A series of leaks this weekend seem to have spilled the
beans on what Apple plans to unveil on Tuesday, its major September event that
it has traditionally used to showcase new iPhone models with cutting edge
technologies to reassert its tentpole position in Silicon Valley.
The tenth anniversary iPhone model will be called the iPhone
X, according to developer Steven Troughton Smith, who analysed a leaked build
of iOS that will be released to consumers later this month and found several
references of the upcoming iPhone models in the strings of software code.
iPhone 8, iPhone 8
Plus, iPhone X
According to code, the iPhone X will be launched alongside
two other iPhone models called the iPhone 8 and the iPhone 8 Plus, reaffirming
that Apple is skipping the "S" cycle, jumping to iPhone 8 after
launching the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models last year.
The iPhone X is expected to feature an OLED screen, a major
departure from the current generation iPhone models that ship with LCD screens.
OLED screen offers improved colour representation, and more energy efficiency.
The other iPhone models — the iPhone 8 and the iPhone 8 Plus — are expected
feature LCD screens. The company, however, may have plans to introduce True
Tone Display for improved white balancing, as we have seen in the recent iPad
Pro models, 9to5Mac reported.
Face ID and Animoji
At least one of the new iPhone models will ship with a
never-seen-before facial recognition technology called "Face ID",
allowing users to authenticate themselves and unlock the phone by just having a
look at the phone.
Apple has managed to pull this feat off by housing sensors
that are able to gauge the depth and expression of a face, the website added.
Users will also be able to make use of this feature by creating custom Animoji,
animated emoticons that look like people.
The inclusion of this feature could further fuel Apple's
dominance in the smartphone industry. The company, which has long positioned
photography as a key part of the iPhone's marketing pitch, could leverage this
new technology to push the reach of iMessage, which is yet to gain much ground
outside developed markets.
This new feature may have been in works for sometime. The
code revealed 3D renditions of emoticons that showed off robots and monkeys.
Behind the scenes, the company may used the technology of FaceShift, a startup
that offered motion-capture expertise. FaceShift's technology had been used in
Star Wars films. Apple acquired the company in 2015.
Ryan Jones, the developer of popular Weather Line iOS app,
said on Saturday that Apple had been rejecting his new app, also called
Animoji, for last one year. "For the last YEAR I've been battling App
Store rejections - we made an app called Animoji with animated emojis...now I
know why," he tweeted.
The code suggested that at least one iPhone model -- likely
the iPhone X -- will ship without the Touch ID fingerprint scanner, which the
company introduced with the iPhone 5s and changed the way people unlocked their
phones. Apple’s new facial recognition technology may become an industry
standard, with different smartphone makers introducing similar technologies.
It wasn’t very clear how several of Touch ID’s features —
like the ability to go to the home screen by pressing it once — will be handled
in the new iPhone model. It may, however, have plans to introduce several new
gestures and interactions to the power button. 9To5Mac said power button may
receive new double tap functionality.
Also spotted in the code was reference to Lightning Portrait
mode, a feature that is likely an enhancement over the existing Portrait mode,
which the company introduced with the iPhone 7 Plus last year.
Apple Watch LTE and
new AirPods
Citing an upcoming version of Apple Watch software, the
separately reaffirmed that the upcoming Apple Watch will feature LTE cellular
network support, and will be able to make and receive phone calls independently
of the iPhone. The LTE-enabled Apple Watch will apparently share the same phone
number as the iPhone it has been paired with, the blog added, citing references
in the code spotted by Steven Troughton Smith and other developers.
A small reference of the AirPods was also spotted in the
code by Smith. The company may have plans to introduce a revised model of
AirPods, its Bluetooth earphones that it unveiled last year. But apart from
repositioning of the charging indicator light, no other changes were spotted.
Current generation AirPods require users to open the AirPods case to see the
charging indicator.
The revised model may have an indicator placed outside the
body. And at last, the code also reaffirmed previous reports that the new
iPhone models will have a cutout on top of the near bezel-less display. The
code suggested that left side of the status bar will feature the system clock
time, while the right side displays Wi-Fi, cellular signal strength and battery
life.
Smith also found references of an Apple TV that suggested
that the upcoming streaming device will natively stream videos at 2160p and
support a variety of colour formats. The upcoming Apple TV, Smith added, will
likely require users to have at least a 15Mbps connection to stream videos in
4K resolution.
