What if your phone’s camera was much, much bigger?

The cameras on our phones won’t stop getting bigger. Xiaomi’s new 15 Ultra is dominated by an enormous ring of cameras on the back, Nothing has rethought its camera layout from scratch to fit a periscope into the Phone 3A Pro, and consistent rumors suggest that even Apple is going to strap a big ol’ camera bar onto the back of its iPhone 17 Pro models later this year. But why stop there? What if you could get all of the heft and weight of a real camera and burden your phone with it? What if we could make your phone camera much, much bigger? That’s what both Xiaomi and Realme have attempted to do at this year’s Mobile World Congress, with two very different concept phones that each attempt to bridge the gap between a smartphone and a DSLR. Realme’s concept has a bare sensor where a lens would normally be. This bulky mount is what lets you attach a regular lens. This lens alone weighs several times more than the phone itself. Realme’s attempt is the most familiar. In fact, its “interc ... Read full article.