Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

In 2017, Apple unexpectedly unveiled "One More Things"-- iPhone X-- at a launch event that was supposed to belong to iPhone 8 / Plus. This landmark work on the 10th anniversary of iPhone is not only a succession, but also a link.

IPhone X continues the "exquisite feeling" of previous generations of iPhone, with a round glass back plate and newly added surgical stainless steel, holding it in the hand like a piece of jade, delicate and moist. When it comes to "Kai Xia", since iPhone X, the future iPhone almost has not jumped out of the overall design framework, which is a little sad.

(photo Source: Apple) nevertheless, in the 16 years since the birth of iPhone, we have also seen Apple's design efforts, or attempts to apply a variety of out-of-market materials to a smartphone, and even led a wave of imitation.

This year, Apple brought "titanium" to the iPhone 15 Pro series as a central focus of its promotion, but the change is far less fresh than it was then, and some see it as a sign that Apple is running out of skills.

(photo Source: Vodafone UK) I have to say that after seeing Apple's classic design in the use of iPhone materials, I am inevitably disappointed with "titanium".

Plastic, the starting point of iPhone in 2007, Apple launched the original iPhone, a smartphone that does not have a physical keyboard and does not support a stylus.

The original iPhone adopts the splicing modeling scheme, the back of the fuselage is made of aluminum metal and plastic, and the metal back plate is connected with the frame, so the visual effect is very strong. In this generation of iPhone, instead of following the mainstream of the market and choosing pure plastic as the body material, Apple uses the less popular aluminum metal, which gives the iPhone an obvious metallic texture, but the manufacturing cost and process requirements are relatively high.

(figure Source: Apple/ 1st Gen iPhone) iPhone's successor models iPhone 3G and iPhone 3GS all use integrated plastic fuselage, which makes the two generations of iPhone have a stronger sense of integration and no longer have a sense of fragmentation. At the same time, the plastic backplane after bright polishing does not have much impact on its texture.

The main task of iPhone in this period is to help users understand iPhone, get used to iPhone, and fall in love with iPhone. Compared to major breakthroughs in materials, designer Jonathan Ive prefers to polish plastic, which is a low-cost, easy-to-make material.

(photo Source: dcfever/ iPhone 3G) it's worth mentioning that Jonathan Ive, who created Apple's first iMac with candy colors and a plastic shell, clearly has the answer to how to make plastic more textured.

Apple's last attempt to use plastic on the iPhone was the iPhone 5C, which was launched in 2013. In Jonathan Ive's creative notes, "the Magic Journey of a piece of plastic" is described in detail, in which the whole piece of polycarbonate is reinforced by filled steel and finally coated with clear varnish, making the iPhone 5C of the plastic fuselage feel like a fruit hard candy.

Due to the ubiquity of plastic materials in daily life, the public has seriously solidified its cheap image, which led to the failure of Apple's attempt to "replicate" the plastic integrated body of iPhone 3G on the iPhone 5C years later, and Apple no longer uses plastic as the main material of the iPhone.

Aluminum alloy, an old partner with iPhone for more than a decade, Apple released the new iPhone 5 at the Fangcao Art Center in San Francisco in 2012.

On the iPhone 5, Apple brought it "Unibody integrated design", that is, a whole piece of aluminum alloy plate is molded by numerical control CNC to make its structure more stable and high impact resistance. In addition, in order to give iPhone 5 a deeper black color, Apple uses an anodizing process to attach colored powder to the surface of aluminum alloy through a specific process.

(image source: Apple/ iPhone 5S) thanks to the application of anodizing process, Apple is also trying to "color" on the iPhone, such as the gold of iPhone 5S and the rose gold of iPhone 6S.

Although "Unibody integrated design" has many advantages, such as light and thin, low manufacturing cost, stable structure and so on, the metal fuselage can also cause signal dispersion and affect the quality of calls and networks. Apple's solution on the iPhone is to open two injection-molded antenna bands on the fuselage to reduce electromagnetic shielding of signals.

(image source: Apple Insider/ iPhone 6S) iPhone 6 series, iPhone 6S series, two ugly sky lines have a great impact on the visual perception, which has been complained by many users. As a result, Apple has developed a new "bright black" color matching on the iPhone 7 series, using polishing technology to create a bright texture of aluminum alloy, but also a good way to hide the sky lines, which is welcomed by the majority of consumers.

(photo Source: 9to5Mac/ iPhone 7) perhaps because of the enthusiastic feedback from the market, Apple is no longer obsessed with visual integration design, and since the iPhone 8 series, it has completely shifted to the glass backplane.

Of course, aluminum alloy is still used in all the basic iPhone models of the iPhone 8 series. After all, its lightweight and inexpensive advantages are the most cost-effective solution for Apple.

Metal + glass, Apple sandwiches everyone likes to mention the landmark iPhone, then it may be the original iPhone launched by Apple in 2007, but if it has the most far-reaching impact on the market, then there is no doubt that it is iPhone 4.

IPhone 4 uses double-sided aluminosilicate glass, and the middle frame is made of highly refined stainless steel strips forged by custom alloys. the front and rear glass + metal frame is also known as the "sandwich" structure. The design started with the iPhone 4, but there was a fault in the iPhone 5 to iPhone 7 series models, and it was not until the iPhone 8 series that it officially returned.

(photo Source: Apple/ iPhone 4S) all three iPhone models released in 2017 have a "sandwich" structure, except that the iPhone 8 series is glass + aluminum alloy, while the iPhone X is glass + surgical grade stainless steel. The stainless steel frame made its debut on iPhone X, and although it is more prone to scratches and fingerprints than aluminum alloy, this new material with mirror texture is still popular with consumers.

According to iFixit, a well-known maintenance website, the design of metal frame + front and rear double-sided glass makes the iPhone 8 series twice as dangerous as the previous model, and the stainless steel frame of iPhone X is also more likely to leave scratches.

Admittedly, compared to the awkward metal fuselage and less advanced plastic, the current "sandwich" structure is already the most balanced choice, and after choosing this direction, Apple tends to "strengthen" rather than "improve". For example, the iPhone 12 series has been replaced with a right-angled frame to increase the drop buffer area, while a stronger backplane glass is used to prevent accidents.

(photo Source: Apple Insider/ iPhone 11, iPhone 12 Pro) at present, the "sandwich" structure has become the mainstream of the smartphone market, and the metal + glass design has also become a "high-end image" recognized by consumers, and most of the credit is due to the huge influence of iPhone 4.

IPhone has found the best solution to cross the river by feeling the stones. Steve Jobs, the father of iPhone, is a perfectionist. He led the design of the original iPhone, showing his imagination of efficient, intelligent and exquisite multimedia devices. Under his influence, Apple's design team left a lot of shadows of the times when they "perfected" the design of iPhone.

"Titanium" is the core marketing slogan of this year's iPhone 15 Pro series. Thanks to the application of new materials, this generation of iPhone has successfully "lost weight" and "lost weight", making it lighter and smaller. But when you think about this change from a business point of view, Apple is a way to find a way out of the old times in stability.

(photo Source: 9to5Mac/ iPhone 15 Pro) Apple's design team had little choice when the iPhone 4 period laid a solid market foundation for the "sandwich" structure, and plastics proved unpopular with consumers when the iPhone 5C was launched. Metal and glass are the most stable and cost-effective materials for iPhone at present or for a long time in the future.

As a result, we see that Apple has chosen to use "titanium" as an iteration of the material, which is the helplessness of the design team subject to commercial decisions. Titanium alloy is not common in the market, mainly because the manufacturing cost is expensive, but there is no obvious advantage over aluminum, but what Apple is good at is to continuously optimize the industrial chain through the "banknote ability", so that the manufacturing cost is reduced to the extreme. In this way, "titanium" can not only be a form of innovation, but also bring room for marketing, the cost will not be significantly raised, this solution is very Apple.

While the market is generally focused on the iPhone 15 Pro series of "titanium", Apple is also quietly making a new experiment with glass. The iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus released this year try "fused glass" for the first time, which is a process of directly attaching color particles to the glass, which makes this generation of basic iPhone very fresh and natural.

(photo Source: Apple Newsroom) predictably, at least until the 20th anniversary of the iPhone, Apple will continue to optimize the overall design of the iPhone based on both metal and glass, until a cheaper, stable and gimmick new material is available.

Looking back at the end, the past 18 generations of iPhone have experienced many changes in shell materials, from plastic, glass, aluminum alloy, stainless steel to today's "titanium metal". It may be difficult to give an answer to which of these designs are better or worse.

From a marketing point of view, the iPhone 15 Pro series regards "titanium" as the core marketing focus, which is not a wise choice. It is well known that titanium alloy frames make this generation of iPhone lose its rugged properties.

(image source: Apple Newsroom) but iPhone is lighter and feels better than itself, and it all makes sense to give experienced users at least from the iPhone X era a clear "excuse" to update iterations.

In the long run, Apple is bound to continue to work on the development of new materials, such as custom alloys used by Apple Watch, which was once firmly believed by the market to be the future trend of iPhone. In the face of all aspects of the smartphone market, whether Apple can break the game in the design that has always been stable depends on when its design team chooses to get out of its current comfort zone.

This article comes from the official account of Wechat: little Ray Beep (ID:xiaoleibbb), author: kkknei

Welcome to subscribe "Shulou Technology Information " to get latest news, interesting things and hot topics in the IT industry, and controls the hottest and latest Internet news, technology news and IT industry trends.