On Apple TV: Picture in Picture, zoom, and sound on the wall
Video Wall for Apple TV 2.5.0 is out. Update from the App Store, or let automatic updates do it. This one is about what happens after you pick a camera: it can now follow you into other apps, you can get closer to it, and the wall can make a little sound if you want it to.
Picture in Picture
Open a camera full screen and select the new Picture in Picture button. The camera shrinks into a corner, the Apple TV goes to its Home screen, and the camera stays on top of whatever you open next. Watch the game and the driveway at the same time.
Press the TV button to move the window to another corner, close it, or send it back to full screen. The window is silent, so it never talks over your show, and it runs a couple of seconds behind live. Battery cameras that rest their live view will close the window when they do; wired cameras stay up. How Picture in Picture works.
Zoom in, and move around
A full-screen camera has a new magnifier button. Press it for 2×, again for 4×, and once more to return to the whole picture. While you’re zoomed, a swipe on the remote moves around the picture, which is handy for the far end of a driveway or a parcel on the step. Menu leaves zoom.
Swipe to the next camera
With a camera full screen, swipe left or right to go to the next one. You move through your cameras in the same order as your wall, without going back to the grid each time. Everything the remote does in full screen.
Sound, if you want it
Settings has a new Audio section with two things the wall couldn’t do before. Both start switched off.
- Sound on the highlighted camera. Rest on a camera on the wall for a second and you hear it. A small speaker icon shows which tile is playing, and the sound follows as you move.
- Background sound. Gentle Rain, Thunderstorm, Ocean Waves, Gentle Stream or Fireplace, looping quietly under the wall. It steps aside when a camera or a clip plays its own sound.
A cleaner full screen
The camera name and the buttons now fade out a few seconds after you put the remote down, so nothing sits on top of the picture. Any button brings them back, and that first press only shows them, so you never trigger a button you couldn’t see.
These are Apple TV features for now. The update is free for everyone on a trial or plan.
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