Check out my Sunday Morning Live Skype Tech Segment from this morning: http://www.globaltvedmonton.com/video/tech+talk/video.html?v=2150578838&p=1&s=dd#video
Who is the Top Dog in Camera Phones?
You may have guessed the new iPhone 4S,
what with all the launch hype this past week. Despite claims at the Apple event
launch about the new iPhone 8 megapixel camera being the best out there, the facts and my tests say the almost
one-year old Nokia N8 12 megapixel smartphone is the best camera phone and in
fact, sometimes better than dedicated point and shoot cameras.
Not only that, but at $19.99 from Rogers
with three year plan, it also has free GPS voice guidance driving or walking
navigation. Most of the world’s roads are downloadable from Nokia’s online OVI
site. The N8 is a sleek metallic finish phone with all the email, browsing,
social networking and office apps most folks would need. It runs on Nokia’s
Symbian OS which although is not as popular as Android, iOS, BlackBerry and Windows
Phone 7, it is an affordable alternative for folks who want to travel light
with one device which can take the best quality photos. Compared to most phones
that use large amounts of mobile data to run Google’s “free” Maps, you can
download every country’s map data on the N8. When you are out of country, you
turn off the phone (even remove the SIM card) and the built-in full GPS antenna
will give you driving or walking directions in any of dozens of languages you
can download too.
Why? Because the size of the actual image sensor,
not the digital processing magic, that determine how much light a camera can
capture for the best picture. This means better colour, detail, contrast and
for capturing pictures in dark scenes.
Apple has not released the actual size of
the iPhone 4S photo sensor, but industry observers put it in the same grouping
of current 8 megapixel smartphones, 1/3.2”, which is much smaller than the 1/1.83”
sensor the N8 uses. Although Apple seems to have done a superb job in getting the
best 8 megapixel quality image, the N8 has additional built-in advantages.
Compared to the “5 element” new lens of the
iPhone 4S, the N8 has Carl Zeis Optics 5 all-aspherical element optics. It also
has real flash for much better results than the LED “flash” lights all other
camera phones have. The N8 still has the most comprehensive picture-taking-settings
and editing features that most closely matches computer photo editing programs. The N8also has one of the widest angle lenses for shooting in tight corners and the large 12 megapixel sensor can zoom intelligently and keep good quality.
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So when Nokia Canada recently invited me to
an exclusive “second look” photo shoot of its N8 smartphone against any other
phone camera I wanted to bring along, I thought “why not?”
It should be noted that all this happened well
before the announcement of Apple’s new iPhone 4S which sports an all-new 8
megapixel camera with very impressive performance specs. This made my scheduled
comparison even more interesting…against a phone that is not in the streets
yet.
Nokia N8 has a serious 5-element aspherical f2.8 lens and real flash
The N8 GPS navigation with 2D, 3D and night view modes can run free maps without a SIM card when you travel, saving you roaming dataMy Toronto shoot involved pitting the N8
against a selection of smartphones like the HTC Incredible, Moto XT860, current
iPhone and point-and-shoots like the Sony 16 megapixel TX10 and mirrorless 14
megapixel Samsung NX11.
I shot the Toronto Skyline before and as
long as 40 minutes after sunset. Each camera was set to auto and steadied.
Check my results on my blog www.techuntagled.ca
The N8, by far was the closest match to the
real cameras. In fact it had comparable vividness and detail. All other camera
phones struggled to produce the same detail and natural colour, primarily due
to their smaller image sensors. Out of the lot, the 5 MP iPhone produced great
colour, but was the least sharp.
Checkout the un-retouched results: 
We also went for a chopper ride around the
Toronto CN Tower early afternoon with lot’s of sun light to test sharpness and
overall colour. The N8 easily won in its category, with deeper natural colours and
the most detail of cars and street goings on more than 1000 feet below us. Here is a sampling of my N8 picture taking in Toronto. Note the richness of colour, shadow detail on the side of the boat and real flash power. Press Ctrl + to enlarge the screen view of the photos and Ctrl – to go back to normal. 
N8 beautiful Toronto night scene 40minutes after sunset on auto mode
A mix of real powerful flash and ambient light make for interesting photos
Note the shadow detail and clean colour hues despite shooting into the sun with the N8
The N8 showed the most detail when compared with other smartphones So, how good will the new iPhone4S be as acamera? Although none of us mortals have actually
tried shooting with the iPhone 4S, I downloaded the four “original” sample
photos from the Apple web site and shot a similar angle and lighted photo, using
the Nokia N8, with three similar objects in the iPhone 4S photo: garden sheers,
fire wood and an open book/newspaper. I blew them up and also posted online. I
think the N8 wins, but not by much, again due to its larger picture sensor. The
iPhone 4S will handle quality 12” lab prints but the image starts pixelating
after that, while the N8 images hold their own to 18 “ prints.
Original iPhone4S image
N8 image shot to same distance scale
N8, bottom, has more details than the iPhone4S fire logs, top 
N8, left holds on to detail while iPhone 4S starts pixelating 
N8, left, shows more detail in the open bookThe N8 has the advantage of the larger
sensor producing a 34.3 megabyte image compared to the iPhone 4S 22.9 megabyte
size file. Simply more image information to work with.
Does this mean you should go out and buy a
Nokia N8? Weigh the options of what you want from a smart phone. The iPhone 4S
is arguably the coolest-made, do-it-all phone with more
magic than ever before.
But if you want to only take one digital smartphone
device that also shoots the best photos and does free “data-less” GPS map guidance world-wide, consider your options.
Nokia has partnered with Microsoft and will
soon release its first Windows Phone7 model. Nokia insiders told me the new
smartphone is a blend of Windows Phone 7 features as dictated by Microsoft, but
will stand out against current WP7 competitors with unique features that make
it a Nokia.
Stay tuned.
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