Breaking into Apple: Halide’s Co-Founder Moves to the Design Studio
In a surprising move that caught the tech design community by surprise, Sebastiaan de With, the co-founder of Halide—the popular iPhone camera app—has joined Apple’s design team. He announced the news on Threads, signaling a new era for Apple’s in-house design philosophy and the way it approaches image capture, user experience, and visual storytelling on iOS devices.
Who is Sebastiaan de With and what is Halide?
Sebastiaan de With is best known for co-founding Halide, an award-winning camera app that emphasizes manual controls, tactile feedback, and high-quality image output. Over the years, Halide has built a dedicated following among photography enthusiasts who want more control over focus, exposure, and RAW processing without sacrificing ease of use. The app became a benchmark for how software can complement hardware in mobile photography, influencing both user expectations and design aesthetics across the ecosystem.
De With’s work at Halide blended technical engineering with a strong design sensibility. His approach—prioritizing elegant interfaces, fast access to professional tools, and a philosophy of “delightful precision”—aligns well with Apple’s own design values. That synergy appears to be a motivating factor behind his recruitment to Apple’s design group.
What this means for Apple’s design approach
Adding a designer with Halide’s pedigree signals Apple’s continued commitment to refining the camera experience and how users interact with iPhone photography on a daily basis. The camera remains one of the most-used features on iOS devices, and small UX choices—swipe gestures for exposure, tactile feedback when tapping to focus, or subtle color-tuning controls—can have outsized impacts on user satisfaction. De With’s background could help push several existing Apple initiatives forward.
Industry observers expect a focus on user-centric camera UX and streamlined professional controls that still feel approachable for everyday users. Apple has long balanced powerful hardware and accessible software, and de With’s sensibilities about offering granular control without clutter could inform new camera workflows, app experiences, and perhaps even insights shared across Apple’s built-in apps and developer tools.
Potential areas of influence
- Camera UI refinements: More intuitive exposure control, faster access to RAW and ProRAW-like features, and improved live preview behavior under varying lighting conditions.
- Consistency across iOS: A cohesive approach to photographic controls that feels native to iPhone hardware and software, across Photos, Camera, and third-party apps.
- Developer ecosystem: Potential lessons for APIs and toolkits that empower third-party developers to build advanced photography experiences while preserving a unified design language.
- Design psychology of photography: Subtle animations, haptics, and feedback loops that make professional tools feel accessible and enjoyable to use daily.
Impact on the broader Apple design culture
Apple’s design culture has long thrived on cross-pollination between hardware craftsmanship and software elegance. Bringing in a designer with a strong product sensibility from a successful consumer photography app could reinforce a more iterative, user-driven design process. Expect collaboration between hardware teams, software UX groups, and product design to intensify as the company explores new ways to integrate photography with augmented reality, video storytelling, and on-device AI-powered features.
What users can expect next
For iPhone users, the immediate outcomes may be subtle rather than seismic: refined camera controls, faster, more predictable performance in challenging lighting, and a more cohesive experience when moving between camera capture, editing, and sharing. Over the longer term, de With’s influence could contribute to more expressive and accessible tools that empower creators while maintaining the simplicity that defines Apple’s user experience.
Conclusion: A strategic hire with a focus on craft
Sebastiaan de With’s move to Apple underscores the company’s ongoing emphasis on the craft of design and the importance of empowering users through thoughtful, well-executed tooling. As the design world watches how this collaboration unfolds, one thing is clear: Apple continues to invest in talent that blends technical prowess with an obsession for delightful, precise user experiences. For fans of Halide and iPhone photography alike, the coming months will be telling as this cross-pollination shapes the next wave of iOS design innovations.
