We’re still on the fence about the reasoning behind tech leaks. Do companies purposefully leak information to create buzz, or are there just genuinely scaly people working for these companies? Either way — we’ve got new inside information about this year’s Apple iPhones.

According to reports on AppleInsider, Apple quietly filed a patent detailing how new iPhones will be able to tell that you want to take a picture. Once it has this information, it’ll automatically open the camera for your convenience.

This doesn’t really surprise us, considering that Apple is working with Sony on some long distance 3D cameras.

The patent was filed with the US Patent and Trademark Office last week. It includes a breakdown of the, “Apparatus and method for automatically activating a camera application based on detecting an intent to capture a photograph or a video.”

But, how? Or more importantly, why? Obviously Apple thinks that a device isn’t truly ‘smart’ until it can sense the user’s needs and act on those needs. We think it is an odd decision to eliminate the need to touch one button to open an app. But we’ll have to wait and see how the tech handles IRL to see just how useful it is.

And back to the the how. It works by recognising the motion made by a user lifting their iPhone to a typical photography position, then scanning for the proximity of a subject in the frame. If both criteria are met, the camera will open automatically.

We’re not quite certain at this stage that the tech will come to market this year, but the timing is uncanny. It also helped along by that Apple/Sony partnership we’ve been wondering about.

Source: AppleInsider