Smartphones with advanced photography and touchscreen capabilities

A smartphone with advanced photography capabilities, comprising:

• (a) an accessory camera unit comprising at least one camera IC module, at least one camera lens having an optical axis, and a camera port having conductive pins in power and circuit connection with said at least one camera IC module;
• (b) a phone housing structure assembled with a built-in touchscreen having a display plane, a battery, a mainboard comprising a PMIC (power management IC) and an APU (applications processing unit), and a phone port having conductive legs in power and circuit connection respectively with said PMIC and said mainboard for outputting external power and for establishing external circuit connection thereto;
• (c) an upholding structure having a supporting column, a top connector and a bottom connector interconnected with conductive lines, wherein (i) said top connector and said bottom connector are rendered engageable to said camera port and to said phone port, respectively, (ii) said supporting column is situated in a perpendicular manner with respect to a side or a back side of said phone housing structurer, when upholding said accessory camera unit, so as to place said optical axis at least in an orientation generally perpendicular to said display plane for said accessory camera unit to function selectively as at least one front-facing camera and/or at least one rear-facing camera;
• (iii) said conductive lines are furnished for establishing power and circuit connection between said mainboard and said accessory camera unit;
• and
• (d) a control algorithm installed and/or embedded onto said motherboard, executable by said APU for (i) actuating said PMIC to provide said external power selectively with an operating power supply and/or a keep-alive power supply from said battery to said phone port, (ii) in accordance with a determination when said operating power supply is provided, interfacing said at least one camera IC module for retrieving images obtained therefrom, and (iii) transmitting said images for displaying on said built-in touchscreen.