Phone cameras

[Critique]

So, recently, a lot of phone manufacturers have been upping their game in terms of the quality of the cameras. In fact, some of them are getting good enough to rival dedicated point and shoot snappers.

So, my question tonight is: Could phones soon replace dedicated cameras? I certainly believe they could - the camera on my current phone is good enough for me to feel that I have a good camera on me at all times.

But how about you?

[cwathen]

For certain purposes the phone camera already has replaced conventional digital cameras and it's certainly more convenient, but for serious photography I just can't see it happening.

The phone manufacturers may be getting there in terms of megapixels but more megapixels does not necessarily mean a better camera - phones still have the serious limitation that you have a small fixed focus lens with no optical zoom and a poor quality flash. Combined with the fact that pretty all phones have no option to save the photo in an uncompressed format but instead will only save as a JPEG, you've got a lossy compression attached to all the phone's output too.

The output from a phone camera often does look stunning on the phone's own small screen, but transfer the file out to a PC and view it at full resolution and even on high end phones you usually find yourself looking at grainy, mushy pictures which get ruined further with compression artefacts. Even sub £100 digicams put them to shame.

[Nick Harvey]

Phone cameras are good enough to take pictures as evidence when Johnny Teenager, who's either pissed or high as a kite, runs into your car because he's no longer capable of driving safely. That's good enough for me. For proper picture quality, I refer the honerable gentlemen to Dr Lobster for real guidence.

[Ebeneezer Scrooge]

Other than what cwathen said, I think the main problems with phone cameras is the amount of noise generated on such a small sensor when manufacturers try to cram on too many pixels - I think 5megapixel is about maximum for a phone sized sensor, and then there is the poor perspex lenses that seem be have been chosen to sit over the fixed focal length lenses. It doesn't take much to get scratches in that and then it shows quite quickly on the photos. You can have the best lense in the world, but if the last element of it is as poor as most of the manufacturers are choosing, it renders them pretty useless!

[Dr Lobster*]

I think phone cameras have come a long, long way. Optically, and in terms of sensor noise they may not be able to output an image that can match a high end compact, but then they're not meant to. But even so they easily match the high end compacts of 4 or 5 years ago, and we were getting a4 sized prints from those that looked pretty good and on my Samsung galaxy s2, noise, colour rendition and dynamic range is actually very impressive considering the size of the entire camera module, lens and all is a few millimetres.

In fact though, I'm not so sure many people in this digital age get as many of their photographs printed and stuck in an album as in the film days where you had to get them printed just to see them, I think many people just stick them on facebook, which seems to murder quality.

I think the biggest argument for a dedicated compact camera is ergonomics, trying to press buttons on the touch screen whilst composing the shot especially in bright sunshine very challenging, but then I prefer a proper optical viewfinder LCD screens are really hard to see anyway and lack true definition.

But in answer to your question - yes. For non photography enthusiasts, for people who just want to capture memories with the push of a button, phone cameras are great and in many ways have an inherent advantage over a dedicated compact insofar as most people will always have their phone on them in their pocket.

[Beep]

Phone cameras are good enough to take pictures as evidence when Johnny Teenager, who's either pissed or high as a kite, runs into your car because he's no longer capable of driving safely. That's good enough for me. For proper picture quality, I refer the honerable gentlemen to Dr Lobster for real guidence.

Part of police evidence training - got your phone take evidential snaps on it.

[Jake]

If Nokia would pop one of these into a decent phone I'd happily switch to a Windows Phone.
http://www.theverge.com/2012/6/25/31134 ... iew-review

[Critique]

And, just a few weeks after I asked this question, Samsung have announced the Samsung Galaxy Camera, running Android, with the 4.8 inch screen from the SIII, a 16-megapixel sensor, and 20X optical zoom.

Android Central has more.

[Christopher]

Probably won't be long until one of the big four / big five puts out an Android-powered CSC, then things will get interesting.