iPad 2 Rolling Review: Camera, FaceTime, PhotoBooth, iMovieiPad 2 Rolling Review: Camera, FaceTime, PhotoBooth, iMovie

Apple iPad 2 3G Teardown

The most enticing new features in the iPad 2 are the camera and video camera capabilities. In addition to a basic camera application, Apple also tossed in its FaceTime video chatting application, PhotoBooth, and its iMovie video editing software. We put them to the test.

Camera

To say that the iPad 2's cameras aren't meant to take photos is an understatement. They produce horrible images.

The application itself is a copy-and-paste treatment of the iPhone's camera. It's as basic as it comes. The camera is launched via a software button on the iPad's screen and it jumps to life quickly. There are really only a few options.

Images are captured by pressing the software button at the bottom of the screen. If you want to switch to the user-facing camera or video recorder, there are buttons that let you do that. The application also supports zooming and provides instant access to the photo gallery. Otherwise, there are no fancy features to the camera software itself.

How are the results? Bad, bad, and bad. The user-facing camera captures a pathetic 0.3 megapixels (VGA). Images are chock full of grain and digital artifacts, and I noticed the camera had trouble handling white balance correctly. It's pretty much worthless for anything other than FaceTime chatting (more on that in a bit).

The main camera is better, but not by much. It handles essentials such as white balance, color representation, and focus well, but there's still so much grain/noise that still images are mostly unusable. Indoors, in darker rooms, the camera produces rough images with little detail. When outdoors in plenty of sunlight, results are much improved. Beyond the quality problems, as I've written in the past, using a tablet as a camera is beyond awkward. It's just not meant to happen.

Same goes for video. The camcorder application, which behaves the same way the camera app does, produces only slightly better results. Apple says the main camera captures 720p HD video, and my tests showed that to be true. The main camera is much more useful for video -- the user-facing camera really is meant for FaceTime only.

Is it nice that the cameras are there? Sure. But they are bottom-of-the-barrel when it comes to quality.

FaceTime

Why did Apple add cameras to the iPad? FaceTime, of course! FaceTime is Apple's video chatting software. As with the iPhone, it works only via Wi-Fi (this is a silly limitation, but whatever). Making FaceTime calls requires that you dial in an e-mail address (not a phone number). I was able to conduct FaceTime chats with other iPad users, iPhone 4 users, and users of the FaceTime application for Apple's desktop and laptop computers.

The experience isn't much different from most video chatting software. The iPad 2 produces a large image of the person with whom you're speaking and shows what you look like in a smaller window. The extra screen real estate is nice, and I found the overall experience more pleasant than FaceTime on the iPhone 4.

What are the downsides? The Wi-Fi limitation, for starters, and, more important, the inability to use it with anything other than another iPad, iPhone 4, or Apple computer. It would be nice if Apple opened up FaceTime so that it works across video chatting services. That'll never happen, but one can always dream.

Apple iPad 2 3G Teardown

PhotoBooth

PhotoBooth is for kids. The best way to use it is to gather up your kids, sit with them on the couch, and just have some fun.

PhotoBooth produces nine real-time images of you with different effects applied (stretch, squeeze, twirl, mirror, thermal, etc.). Pick one of the nine options, and it will zoom in and just use that one. Basically, PhotoBooth then completely distorts whatever is visible by the user-facing camera to match the effect being applied. The results are silly, funny, and not in any way useful to business users.

Kids, however, will be reduced to fits of laughter. Still, I wish the user-facing camera were capable of producing much better results. That would make PhotoBooth all the more fun.

iMovie

iMovie on the iPad is sick. I use iMovie on my Macs regularly to edit video. Thankfully, the user interface is very similar and the software offers a similar -- if somewhat pared down -- feature set.

Movies can be imported to the application in a number of ways. First, you can use the iPad itself to capture video. Second, you can import video from an iPhone (requires iPhone adapter). Third, you can import from another camera (requires SD card adapter). Last, you can load it from your PC via iTunes. However you choose to do it, getting video into iMovie isn't all that complicated.

Once your video is on board, it's time to button down and have some fun. iMovie lets you tweak clip length, paste clips together, add theme music, adjust the sound, do voice-overs, and more. The application offers simple transitions; don't expect anything too fancy. It also offers title sequences, and videos can be tagged with location. (Oddly, though Google Maps was able to get my location accurate down to the meter, iMovie was off by 30 miles.)

Everything is laid out plainly and is finger friendly. The editing bar, in particular, lets you expand or compress the video thumbnails so that you can really fine tune your editing. While the breadth of features from the desktop version of iMovie is absent, the basics are there. Simply having the ability to edit video at all (beyond simple trimming of clips) on a device such as the iPad is fantastic.

These new photo-based features are a welcome addition to the iPad and will surely make plenty of people happy. PhotoBooth, FaceTime, and iMovie offer users a lifetime of options when it comes to creating and editing photo/video content. The only limitation is in the camera modules themselves. It's a shame Apple handicapped the iPad 2 with such lousy sensors. Otherwise, its magical product would be capable of producing much more magical results.

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