
Nokia Lumia 1020 packs 41-megapixel camera whopper - usaphp
http://reviews.cnet.com/smartphones/nokia-lumia-1020/4505-6452_7-35822762.html
======
untog
As someone who takes a lot of photos with my phone, this interests me a lot.
Though as someone who has previously used Windows Phone, I'm very skeptical
about going back to it.

This is the first device that makes me wonder about Nokia's WP-exclusive
decision. They didn't go with Android to avoid becoming "yet another" Android
manufacturer, and I agree with that sentiment (look at how few are turning a
profit). However, there are no Android devices that really excel at stuff like
photography- I think that Nokia could have carved out an interesting niche in
solidly built, feature-focused devices.

But oh well.

~~~
300bps
I've had the Lumia 928 for 3 weeks now. My three previous phones were iPhone
3G, iPhone 4 and iPhone 4s.

Part of me wishes that I would've gone Windows Phone sooner but the realistic
part of me realizes that Windows Phone 7 was still nowhere near the quality of
iOS.

Windows Phone 8 is a completely different matter though. It's superior to my
old iPhones in almost every way. Live tiles, SkyDrive integration (much better
than iCloud especially if you get the 25 GB free from Microsoft), much better
maps application, tight OneNote integration, native Office support, excellent
Remote Desktop support. The other thing that's important to note is that the
web browsing is just as good and email is just as good. I actually do those
two things more than any other function on my phone.

~~~
untog
At the risk of starting a device war, I'd agree with everything you've said,
except that Android does a lot of those important things better still. Maps in
particular- Google Maps is utterly unparalleled.

But it's all down to the user- I have no requirement for Remote Desktop
support, so that doesn't matter to me. I don't use OneNote or Office, and use
Dropbox for file syncing.

~~~
gebe
Nokia Maps is _amazing_ and has been since the Symbian days, even more so by
the fact that you can download maps beforehand (whole countries) and use them
offline. Utterly unparalleled might be a bit harsh.

~~~
sp332
Google Maps can download maps beforehand, but for some reason it won't let you
plan a route without an internet connection. Probably because their route-
finding algorithm would crush a phone or something :)

~~~
barista
That is definitely a thing that you don't appreciate until you have to use it.
We were on road over the long weekend and were lost with no network
connection. Thanks to offline maps on my Lumia 920 I was able to find the
nearest road offline and get back on road to our destination.

~~~
yid
Not to be glib, but it sounds like your Nokia saved you from adventure :)

~~~
barista
adventure that I didn't anticipate. Yes. and I am thankful for that :)

------
limejuice
Key Specs

• 41MP 1/1.5" BSI sensor (capable of 34MP and 38MP output images depending on
aspect ratio) • Mechanical shutter • Zeiss F2.2 27mm equivalent (for 4:3 still
images) six-element lens • Xenon flash • LED light for video • Windows Phone 8
OS • 4.5" AMOLED WXGA (1280x768) display • 1.5 GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4
processor • Front facing 1.2MP camera • 2 GB RAM, 32 GB internal memory

source: [http://connect.dpreview.com/post/6384275680/nokia-
lumia-1020...](http://connect.dpreview.com/post/6384275680/nokia-
lumia-1020-preview)

~~~
mililani
It seems to me that they went backwards on the sensor size--which, I think, is
probably the most important thing for cameras next to the lens. The Nokia 808
had a 1/1.2" sensor. I was hoping the next iteration of the Nokia would have a
1" sensor.

~~~
cwe
Aren't bigger sensors generally better quality when it comes to cameras? 41mp
in a tiny sensor is lousy, those pixels need to be big enough to capture
quality light.

~~~
sukuriant
You're correct

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ing33k
I am a huge fan of android , but using wp since the past 3 months, I hope that
people who comment badly about wp will use it once before complaining about
it.

~~~
untog
I used Windows Phone 7. The UI was fantastic. The platform innovation was
poor. The Maps app (including the Nokia one) was poor- and utterly terrible at
interpreting addresses. Any IM experience outside of the built-in (and not
extendable) native options was awful.

I want to like WP, but in many ways it was a mercy when MS decided that my
(few month-old) phone wasn't going to get any updates any more and persuaded
me to head back to Android.

~~~
Livven
Why is this being downvoted? I use an HTC 8X as my main phone but the points
mentioned in this comment are perfectly true. For comparison I also own a
Galaxy Nexus and 4th-gen iPod touch.

Searching in both the stock and Nokia Map apps doesn't seem to do any
intelligent keyword parsing/correction as even the web version of Bing Maps
does, push notifications tend to be unreliable compared to iOS and Android,
live tiles simply don't consitute a notification center, and abandoning
Windows Phone 7 meant that some phones barely got a year of updates.

------
GR8K
Lumia 1020 sample images: [http://conversations.nokia.com/2013/07/11/nokia-
lumia-1020-p...](http://conversations.nokia.com/2013/07/11/nokia-
lumia-1020-picture-gallery-zoom-in/)

~~~
yread
Some more
[http://www.flickr.com/photos/87544844%40N00/sets/72157634597...](http://www.flickr.com/photos/87544844%40N00/sets/72157634597356196/)

------
yread
This video makes a good job demonstrating how the 41 MPs work
[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUMNm9-dgJ0](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vUMNm9-dgJ0)

My only complaint is that it is a bit slower than my compact..

~~~
tambourine_man
_that 's how we reinvented Zoom_

It's called cropping, and it's been around forever.

Does it save RAW? If not, it's useless to me.

~~~
slantyyz
>> Does it save RAW? If not, it's useless to me.

So is just about every other phone with a camera.

~~~
dave1010uk
In case anyone's looking for a phone with a camera that saves RAW, the Nokia
N900 does.

[http://fcam.garage.maemo.org/fcamera.html](http://fcam.garage.maemo.org/fcamera.html)

~~~
voltagex_
I've still got one, sitting in a drawer...

------
ebbv
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.

~~~
revaaron
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.

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

~~~
slantyyz
>> 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.

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

~~~
slantyyz
>> 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.

------
chenster
My first impression is, does more mpegapixel instantly make the Nokia Lumia
1020 a better phone? If you truly want to take good photos, use a real camera,
like a DSLR. Admittedly, 41-megapixel is quite a wow factor, but based on the
hardware specs it seems it's more of a camera than a phone. The other
questions is, do people want to every photo to be 20MB+?

~~~
untog
The article does a really bad job of explaining what's going on here- the
resulting photos won't be 41megapixels. It uses that huge amount as a means to
"smooth out" the noise/oddities in the photo, and save it as a more reasonable
5MP or 8MP image.

~~~
Osmium
Presumably the individual pixel size is smaller though? So where's the true
advantage here vs having fewer larger pixels which would presumably have less
noise anyway.

~~~
potatolicious
There are a few ways this is advantageous. Modern camera sensors have a bayer
filter in front of them - a RGB grid basically. This allows each pixel to see
only one color of light.

The resulting image is "demosaiced" with an algorithm, where by each pixel
determines the two colors it's missing by borrowing from nearby pixels.

This can cause some artifacts. By squeezing more pixels into the same space,
effectively each _resulting_ pixels in the ~8MP image has actual RGB data, not
just data borrowed from neighbors.

~~~
Osmium
Thanks -- I hadn't thought of that. I have read recently that there's a push
away from Bayer filters, e.g.

[http://www.43rumors.com/detailed-panasonic-colour-
splitter-s...](http://www.43rumors.com/detailed-panasonic-colour-splitter-
sensor-report/)

But I imagine that's a long way off from appearing in smartphones...

------
ctdonath
Anyone wanna comment on what one is supposed to _do_ with a 41-megapixel
picture taken under the optical limits of a camera crammed in just a few cubic
millimeters?

We're talking resolutions way beyond what's needed for most prints, and
laughable on any electronic display. Even a stunning near-futuristic 4K
display is just 9MP; need to reach 8K to start being useful. Flip side,
anything needing that level of resolution is going to demand some darned good
(i.e.: big) glass in front of it.

I appreciate the view that "what could you possibly need X for?" often has
good answers, but there are outer limits of human perception.

Only use I see is digital zoom (a la cropping), and that better prove
stunning.

~~~
hbharadwaj
Oversampling of images - super pixels. You are not taking 41 MP images.

------
JimmaDaRustla
I really wish this would rattle Android market share (I know it won't),
because I would never in a hundred years have guessed that the camera in my
Nexus 4 is as terrible as it is. My Samsung Focus had a better camera =(

I always mock my GF for having an iPhone (she buys stuff for looks), but if we
need to take a picture, hand me that baby because I chose Nexus 4 over the
Lumia 928.

------
Demiurge
But why?? It's not possible make use of more than 10mp unless you're printing
a billboard? And that is if you get whole 10mp of sharpness. The best
DSLR/Hasselblad images are limited by the cameras optics. There are other
vital properties of a camera, like dynamic range and color accuracy. Going to
extreme in one spec is absolutely pointless without improving all other
aspects of the system.

------
auctiontheory
In my experience, 99% of people don't know the first thing about taking a good
photograph. They will not be helped by a 41-megapixel or even 41-gigapixel
camera.

Beyond a point, all the pixel density does is dramatically increase their
storage requirements - on the camera, on the computer they sync with their
camera, and on their backup device. 41 megapixels is well into the realm of
negative marginal returns.

~~~
ChuckMcM
In a weird way, if you can capture enough of the light field over time (an
insane amount of data by the way) you can "go back" and get whatever picture
you want. Which has the potential of allowing complete novices to grab the raw
data with some local sensor, and to out source the 'picture taking' to someone
who can look at it and return the picture that they should have taken. I know,
its crazy talk and off the wall, but my friends in computational circles say
that its no more crazy to them than a 1TB hard drive possibility was to me
back in 2000.

------
ck2
Imagine the array dimensions on the next generation drones.

They will be able to capture large swaths of a city with just a few drones.

~~~
missing_cipher
Already here, check it out: [http://www.theverge.com/2013/2/1/3940898/darpa-
gigapixel-dro...](http://www.theverge.com/2013/2/1/3940898/darpa-gigapixel-
drone-surveillance-camera-revealed)

------
owaislone
Nokia are never gonna learn. Megapixels and Gigahertz don't matter any more.
What matters is the experience. Jolla are doing this perfectly right. Focusing
on the software to deliver an amazing and unique experience.

------
edent
So, two years later Windows Phone has finally caught up with Symbian!

Is it because WP couldn't handle the camera - or were Microsoft actively
crippling Nokia's technical advantages over the other OEMs?

~~~
dntrkv
Oh yes, because Symbian was such a great OS!

I really don't understand all you Symbian lovers / WP haters. Symbian was the
shittiest mobile OS that I have ever used. I would use Windows Mobile before
Symbian. I remember when all the Nokia lovers were raging about the N97, so I
decided to pick one up for something like $700 because it seemed like a great
phone (and it had great specs for the time). It was the worst phone experience
I ever had. Even after doing all the updates and mods that everyone suggested,
it was still extremely buggy and slow.

~~~
slantyyz
I've never used Symbian, but if it's worse than Windows Mobile 5, then it's
got to be really bad.

If you didn't quit the camera app on WM5, it would stay running in the
background and kill the battery without you knowing it. I also had lots of
hangs that prevented me from answering calls.

------
superuser2
Past a point, more megapixels does not mean more quality. I'd like to see
better optics before we pour R&D into sensors.

~~~
UnoriginalGuy
I see this copy/paste a lot. And while MP doesn't mean better dynamic range,
lower noise, faster shutter speeds, or higher ISO performance saying that it
isn't "higher quality" is nonsense.

Higher megapixels literally mean more information about a scene stored by the
sensor. Now that information might not be more accurate than a camera with
lower MP, but even with that being the case it does better allow you to sub-
divide the picture (crop it) and generate new scenes/images without noticeable
pixelation.

I shoot with an SLR. I've read this "MP is meaningless" stuff a million and
one times. But the people spouting it are almost wrong. Yes, there is FAR too
much focus given on MP over more interesting things (e.g. dynamic range) but
people take a basic truth too far.

After going from 10 MP to 16 MP, sorry, but it did make a difference. In
particular the freedom it gave me in post.

~~~
sukuriant
The issue I have with super-high megapixel cameras isn't that number, it's the
sensor density. At certain densities, light begins to behave different because
of the shape of the sensor and it doesn't capture the image correctly anymore.
This is part of the reason why a 16MP SLR and a 16MP point-and-shoot have
vastly different image qualities. As for your SLR, 16MP, even around 20MP is
still well within the "light behaves well" range. 16MP in the point and shoot
range? 40MP in the camera phone sensor range? Now we're getting in a bad
place.

~~~
UnoriginalGuy
> This is part of the reason why a 16MP SLR and a 16MP point-and-shoot have
> vastly different image qualities.

I'm sure the fact that the SLR's sensor is physically sixteen times larger has
nothing to do with it...

As I said above, MP is just one way to measure a sensor's performance
characteristics, and they have kind of ignored some others (dynamic range in
particular).

I'm not sure I follow your argument about "light behaving differently as
pixels get smaller." I'm not even sure if that argument has scientific merit.

~~~
superuser2
>I'm sure the fact that the SLR's sensor is physically sixteen times larger
has nothing to do with it...

He's agreeing with you. When consumer-level devices boost megapixels, they
don't usually boost the sensor's physical size.

The explanation I've heard is that the denser you pack the sensor elements,
the more interference they receive from each other. This is why digital images
become grainy at higher ISO, and why the problem is worse with higher-
megapixel cameras (when the sensor size isn't also increased). SLRs can go
higher than P&S cameras while maintaining acceptable levels of noise because
their pixel density is lower (even if there are more total pixels).

In this particular case, they did make the sensor larger, which is great. But
this is part of why more megapixels does not mean better.

------
ceautery
That's pretty good. In a few more years digital resolution might be comparable
to film.

------
davidcollantes
41 megapixel camera, how big are those photos, and how much space will the
phone come with?

~~~
barista
Comes with 32 GB I think and the photos are 5MB I think.

~~~
davidcollantes
5 MB only? Wow. My 12 megapixel Canon D30 used to take raw photos that were
20-24 MB in size.

The 32 GB will get reduced by the OS, I am sure.

~~~
dhbanes
Surely this phone does not store raw images.

------
malkia
41 megapixel camera would make quite big images, even compressed.

------
mtgx
Maybe this would've had a chance with Android, but with WP8? It's a niche
offering within a niche OS market. It's like offering Battlefield 4 for Linux
_only_.

~~~
rgulati
If everyone had an attitude like that, no one would ever take a risk to fight
the incumbents in any of the markets.

Offering Battlefield 4 for only Linux would do wonders for Linux adoption.
Linux on the desktop needs something like that to push it.

~~~
danmaz74
Only, what would a game company care about Linux adoption?

~~~
rjbwork
Ask Valve...

~~~
danmaz74
Why, they're going to release their next Half Life as a Linux exclusive? Or
even any lesser franchises?

~~~
rjbwork
They've released a good bit on linux thus far as a hedge against the demise of
windows as a gaming platform. Go do your own reading on the topic.

~~~
danmaz74
We were talking about exclusives, not hedges.

~~~
rjbwork
You asked the question: "Only, what would a game company care about Linux
adoption?" Regardless of the content of your parent's context, you were
specifically asking about why a game company cares about Linux. I provide
information, you say it's irrelevant unless they're developing solely for
Linux. How silly.

~~~
danmaz74
Let's just say that everyone is entitled to have a different opinion about
what is sillier, ignoring the context of a question or deeming irrelevant an
answer that is out of that context. Cheers!

------
blackcoffeee
I would buy it.

------
rgulati
The whitepaper on an older version of the technology is here.

[http://i.nokia.com/blob/view/-/849564/data/2/-/Download1.pdf](http://i.nokia.com/blob/view/-/849564/data/2/-/Download1.pdf)

The Xenon flash eliminates the blur in standard flash. Comparison pictures
against the S4 and iPhone 5.

[http://i.imgur.com/fUe8rLC.png](http://i.imgur.com/fUe8rLC.png)

The optical image stabilization is cool, with ball bearings replacing the
coils on the Lumia 920. Sample video comparison against the S4(Edit: S3, my
bad).

[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuLlAa4zDbU&t=0m55s](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuLlAa4zDbU&t=0m55s)

More details here.

[http://conversations.nokia.com/2013/07/11/nokia-
lumia-1020-t...](http://conversations.nokia.com/2013/07/11/nokia-
lumia-1020-the-smartphone-camera-revolution-begins/)

~~~
vanderZwan
> Sample video comparison against the S4.

Ahem, S3. I'm sure the 920 will still perform favourably against an S4 in this
regard, but still.

------
Maakuth
Even with this kind of device, it is still very doubtful if Nokia is going to
get any kind of success with Windows Phone. Their market share drop has been
nothing short of catastrophic everywhere but in the US, where they never had
significant market share. Even their feature phones have stopped selling as
well as they used to. It will be interesting to see if they can get back on
track with current strategy or with any strategy at all.

~~~
martingordon
This is a niche device, IMHO, which may be the way to go for Nokia (as long as
the software can keep up).

It starts at $299, which is $100 more than the entry price of the iPhone 5
(even though it's the same price as the 32 GB iPhone, you can get an iPhone
for cheaper if you wanted to).

It won't necessarily appeal to people for whom iPhone/GS4 quality photos are
good enough (and who only share on Instagram anyway) but it definitely takes
the place of a point and shoot. It seems much more appealing than the Galaxy
Camera or Galaxy S4 Zoom.

