Tricky Angles ⇥ marco.org

Speaking of the new iMacs, Marco Arment thinks Apple’s cheating:

Take a look around Apple’s iMac pages — how long does it take you to find a picture that shows the thick bulge in the back accurately? Nearly every photo of it is from a misleading MySpace perspective. That’s the sort of trick that Apple doesn’t usually need to pull.

I disagree. This is the same bit of clever design that is used to make the MacBook Air look thinner. While there are a few more photos of the Air from a planar side view¹, most of the photos are from a raised camera perspective. The Air feels much thinner in person, even if it’s hiding a bulge. Similarly, the new iMac almost always appears as razor thin as it is in the photos, even if it isn’t.

Take a look at just about any hands-on photos: the new iMac needs to be rotated to such an oblique angle to even begin to see that bulge. For well over 80% of a horizontal rotation, it looks as razor thin as the edge. Why destroy the illusion?