17 July 2013

My Nokia Blog

My Nokia Blog


Nokia Performing The Impossible: Making Windows Phone Cool

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 01:58 PM PDT

 

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An interesting piece over at ReadWrite where they look a little bit at the imaging in the new Nokia Lumia 1020. Nokia is working superbly hard in making Windows Phone a genuine alternative to the consumer’s two choices of iPhone or Android. The use of the imaging SDK to take advantage of the best camera in a modern smartphone is yet another added value for Nokia Lumia devices. This is a platform for developers to create things for the Lumia line. To ReadWrite, it shows Nokia is not simply taking a backseat whilst it painfully watches Microsoft travel back in time with their utterly slow speed of development, but instead Nokia is taking their future into Windows Phone in their own hands to improve both WP and Nokia Lumia devices.

http://readwrite.com/2013/07/12/nokia-performing-the-impossible-making-windows-phone-cool (via)

To let the insane camera (which is as good, or better, than advertised) and the pricey $299 price tag (on a two-year contract with AT&T) deter you from what Nokia is doing would be a mistake. The Lumia 1020 is no gimmick smartphone being presented as a hero device. Nokia may be doing what many thought would be impossible.

It is starting to make the Windows Phone platform look cool. 

How is Nokia doing this? By breaking away from the Microsoft-centric development of Windows Phone and creating new, creative ways for developers to take advantage of Nokia features. Features such as Nokia's HERE maps program and the new Imaging SDK (software developer kit) give developers real incentive to build for the Lumia line while making Microsoft and Windows Phone tangential to the conversation.

 

All About Symbian puts Nokia 808 PureView against Samsung Galaxy SIV Zoom

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 01:19 PM PDT

zoomand808

Steve Litchfield puts the Nokia 808 PureView up against Samsung’s contender for ‘smartphone camera’.

http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/features/item/17932_Crossover_smartphones_Nokia_80.php

It certainly does help to read this on a big screen. I initially opened the link from my 920 and some of the Sammy pictures looked surprisingly better but on the bigger screen, I noticed the 808 pulls in the better image (where Steve was undecided).

Check out how oversampling works on this scene. It’s a crop of a centre of the pool pic. The 808 is at the top.

poolcomp

This test though does cater for the SIV’s strengths in zooming. The 808 features ‘lossless’ digital zooming whilst the massive SIV Zoom quite rightly shoves in 10x optical zoom which for the most part, Engadget slated as being a messy marriage of smartphone and camera. http://mynokiablog.com/2013/07/15/engadget-samsung-siv-zoom-messy-marriage-of-smartphone-and-camera-might-want-to-hold-out-for-nokia-lumia-1020/

It’s surprising therefore to see it pull slightly in the lead against the 808, no? Perhaps this is where that added versatility from the optical zoom wins out.

Basically, when there is no zooming involved, the 808 will win every time.

As ever, it’s instructive to add up the scores: Nokia 808 PureView: 76/100, Samsung S4 Zoom: 79/100. Giving the overall win very slightly to the Android-running S4 Zoom, though as I’ll explain in the third part of this feature, beating the Nokia 808 comes at something of a huge price in terms of bulk and form factor. It’s actually a big compliment to the 808 that Samsung have had to go this far into standalone camera component territory in order to finally pull ahead of the Symbian phone.

In terms of the strengths of each device, it’s clear that the Nokia 808 PureView wins every time when no zooming is involved, but that optical zoom beats PureView zoom every time once the level gets near 3x or beyond. Which is as expected – physics usually wins, as I’ve been saying about the Nokia 808 sensor for ages, in comparison to other tiny-sensored phones like the iPhone and Xperia Z. However, with the S4 Zoom we have a device which, in one respect at least, manages to out gun the 808 in terms of physics, with its huge optical zoom.

http://www.allaboutsymbian.com/features/item/17932_Crossover_smartphones_Nokia_80.php

 

Where does that leave the 1020? Well it’s a good thing Nokia’s positioning it as zoom reinvented. It’s not about initially zooming it at first, it’s about taking the picture and then reframing it and recomposing the picture later. Even if you did zoom in, you can zoom back out and do the picture again without having to go back on that scene. The SIV Zoom can’t do that. Actually, the 808 can’t either, if you zoom in at least before snapping the shot.

I expect Apple, if they continue to do what they do with regards to marketing, is to come up with some new gimmick thing with their camera to make it more interesting too. If they simply launch it with a better 12MP camera, then we’d expect the 1020 to easily trounce it at least where perception is concerned.

Cheers spacemodel for the tip!

Shot on Nokia Lumia 1020! Launch promo from New York #ZoomReinvented

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 01:04 PM PDT

1020 PROMO

Wow, check this out. The video looks soo good. There was a guy at the event just filming with a Nokia Lumia 1020. As it turns out, it’s for this promo.

The fact it was shot on Nokia’s own Nokia Lumia 1020 is awesome. They should have tried something like that with the other promo videos too! Oh, remember that film that was shot on the N8? I was watching that the other day (it stars Tywin Lannister along side Pamela Anderson :p).

I was pleasantly surprised by the quality of the videos I had shot simply with the Nokia Lumia 925 so it should be no surprise the 1020 looks so good.

Lumia 1020s Ready to Ship!

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 11:16 AM PDT

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Head of Nokia Sales and marketing, Chris Weber, just posted the image above in a tweet mentioning that the Lumia 1020′s are rolling off the production lines and should be ready to ship! yay!

For some reason though the 1020′s in the image above seem to be glossy rather than matte? Is it the light playing off it or are we in for a surprise (an unpleasant one, since I really like the matte).

Lumia 1020 Priced $659 Off Contract (At&t locked?)

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 09:10 AM PDT

GECF37OThe rumors regarding the pricing of the Lumia 1020 were apparently off when it came to off contract pricing. Thankfully the Lumia 1020 isn’t as expensive as we thought ($699), rather a slightly more reasonable $659 without the two year agreement.

Although $40 doesn’t make *that* much of a difference, it does make the price tag slightly easier on the wallet.

If you’re interested you can pre-order it at the At&t store below:

http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/devices/nokia/lumia-1020-matte-yellow.html#fbid=k6Lrz_X7o2N

 

Lumia 520 Image & Video Test + Dropped Frames While Filming in HD?

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 08:54 AM PDT

 

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We’ve covered the Lumia 520 a bit in the past; so here’s the obligatory camera test that must be part of any review. The Lumia 520 has a 5 Mp camera without any form a flash, which means that you can’t use a torch while recording videos either.

Up first here’s a video sample in 720p (maximum output for the 520); unfortunately this is probably one of the only areas where the inferior specs of the 520 showed off, while recording I had some dropped frames and stuttering while filming; which you can see in the video sample below. The audio was also cutting out which is a bit disappointing; check it out below:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nE_wNNDyLRs

On the other hand in terms of images the 520 was very impressive, the lack of flash made for some poor low light images of course (so I didn’t bother with them); but it’s very easy to forget that the phone doesn’t have a flash.

The 520 also seems to have the same “darker viewfinder” issue that the 920 has; where the captured images always end up looking brighter and nicer than the viewfinder, which is good.

Check out some full res samples below:
WP_20130702_003 WP_20130702_004 WP_20130702_006 WP_20130702_007 WP_20130713_001 WP_20130713_010 WP_20130713_016 WP_20130715_001 WP_20130715_003 WP_20130628_009 WP_20130702_002Video

 

QuickTest: Nokia Lumia 1020 vs Canon EOS 60D. PureView vs DSLR (filmed on Nokia Lumia 925)

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 02:24 AM PDT

mnb Nokia Lumia 1020 (14)At the Nokia Lumia 1020 launch, the demo areas had a ‘lab’ with Nokia and Carl Zeiss folks inside. They had a resolution test chart whereby you can compare the detail the Nokia Lumia 1020 resolves against your competing device. I only had Nokias with me at the time but I did bring that massive EOS 60D. We weren’t allowed to get the samples from the 1020 so the best we could do was view from the device screens.

Below is a crop from my Canon EOS 60D (the actual photo it took). At the time I recorded the video I mistakenly said it blurred at 15 as I read the number direction wrong. It blurs possibly about 12-13.

The Nokia Lumia 1020 blurs at about 15/16. Now this isn’t testing out image quality. It’s merely demonstrating that the Nokia Lumia 1020 does indeed capture a lot of detail, and in this instance, so much more so than my DSLR which I can’t bring everywhere like I can with my smartphone. And now when my smartphone becomes the Nokia Lumia 1020, it’ll have that versatility again to capture all that lovely extra detail.

I think because of the crop sensor on my 60D, the 1020 also has a slightly wider angle (so it isn’t already a little zoomed in like in other smartphones).

As well as all that detail, the OIS helps in keeping my hand steady so as not to blur the lines by way of user fault. This is where my 808 at the time sometimes stumbled on some occasions due to shaky hands.

BTW, lack of AF really killed using my 60D to do hands on demo videos. I think it was Sam J Pullen who noted that even the 650D with Continuous AF was not good enough for him. Fortunately I had the Nokia Lumia 925 there to capture video (or the 920).

I think even the Nokia people were surprised as they asked to take a photo of the result I had. Haha.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1wt3e_yeDMg

From the 60D. Full res here: http://imgur.com/DBHXP0S

IMG_0628

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Video screenshot from 1020

video screenshot 1020

Here’s another test. This is of this screen. Full image available at http://imgur.com/3aQYNXV

This is actually something I’ll be using quite often whenever I have lectures to take pictures of. When I had the 808, I remembered just having such incredible detail from the lecture slides!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AhNQFoM5TSk

mnb Nokia Lumia 1020 (18)

Silly smartphone. You’re not supposed to show up a DSLR. Especially not a Lumia! You’re not even supposed to be able to handle 41MP! What’s that about.

Beautiful: Rick Ray Photography delves into Nokia Lumia 925

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 01:24 AM PDT

925 photos

We were tweeted these photos by Rick yesterday and quite right as he mentions, he does have some fantastic low light photos.

Awww kittty! http://www.nickrayphotography.co.uk/blog/2013/7/nokia-lumia-925

Rick is a wedding photographer. He uses two Canon 5DMklll bodies and a variety of prime lenses. But even he doesn’t lug those around everywhere and thus the camera that takes the rest of his photos is the one that’s always with him. His smartphone. He notes that smartphones however are limited particularly in low light situations so he was given the opportunity to test this out in the Nokia Lumia 925 and he came away impressed.

Someone give this man a Nokia Lumia 1020 too!

925 photos

AVAILABLE: Pre-order the 41MP Nokia Lumia 1020 PureView, ships July 23rd! 50GB Cloud storage free!

Posted: 16 Jul 2013 01:18 AM PDT

PREORDER NOKIA LUMIA 1020

 

I think it was pre-orders from July 16th (today?) and then shipping on July 23rd. All just from July 11th announcement. Well done Nokia.

 

http://www.att.com/shop/wireless/devices/nokia/lumia-1020-matte-yellow.html#fbid=WsI9F3nXEb2

With AT&T Locker for Free you get an additional 50GB storage.

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