New Apple Patent Suggests Possibility Of Future iPhone 3Ds

3D is the newest craze in gadgetdom — or, at the very least, a lot of gadget makers would like it to be — and it looks like even Cupertino is interested in getting in on it. a new patent says that Apple has been exploring a multi-camera system for 3D picture taking, hinting at a future iPhone 3D.

The patent is called “Systems and Methods for an Imaging System Using Multiple Image Sensors,” and the idea described is a fairly typical one: using two or more rear-facing cameras on a handheld device to allow multiple pictures of the same scene to be taken at once, then recombine them into a 3D image of that same scene.

Apple’s approach is different than the usual stabs at the 3D problem, though. Their patent application describes a “paradigm shift from the known software-based approaches.” Noting that current 3D imaging software must make a guess at how to perform stereo disparity compensation for 3D images, Apple’s method would employ a more accurate, hardware-based approach.

It’s an interesting patent, and it’s easy to extrapolate that one idea Apple might be working on is an iPhone 3D, with a glasses free 3D display like the Nintendo 3DS. It’s exciting to think of what Apple could do with 3D that the competition hasn’t thought of yet, but I think it’s a ways off yet: right now, the battery life trade-offs for 3D devices like the Nintendo 3DS (which gets as little as 3.5 hours per charge) preclude it from inclusion in the iPhone.

John Brownlee

John Brownlee is a writer for Fast Company, and a contributing writer here at CoM. He has also written for Wired, Playboy, Boing Boing, Popular Mechanics, VentureBeat, and Gizmodo. He lives in Boston with his wife and two parakeets. You can follow him here on Twitter.