Does Apple Watch Have Camera

The Apple Lookout man has never had a camera. Apple may never add one. But i company is giving the Picket the ability of sight via a watchband accompaniment called the Wristcam.

As watchbands go, the Wristcam is a bit of a beast; it looks thick and rigid on the wrist. But there'south a lot of applied science within. The ring packs two cameras—an eight-megapixel world-facing camera and a two-megapixel front-facing selfie camera. Both apply Sony sensors (like the iPhone), and both capture high-definition photos and 1080p video.

A large button on the band activates i or the other of the cameras (yous double-press to switch between the cameras, single-press for photos, and long-press for video). The Wristcam connects to the Apple tree Sentinel via Bluetooth, so that images or video immediately show upwards within the Wristcam app on the screen of the Watch.

The device has 8 GB of retention, enough to concord about an hr of video and thousands of photos. The band pattern, which also contains a decent-size curved battery, weighs merely nearly 23 grams—or the weight of about 5 Hershey's Kisses, as Wristcam cofounder and CEO Ari Roisman puts it. The battery lasts for well-nigh 8 hours of steady camera use, Roisman says.

Wristcam (the company) worked with Apple to have its product certified to comport the "Made for Apple Lookout" characterization. But Bluetooth connectivity is the extent of its integration with the Watch. For instance, information technology requires its own separate bombardment charger.

Why would you want cameras on your wrist, specially if you've got even amend ones on an iPhone in your pocket? The Wristcam lets you quickly take pictures while you're already engaged in another activity, Roisman tells me. "The phone isn't always inside reach, and it's prissy to have a camera handy when going out with your friends, or going on a run or a hike with just an Apple tree Sentry."

The image quality of the photos isn't the greatest, merely it's pretty good (encounter sample below). Sure, if you zoom in on ane on your phone screen y'all'll before long start seeing some pixilation. But pristine quality isn't exactly the point. It's the immediacy of the shots that may justify the "good plenty" picture quality.

For privacy, the camera band has bright LED lights side by side to each camera to indicate when they're capturing video.

Wristcam too does a form of live video conversation, but information technology isn't exactly FaceTime for the wrist. "It's video walkie-talkie," Roisman tells me. "It'southward like those one-time Nextel push-to-talk phones, only it's with live video, and y'all tin can watch the videos live or later." You can send live video and receive it, but non at the same fourth dimension.

For now the video chat happens merely between Wristcam users. Simply the visitor says it volition before long enable video conversation betwixt Apple Watch and iPhone, and, after, betwixt Watches and Android phones.

Roisman is also the CEO and cofounder of Glide, developer of the Glide live video messaging app for smartphones and tablets. Similar Glide, Wristcam uses a proprietary streaming media protocol and custom encoders and decoders so that video is sent and received with very petty latency time.

Deja vu all again

If some of this sounds familiar, it'south because these aforementioned developers floated an earlier version of the camera device under the CMRA proper name back in 2016. The company took pre-orders at its website, but no CMRA devices ever shipped.

Roisman says that the company ran into serious bug with CMRA's design when it went into mass manufacturing and significant numbers of units didn't meet product standards. This meant that the product had to be redesigned. And then Roisman and company parted means with the outside design firm information technology used to create the CMRA design, and brought the redesign of the product in-house. Before that process was completed, the developers updated the Bluetooth tech in their device, now called Wristcam. They also created a new modular design that allows the camera module to be decoupled from the ring so that users tin can chose unlike colored bands.

It's possible that Apple built image Watches with cameras on board.

When the new design was finally done, Wristcam (the company) waited until its production was already in mass production before launching and accepting new orders. Roisman said all those who ordered a CMRA device were offered a refund, but the bulk decided to wait for the Wristcam. The Wristcams coming off the manufacturing line now are being shipped to those patient folks. Once those orders have been completed, Roisman says, new Wristcam orders volition exist fulfilled in Feb and March 2021.

Wristcam isn't the commencement time a camera has been fastened to a smartwatch. The very first Samsung Galaxy Gear smartwatch in 2013 had a world-facing camera built into its band. That camera moved to the forepart of the watch face in the Galaxy Gear 2 the following twelvemonth. Samsung gave upwardly on the smartwatch camera thought the following year and never looked back.

Apple itself practical for a patent back in 2016 for a watchband pattern that included a photographic camera. Even earlier, well-known Apple reporter Mark Gurman predicted dorsum in 2015 that Apple would add together a FaceTime camera to the second Apple Picket. That rumor turned out to be false, but information technology'due south possible that Apple built paradigm Watches with cameras on board.

The Wristcam goes on auction today at the company's website for $299, and new orders will send in March 2021, the visitor says. The optional bands come in 5 colors—Noir, Blanc, Grayness, Rose, and Sage. They sell for $49 apiece.

After the bulky design, that toll is the other major drawback. Three hundred dollars for a wearable photographic camera device puts you into GoPro territory.

But I'g non dismissing the Wristcam. It'south not an easy product to build, and information technology'due south only Roisman and company's 2d try. With whatever luck the developers will get the opportunity to make a second Wristcam—hopefully i that's a bit slimmer on the wrist and easier on the wallet.