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Comment by version_five | Hacker News Reader

I guess I'm old. Is "live photo" a new name for video? This is the first time I've heard the term.

Apple thing; they're short clips of about a second, with a few options for displaying as loops or long exposures.

I've used them deliberately perhaps twice, and wish I knew how to force all the far more numerous accidental uses into normal jpgs as I don't want to waste any of the limited iCloud storage space on video I'll never watch.

I just took a Live Photo and a non-raw photo of the same thing. The size is identical, likely because Live Photos compress really, really well.

Samsung has something like this too, though I'm not sure what it's called. My mom was showing me "photos" she'd taken recently, and they all had 1-2 seconds of "noise" (motion) surrounding them. To me there is no appeal in this as a default setting, it just shows off how unsteadily you hold your phone when taking a picture. But I can see how an experienced photographer might take advantage of it when capturing moving targets.

I'd never heard of them either. Seems to be an iPhone thing.

"Basically, Live Photos on iPhone is a regular digital photo and a short 2 seconds video recording the few moments before the photo. Essentially, the iPhone camera captures 2 media files, one photo and one video. When viewing a Live Photo, the operating system, iOS plays the video file first and then it shows the picture."

The part that makes me feel old is that I have literally no idea why this sort of thing would be useful or desirable.

They can be fun, you get a photo plus a short video "for free." Much easier than filming constantly and editing things down later. You can pick a different key frame to display as well, so it can be a good way to fix an awkwardly-timed yawn or such.

I don't use them personally, though, but I'm a curmudgeon about my camera controls ;)

I think Google added something similar in their Pixel camera app.

Eh, I think this is just one of those things I don't "get". A 2 second video seems without value to me.

From the POV of the user it's much more "a photo" than a video. It just gives you a bit of extra context and ability to pick your key frame.

A two-second video is pretty pointless. But a photo that incidentally moves a little bit is often charming.

It’s the animated photos from Harry Potter.

It’s a fun gimmick especially with kids as 2 seconds goes from not seeing you to noticing and lighting up with a smile.

I agree, they capture a moment in some ways better compared to a static photo. Not replacement but a nice feature on their own.

> It’s the animated photos from Harry Potter.

That's what I was picturing. I'm glad my impression isn't far off. Perhaps it's a "you have to use it to understand" sort of thing, but I truly struggle to see the value.

It doesn't matter, though. I don't use iPhones and even if I did, that I don't understand it is meaningless.

It's similar to the "burst mode" that digital cameras have used for decades to capture exact moments during fast action.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burst_mode_(photography)

Adding sound can make these bursts more pleasant. But there is no easy way to disable or remove the audio.

It's actually really nice. Not only does it provide a really good effect when swiping between photos in your photo album (it plays a bit of that video during the swipe, so your photo basically animates into place), but it often captures some really good stuff. I can't tell you in how many photos of my kids I've found utter delight in the live portion.

It also lets you pick a different key frame, so if e.g. you get someone blinking, you can pick a different frame from the video to use instead.

And if you capture photos back to back such that the live portions overlap, you can convert the group of photos into a single contiguous video.

> It also lets you pick a different key frame

Note that this significantly lowers the photo quality.

I love them. I often just swipe through memories in pictures, and it takes me back to the moment with the audio and quick movement before the shot was taken.

When on an iPhone and viewing a “live photo”, you can hold down on the screen and the image turns into a short video leading up to the moment of the photo.

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