Hacker News Reader

Comment by ebbv | Hacker News Reader

They ruined the design of the old Lumia for the benefit of a better camera. Who's really clamoring for that? And who's willing to pay $299.99 with 2 year contract for it?

Nokia really doesn't know what they're doing.

View on HN

Hmm, there was a time when function was occasionally considered over form..

The phone is hardly ruined, it's just a high end handset for people in a particular niche, one I happen to belong to (long gave up carrying real cameras, don't give two heaps about Android/pointless OS wars or "mobile apps" or any of that crap, adore the notion of a reasonably high end camera that requires zero effort to bring with me).

Design is often about trade-offs, and based on the parent comment, you seem to have entirely missed the point of this particular design.

I am clamoring for that. A smartphone that combines the best of the 808 pureview[1] sensor and the improvements of the Lumia 920 like image stabilization and better dynamic range[2]? Yes please. Also, I'm in Europe so don't need to worry about US contract woes.

[1] http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808...

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LbvhZ-Mq4aQ

In Europe you have to worry about this being close to 1000 euro, unlocked, which is what its price will be.

I paid this for the 920, huge disappointment.

True. Worst part is that in the long run combined with the right contract, that's still a cheaper option.

Phones tied to contracts are scams.

It's not about the camera, it's about presenting Nokia as a producer of a premium phone, so that other versions of Nokia look better in comparison. No one cares about Windows Phone, but when Nokia makes headlines for 41-megapixels, the general populace that doesn't really get that they don't need 41-megapixels will nevertheless notice, and think 'wow, that is a lot, does my iPhone have that?'.

99.9% of people who will buy this phone will never have a need for 41 megapixels. But they'll buy it just the same.

>99.9% of people who will buy this phone will never have a need for 41 megapixels. But they'll buy it just the same.

The tech does make normal pictures look better because of the oversampling. Not to mention optical image stabilization for reducing blur and shake in both image and video.

http://i.imgur.com/fUe8rLC.png

>> 99.9% of people who will buy this phone will never have a need for 41 megapixels.

Nokia's really screwing up the messaging on this, as people are fixating on the megapixel count -- they are missing the forest for the trees.

The best images you will get out of this phone will actually be the oversampled images, which have significantly fewer megapixels.

41 megapixels can't be nice on a crappy sensor and lenses system. 41 megapixels would be interesting on a real camera unless someone wants to print oversampled stuff.

You don't need to print to see the improvements the oversampled images provide. You should see much cleaner images, especially in low light. These are noticeable even at Facebook level resolutions. Anyone who has used a real camera would know that.

There's completely no point in such sensor if lens are not providing equally high resolution image too. Unless you're into shooting Airy disks (though, I don't think the phone will provide raw sensor data).

That is, the whole 41MP thing is, mostly, PR bullshit.

Well, this camera's spiritual predecessor, the 808 seemed to shoot high megapixel images just fine. The Verge's 100% crops of the 34MP images look fine to me.

http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/25/3113460/nokia-808-pureview...

edit: DPReview gave the 808's camera and IQ a glowing review also. http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808...

  Nokia's really screwing up the messaging on this, as people are fixating on the megapixel count

HTC has been trying to push the message you suggest with the camera on the HTC One, and while the One is a great device and (I think) doing well for HTC, no one is really talking about their camera -- even though it is a superior camera to most other phones. Megapixels are like Clock Speed was a decade ago: there are more important stats to look at, but consumers just see the one number.

I'm not making any judgement, I'm just saying the point of 41 megapixels isn't to give consumers a huge picture, it's to give them a reason to buy the phone.

What HTC did do a good job of was branding their pixels as "Ultrapixels". I see that branding used on all the major tech blogs when mentioning the HTC One's camera.

Nokia's making the mistake of pushing a camera with specs that isn't easily understood by many people, and from the looks of it, that seems to include people who consider themselves photographers.

I tend to think that the 41 megapixel count will turn off many prospective buyers ("Why the hell do I need so many megapixels?").

I sincerely doubt that people looking at the highest-end cost of phones will be thinking 'Why do I need [feature x]?'.

Yeah, but they'll look at that less-than-beautiful hump on the back and ask if that hump is worth the extra megapixels.

I do believe Nokia has been very clear that the high megapixels is meant to be used as supersampling to reduce noise in normal sized pictures. They are after all targeting the enthusiast photographer who likes to (believe he) understands how camera's work.

Also, from an engineering point of view it's pretty neat: if the idea is to downsize the final picture to 5 mp, while using cropping on the pre-downsampled image to zoom, that means you can focus on having a high optical resolution in the centre of a fixed focal lens, and worry less about the edges. That has lots of advantages: a fixed focal lens is less complicated than a zoom lens, which has the side effect of making it easier to keep the lense flat,and getting a higher optical resolution in the centre is easier to do from an optics standpoint.

No, I'm pretty sure they're going for the "OMG! A lot of mega-pixels, it must be better" crowd.

Most enthusiast photographers will realize 41 MP with a tiny, tiny image sensor is going to be pointless.

I highly doubt that, as the 808 has already disproven that statement and has quite the reputation among enthusiast photographers.

The camera is definitely the most used app on my phone. I would say it's the same for about 50-70% of my friends.

I find that hard to believe. Nearly everyone I see using a phone is txting.

I think he might be on to something. Instagram/Tweeting pictures of random stuff is quite big.

I don't text nearly as much as I used to. Most of my friends communicate using either Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Vine, and our recent, biggest replacement for texting, Snapchat.

> And who's willing to pay $299.99 with 2 year contract for it?

It's got 32GB of storage, so it matches the iPhone 5 price at that size.

The camera is without a doubt, the most important part of my phone. I use it at least a dozen times a day. I'd absolutely pay $300 for a phone with a good enough camera.

Unfortunately, I'm not going to do that AND switch to Windows Phone. But given an Android or iOS device with this exact hardware? I'd 100% grab one of these.

Without sounding like a fan boy, I would actually recommend you to go give WP a try. I am not going to say it's better than iOS for lacking quality apps but it's way better than my Nexus 4. Android to me is the poorest OS amidst the 3.

second that. If you are saying that after using Windows Phone then I respect it but I won't write off windows phone without giving it a shot. Take this from someone who has tried iPhone for a year before moving to Windows Phone.

I've actually given it a shot. It's a fine OS, no debate there, but the app market is key for me.

If I could get this on an Android phone, I'd probably go for it. I'd really like a camera on my phone which wasn't next to useless.

The problem with phone cameras (mostly) ins't the sensor, it's the glass, or lack there-of.

>> The problem with phone cameras (mostly) ins't the sensor, it's the glass, or lack there-of.

Is that a problem with the camera or the user's expectations of what that camera can do?

You can only push the laws of physics (with respect to optics, especially) so far, and if you want a camera that can fit in the pocket of a pair of skinny jeans, compromises must be made.

Sure. My point is this is the _worst_ kind of spec padding.

>> My point is this is the _worst_ kind of spec padding.

How so? This is actually the first officially announced smartphone (I also have a keen interest in the upcoming Sony i1, but it's not a reality yet) that I'd consider buying just for the camera.

Personally, I think Nokia has taken an interesting approach with the sensor, because the added resolution gives them leeway in overcoming the optics problem (from a focal length perspective, at least) in that the "digital zoom" will produce better results than any other phone.

There's still a lot of room to push the laws of physics, although I'm not sure glass is the answer. I think manufacturing tolerances will be the biggest limit for inexpensive handsets.

If I play (hah!) stupid, I look at the flange distance and lens size for an SLR of any sort and compare it to a mirrorless camera such as the M9 or even NEX-7, I can get much higher quality on the same or smaller sensor with smaller lenses, especially in the normal field of view. This is purely based on that big empty space in the SLR. The main thing we'll have to give up is an expectation of a shallow depth of field, but "f/8 and be there" is why camera phones are useful anyway.

I've been impressed with the sapphire lens on the iPhone 5, all things considered. It's not what I would call a good camera, but perhaps coupled with a high-density sensor with an alternative pixel structure[1] and microlenses, it would not be unreasonable to expect 2013 "full frame" image quality in a mobile device in 2-5 years.

I don't want to burn my fingers trying to capture 4k raw video on my phone. Heat dissipation will become an issue, as it is on HDSLRs and MILCs.

[1] For example, http://translate.google.com/translate?sl=auto&tl=en&js=n&pre...

I won't argue that camera phone lenses are high quality, but you can really only push a 1/3" or 1/4" sensor so far.

It's both, actually. But that said, Nokia uses very good glass.

It's only once you get up to P&Ss and DSLRs that the glass can really hold back the sensors -- phone sensors are always struggling to make a compromise between package size and image quality, and usually package size wins.

The upcoming Sony i1 should please many people. It's rumored to have a 1/2.3" sensor - while smaller than the Nokia's sensor, it's still quite large for a phone.

Over 5 inches big, though. Sigh.

Haha, YMMV.

As an "older person" whose eyesight is progressively getting worse, I consider the 5 inches to be a blessing more than a curse.

What ties you to Android?

>Who's really clamoring for that?

Me. It is absolutely absurd that I have to carry around a separate phone and camera.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com