Apple has clarified that its new Texture and Grain adjustments in Photographic Styles, introduced alongside the iPhone 18 lineup, can only be applied to photos captured with iPhone 18 Pro models and iPhone Duo's Ultra Wide, Main, and Center Stage cameras. Earlier press materials had implied broader availability on older devices like the iPhone 16 and iPhone Air, but Apple has since revised those statements to specify the narrower scope. A Reddit user confirmed the limitation, showing the controls only worked on an iPhone 16 Pro Max when editing sample photos taken with an iPhone 18 Pro.
Fast Company published a behind-the-scenes look at how it created its Fall Issue centered on design, emphasizing the physical qualities of print—paper texture, ink smell, and tactile feel. The piece walks through the creative and production process behind assembling the package.
A developer working at 505 Games on porting a custom PC game engine to consoles published a technical blog post explaining the hidden complexity of converting texture data between platforms. Using a 1024x1024 BC7-compressed wood texture as an example, the post walks through concepts like block compression, texel ordering, mip levels, and texture tiling that must all be correctly handled together to avoid corrupted images.
A Binomial LLC engineer working on GPU texture interchange has published research fitting neural textures and physically based rendering material maps using evolution strategies (ES) instead of traditional backpropagation. The approach avoids gradient-based optimization typically used in neural texture compression and material fitting workflows.
Apple introduced the iPhone Duo, its debut foldable device, pairing a 7.6-inch inner Super Retina XDR display with a 5.4-inch outer screen. The inner panel uses a matte nano-texture coating that hides the fold crease and cuts glare, and reviewers noted a smooth hinge and a gradual blur animation when opening or closing the device. Pre-orders begin October 16, with a full launch on October 23 starting at $1,999 for 256GB.
Developer Chris Sotraidis built SpaghettiPad, an iPhone app that runs a decompiled PC source port of Mario Kart 64 called SpaghettiKart using the Libultraship library, which reimplements the original N64 SDK for modern hardware. Unlike emulators such as Delta, this approach renders the game natively via Metal, supports Bluetooth controllers, and unlocks widescreen visuals, frame rates up to 120fps, and higher-resolution textures.
Astropad has released version 4.0 of its Rock Paper Pencil accessory, which pairs a reusable nano-texture screen protector with custom Apple Pencil tips. The update adds a new graphite tip modeled on a 2B pencil alongside the existing steel ballpoint tip, giving users two distinct writing and drawing feels in one $49.99 kit shipping worldwide now.
Apple has launched an updated version of its Polishing Cloth on its online store, with U.S. pricing dropping to $9 from the previous $19. It's still unclear whether the new cloth differs in size or material beyond the price change, but Apple says it remains a soft, nonabrasive cloth safe for all Apple displays, including nano-texture screens.
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