Sorting through back issues of Amateur Photographer I spotted several headlines asking if some model phone could be considered a camera.

I suspect reviews will ask this question every time a new generation of smart phones boasts new camera technology. So, is the latest generation of 8 megapixel camera phones eliminate the need for photographers to carry a point-and-shoot camera when they want to travel light?

Sony, Nokia and Samsung continue to push more camera into their smart phones, with Samsung, like Sony also a well-known camera manufacturer, leading the charge with several 8 megapixel models.

Recently Samsung released the i8510 “Innov8″ as it’s flagship smart phone. The slide form factor phone runs Symbian S60 3.2, has the usual assortment of media players and includes support for Real, DivX, and various other flavours of mpeg4, mp3, aac, wmv, and a wealth of other features. It has GPS so the camera supports geotagging.

The 8GB of internal memory and another 16GB can be added via microSD.

I find it a very capable smart phone, but want to focus mainly on the camera aspects of the phone.

Handling
As phones go, the Samsung i8510 feels heavy, but this is an advantage in holding it steady, and the black-enameled metal body looks smart and feels solid.

The i8510 uses a sliding form factor, but can be operated open or closed. To operate the camera while the phone is closed requires two buttons, which is a bit disappointing as many others, such as the Nokia N95/N96 and Sony Cypershot C905, only require one button to activate the camera mode.

I started using the i8510 closed as I thought it would feel more like using a point and shoot camera, but decided eventually I preferred using it open. It’s easier to hold and allows access to the numeric keypad, which also function as shortcuts to access various camera features.

The i8510 offers a list of “real camera” features like anti-shake and dynamic range optimisation, which both work reasonably well. However they only work when using the default settings - changes of shooting or scene modes disable those features and they have to be turned back on by accessing the advanced settings.

The camera offers the user three live-view display modes - Regular, which only displays basic menus and focus area; Indicative, which shows all the available settings; and Gridline, which shows the display divided into 3 both horizontally and vertically, to aid photographers fond of following the Rule of Thirds

The 2.8 inch 24 bit display gives a crisp preview of the photos using a 320×240 pixel or QVGA resolution.

The volume keys also work as digital zoom, but as they are situated on the opposite side from the shutter release, trying to use is quite fiddly.

The keypad shortcuts are very useful, especially for quickly turning the flash on and off, setting the timer and changing the display modes.

Image Quality

Some photographers will find it hard to accept a tiny CMOS sensor from which the camera has to extract 8 megapixels of data too noisy and low-detailed to be of any use. I disagree though.

Using low-fidelity cameras requires a bit more skill than using a point & shoot. Because of dynamic range limitations you may have to occasionally use spot metering or Ev adjustments to get the exposure right. You may sometimes find it hard to get horizons level and miss detail.

Some photographer find these limitations unacceptable but I found the images produced to be reasonable.

Like all small, budget sensors the full-scale images reveal digital fringing and somewhat messily interpolated background detail:

But these days images are rarely viewed at full size and when put the resizing interpolation or printer screen they look quite sharp and very usable.

Original

Original

Original

Original

The LED flash however, looks dreadful. The LED flash created a horrible bluish cast, throws very directionally and in a beam far too narrow for the wide 28mm (equivalent) lens. Sony wisely chose to use a Xenon flash in the C905. While being far less power consumptive, I think Samsung failed badly on providing a point and shoot camera alternative by choosing LED.

More example images from the i8510 are available here.

Conclusion

I like the camera in the i8510 and will probably find myself relying on it often. I currently use a Canon G9 as my point and shoot digital camera and an old Nikon 35ti as current favourite pocket film camera. I know a tiny sensor in a phone can never compete with the quality of those cameras. It surpasses those cameras in one area though - I always have it on me. Most of my “pocket” cameras fit in a bag better than a pocket, yes they’re light but not something you’ll grab and carry while running out the door on a quick errand.

If like me you won’t carry kit around sometimes for various reasons — going to familiar locations or just off for a walk in the park or a jog or something similar — it’s nice to have a usable camera to hand. The best pictures are the ones you actually take and I know most people always have days they wished they’d brought a camera but didn’t.

The quality of the i8510 is good enough to use for web, and in a test print, printed nicely at 4×6 and A4 on Kodak Everyday Glossy Paper. A clean, daytime shot at 8 megapixels should print well on A3 as well, but I don’t have an A3 printer on which to test.

The camera supports Pictbridge printing, which made it a breeze to print straight into my Canon Pixma IP4300.

I think the quality of the images, in most circumstances, are good enough to print and post on gallery sites. If you list a decent camera as one of the things you want from a smartphone you won’t be disappointed by the Samsung i8510.

Camera Tech Specs

• 8 megapixels (3264×2448 pixels)
• 5.7mm (equivalent to 28mm) / F2.6
• autofocus
• image stabilisation
• face, blink and smile detection
• video(VGA@30fps, QVGA@120fps)
• dual-led flash
• Camera geo-tagging
• Pictbridge compatible
• Business card scanner
• TV out
• Li-Ion 1200 mAh Battery

Camera Features

Shooting Modes:

• Single Shot
• Multi-Shot
• Frame Shot
• Mosaic Shot
• Panorama Shot
• Smile Shot

Scene Modes:

• Portrait
• Landscape
• Sports
• Indoor
• Beach
• Sunset
• Dawn
• Autumn Colours
• Waves and snow
• Night Shot
• Against Light

Effects

• Black & White
• Sepia
• Sharpen
• Negative

Other Advanced Settings

• ISO 50-1600
• Matrix, Spot and Center-weighted metering
• Wide Dynamic Range

At the end of last month Panasonic released its new flagship point-and-shoot camera, the Lumix FX-500. The camera belongs to a friend of mine, and I agonised briefly over whether or not to recommend a Canon G9 or Sigma DP-1. The Panasonic aims itself at an entirely different market - it’s a small, pocketable P&S, with no optical or external viewfinder and only shoots in jpeg instead of raw or a lossless format, though the resolution is 10 megapixels.

So it looks like Panasonic aims it new high-tech point-and-shoot at an entirely different market, but not the traditional point-and-shoot market either.

Amateur photographers I know go through a multi-fold phase of digital camera buying. They buy a dSLR to replace their 35mm SLR. Then they often realise the reason they stopped carrying the 35mm SLR was not the inconvenience of film, but the inconvenience of a bulky camera. They decide they need a point-and-shoot camera for convenience. Then they choose between highly portable, or a vaguely portable alternative to a dSLR such as the Sigma DP-1 or Canon G9. I chose the latter, but many of my friends prefer the former. I don’t blame them — there’s nothing nicer than having a fairly decent camera with you at all times that fits easily in any pocket. I end up shooting with my phone instead — my Canon G9 is a bit too bulky to carry around all the time. I think the folks who chose the former may have gotten it right. Mind, I don’t have an dSLR, so the Canon is my “big” camera in the digital world.

The Panasonic will appeal to the first group, and fit the bill very nicely indeed. It mostly features high gadget-value. It has a touch screen for one example of high gadget-value. I thought Panasonic might be going a bit gadget-gimmicky with the touch screen, but I was wrong. For one, the touch screen actually has a photographic use, and a very good one — perhaps my favourite thing about this camera. The camera features “motion detection.” It’s a great feature.

Touch an area on the screen you want the camera to expose correctly and either move the camera to compose your shot, or keep the camera still and let the subject move. The camera tracks the point you focused/exposed and keeps evaluating the focus and exposure as either you or the picture moves. I can’t think, without aid of a touch screen, how else you would make that work. It is a fantastic “gimmick” and a very helpful one. It doesn’t track fast-moving objects but I suspect in the future cameras will have the processing power to do that much better.

The fast Leica lens performs as well as you would imagine. The detail and sharpness of the optics stand out as being excellent, possibly better than on my Canon G9. There is almost no flare to speak of, very little fringing, and in spite of being a P&S, the wide end of the goes all the way to 25mm (equivalent) at F2.8.

Full-sized version of the above.

Full-sized version of the above.

The biggest limitation of the camera is the auto-exposure and post processing. It seems to have a tendancy to over-expose a bit, and it occasionally gets the sky colour wrong and the results are skies that are bit too cyan rather than natural blue.

The sky is more cyan than blue.

A good job with a difficult to expose scene but the sky is a bit over exposed and has a cyan cast.

But a slight adjustment of levels quickly fixes the exposure issues:

Full-sized version of the above.

Full-sized version of the above.

Fortunately the exposure mistakes are only occasional, and it does also get it right and produces excellent results, even with tricky unevenly-lit subjects.

Full-sized version of the above.

Full-sized version of the above.

Conclusion

In some ways I prefer carrying this camera to my Canon G9. It’s tiny, light and unobtrusive. Generally taking pictures raises a few eyebrows but I found using this camera went largely unnoticed by passersby, presumably because it wasn’t much bigger than a phone and people seem to have less reservations around phone cameras in my estimation. I enjoyed using this camera a great deal, though an optical viewfinder would have been nice. I still think like a film photographer and like to sanity check my LCD composition in a real viewfinder.

At a pound shy of £300 the FX500 is a very expensive camera, especially for one that only produces JPEGS. But I think the combination of a very-wide angle, fast Leica lens, the intelligent electronics and especially the motion-tracking feature make this an excellent camera, especially given it’s exceptional portability. Therefore it makes a great small backup camera for serious amateurs as well an good choice for anyone who just wants decent digital they can easily throw in a bag or a jacket pocket. In my estimation the thing that most often prevents people from taking good pictures is the fact they don’t feel like carrying a camera around. With such small cameras able to perform well there’s no excuse now.

More sample pictures are available here.