3 DSLR cameras this year none have 4k but they announce camcorder which have 4k and same processor digic 6 .
Camera companies think people are dumb and they can easily fool us but they are wrong if they didn’t provide us with better features they will loose their customers
Sounds like a bunch of b.s. excuses to me
Imagine all the selfies
Imagine all the selfies
JoEl Ster I’m borderline I want it but I don’t need it lol
you will never be able to upload or share the video at 4k 60fps so its pointless.
Nope.
Canon 1DX Mark II outputs 4K 60fps since 2016
There are a bunch of cameras released since 2014 that shoot 4k. This article is out-of-date.
4K 60 fps???