Apple is well known for the simple, no-frills product photos that highlight its lineup of mobile devices and as it turns out, a lot of work goes into capturing those images. The Verge interviewed Peter Belanger, a photographer who has worked with Apple for years, to shed some light on Apple's creative process. In the interview, Belanger reveals that Apple exercises extreme attention to detail when it comes to product photos, providing him with both sketches and a comprehensive shot list

Echoing recent reports about a redesigned 'flatter' user interface in iOS 7, 9to5Mac says the next version of the operating system will lose "all signs of gloss, shine and skeuomorphism" . Jony Ive took charge of all Apple's user interface teams last October following a management shakeup .

Susan Kare, who created many of the original interface elements for the Apple Macintosh in the mid–1980s, today reflected on her work at Apple in an interview with Path (via AppleInsider ).

KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo is reiterating his claims that Apple's low-cost iPhone will have a 4-inch screen, plastic casing, and be available in a range of colors similar to Apple's iPod lineup, sharing a few new details in a report highlighted by AppleInsider . In particular, Kuo shares offers some information on the device's plastic and fiberglass casing.

Digitimes reports that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) will "tape out" the design for an A7 system-on-a-chip built on a 20-nanometer process this month. Taping out refers to the initial design of the chip having been completed for creation of the masks that will be used to print the actual chips, although further tweaks are likely as test production is carried out.

Shipping estimates for new orders of the 21.5-inch and 27-inch iMac dramatically improved today, with both models now shipping in 1–3 days from the online Apple Stores in Canada and the United States. In January, shipping times for the 21.5-inch iMac slipped to 2–3 weeks , and the 27-inch iMac has been in short supply since its November release. The supply shortage has been attributed to issues with display production resulting from a new lamination process.

Following last week's introduction of new processors for the Retina MacBook Pro lineup, Primate Labs has analyzed benchmarks coming in from the new machines through the company's popular Geekbench 2 software.

There have been a growing number of reports that Apple is working on a larger form factor iPhone, presumably to better compete with the wide variety of Android devices currently available. Based on those rumors, there have been also been a number of speculative articles on exactly how Apple might adapt iOS to handle the increase in screen size

Taiwanese newspaper Economic Times reports [ Google translation , via Macotakara ] that Apple is lining up suppliers for its next-generation MacBook Air for launch in the third quarter of this year. According to the report, the MacBook Air will not only be receiving internal upgrades to Intel's new Haswell platform but also a "facelift" with new external features, including the possibility of a Retina display

As noted by 9to5Mac , the Mac Pro is no longer available for purchase from Apple's European Online Stores.