Nokia 808 PureView gets reviewed on DPReview – “Nokia blows its competition out of the water”.
The Nokia 808 PureView sets another milestone in getting itself reviewed on DPReview, a highly respected camera review site.
They’re impressed with the detail capture.
It’s hard not to be impressed by the 808′s performance here, especially at low ISO sensitivity settings. At its maximum resolution of 38MP the 808 is capable of capturing a ton of detail, and pixel-level image quality is up there with some of the best cameras around. In its 8MP PureView mode pixel-level image quality is extremely high at low ISO settings, and even up at its highest ISOs, the 808 gives a lot of ‘proper’ cameras a run for their money.
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/3
On page 4, we hear from Juha Alakarhu how optical zoom in the 3MP N93 resulted in a very low F-number at the telephoto (zoom) end. This meant at 3x zoom, there was more noise and more blur (if exposure time was too long). With PureView, the F-number remains the same. Juha says the best way to show it’s not all about the 41MP is to see the images. So true. As incredible as the specifications on the 808 PureView’s camera sounds (to the point that we’ll get moans from Sony and Olympus) they only have to see results, such as GSM Arena’s blind camera tests, that make said whiners eat their words. The proof is in the eating of the pudding and the 808 produces some of the sweetest pictures around.
Regarding PureView coming soon to Lumia? Er, no. It doesn’t sound like it will appear any time this year.
Nokia only announced our collaboration with Microsoft a little over a year ago. You don’t develop something like PureView in such a short time. We have already announced that our plans are to bring Pureview technologies to our future Windows Phone portfolio.
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/4
A brief, wonderful summary of what Nokia achieved in the past 10 years of imaging. I wish this was how they introduced the 808.
Nokia has long heritage of producing excellent camera phones. We made our first camera phone, the 7650 ten years ago. The N90 was our first device with autofocus and Carl Zeiss optics, the N93 featured our first optical zoom in a mobile phone camera, and the N95 introduced a 1/2.5″ sensor. More recently the N82 was our first cameraphone with a xenon flash, the N86 had a variable lens iris, the N8 had a 1/1.8″ image sensor, and now we’re introducing the 808 PureView, which introduces an even bigger sensor, and our proprietary oversampling.
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/4
It makes me smile because I remember my folks at the time telling me this camera phone thing was just a gimmick.
Pros and Cons?
Not a lot on RichRecording, but this is a camera/photography site so I wouldn’t have expected a lot of talk on video.
- Excellent detail resolution in all modes
- Very good image quality – detailed, colorful JPEGs
- Impressive photographic feature set – controllable ISO, WB, scene modes et al
- Generally reliable AF and metering
- Automatic white balance works well in all but the trickiest of light
- PureView allows ‘zoom’ without penalty in image quality
- Excellent video quality (and sound)
- http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/5
Things Nokia needs to improve on (Cons)
- Highlight clipping problematic in scenes with wide tonal range
- No one-shot HDR/dynamic range expansion function (but bracketing is available)
- Metering can be rather wayward in bright light
- On-screen histogram only available while exposure compensation dialog is open
- Interface somewhat dense in ‘creative’ mode
- Obscure on-screen icons for ND filter and white balance in creative mode
- On-screen ISO indication just shows ‘M’ when any setting other than Auto is selected
- Non-optical ‘zooming’ doesn’t allow control over depth of field
- No image stabilization in still capture mode
- Red-eye can be an issue in flash shots (but red-eye reduction works well)
- http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/5
Conclusion:
Pretty impressive. I’m concerned that they found the camera UI a little fussy. It is so much improved from the S^3/Belle interfaces, but I’d have to agree that there is still improvements to be made to make the options clearer and easier to use. Still, it’s a much better offering than that lump of turd Microsoft dared to put in as their Windows Phone camera UI. Yes tap to snap a photo is nice, and swiping to see the gallery is good enough to be stolen by google for jelly bean, but everything else was designed by someone with a goal to frustrate you into punching walls.
As a phone, they don’t like Symbian too much but that’s not news. They like the vertical zoom on the 808 and say the pinch and zoom has never felt natural on their iPhone. Whilst they praise the simulated zoom for maintaining the high quality, they do note that it does lack that background blur at the telephoto end. A major issue they note is something called ‘highlight clipping’
Final Word:
There are inexpensive compact cameras that offer more photographer-friendly features than the 808, but as a cameraphone, the Nokia blows its competition out of the water, and significantly narrows the gap between dedicated cameras and portable communications devices to the point where ultimate convergence seems all but inevitable (and probably sooner than some commentators had realised)
http://www.dpreview.com/articles/8083837371/review-nokia-808-pureview/5
The 808 proves that Nokia can innovate, and its PureView technology has piqued the interest of serious photographers, being one of the most important innovations – arguable the most important – in mobile photography since the smarphone era dawned five or so years ago. As such, the 808 is intriguing not just in itself, but because of what it represents. Things could be about to get interesting…
I believe there’s also a gold award in it for the 808.
Thanks Bhairav and tulip for the tip!
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The publication of the review itself speaks volume…..
More praise for Nokia. Good stuff!
Amazed by how effective the pureview is at all mp settings.
Too bad Nokia never really advertise all the capabilities of 808 to attract buyers. All focus is put to Lumia and WP8 only :/
just another amazing review for the pv technology,
when nokia puts the pv in lumia all the isheep and haemodroids will die with envy.
Not going to happen anytime soon, and certainly wont be as big as the 41mp sensor in the 808..
yeah if the lumia pureview is not 41mp, it will be a marketing disaster,
I disagree. The technology is miles ahead of what anyone is doing, and probably will be doing by the time PV is released on WP.
Even at less than a 41MP sensor, WP with PV will best any camera on a phone, save the 808, and will definitely be a joy to use and provide an overall wonderful user experience.
Q4 2012 or 2013, doesn’t matter to me; I’m definitely buying WP8 with PV – on contract or full MSRP
You can’t go much lower than 41 MP… Well for 2 times zoom sure, but Pureview does what? You should see how it applies the DSP level filters. To make use of PureView you need a lot of accompanying pixels. Go down to say 20 MP full resolution, you won’t get a useful PureView. Just as Damien told us why no true PV algorithms will be used in any update with the N8. 12 is just not enough. I mean the PV image you want to get in the end should be not lower than 5 MP for convenience. The same issue will remain with only 20 MP.
So it’s either on the level of the 808, or not at all. Would be of no use. I’d rather think that Damien is on to improving the algorithms and the sensors as well and not going down in MP size. I mean what for?! By the time WP8 let’s Nokia access the necessary layers, why do you think on should go with less than 41 MP?
External DSPs will do the work anyway
i agree with you both,
but im thinking about tech blogs, they mostly try to cause drama so they can get more web clicks,
if nokia releases under 41mp the tech sites will criticise it only to cause web traffic,
maybe call it little pv, or lower standard pv, or cheaper version of pv etc etc
and android/ios fanboys will seize the opportunity to also ridicule it as not being “really” pv,
and unfortunately the average consumer will listen to all their opinions and hold off
buying until a “proper” 41mp pv is released on wp8,
nokia needs to avoid all this headache and lost sales,
if the phone has pv then it must be a 41mp sensor, equal with the 808,
nokia can also release lower mp pv to cater for different budgets and needs,
but for public opinion and perceptions, it must have a 41mp pv wp8,
If they can get it without the bulge, but still higher res than anything else out there, they’ll be fine. Just as long as they also release a 41MP version.
I’m just curious…
I read that the next SoC approved for WP8 only supports 20mp. Why not use the same 1/1.2″ sensor size, same optic, same flash, but with larger pixels so it only has 20mp instead of 41?
With 20mp, you can still do oversampling on that, and gives 5mp result in the end…. Sure you can’t zoom as much, but it’s still better than anything out there….
Apart from the 808 that is
It’s so good you can even see the bra of the girl in one of the photos
Smart people could understand the potentials of PureView
Look how TechRadar reviews Nokia 808 and bragging about how miserable Symbian is
Highlight Clipping
I’ve noticed this in pics I’ve taken and I had assumed it was me choosing the wrong settings in creative mode kind of a shame
and advantage of pureview mode over full resolution seems to be minimal
another interesting point is the comment by Juha about the N95s sensor size 1/2.5″! larger than the iphone4s
(something I was interested in finding out but couldn’t)
I think you mean “and the advantage of full resolution over pureview mode seems to be minimal” ?
I see minimal differences..so for the extra zoom ability and smaller size files, its better to just stick with the 5mp PV default .
Even my 2mp PV captures are quite stunning..
I’m a proud owner of an 808 since last week, and a few friends are now very tempted to buy one as well. Since the phone screen is not HD it was difficult for them to appreciate the quality of the pictures, but two things blew them away: the rich recording audio quality (I showed them some videos and asked them to wear headphones) and the zoom and zoom again possibility with full res pictures. Unfortunately in Switzerland you can only buy this phone in web shops and very few physical stores. Even Nokia fans are going to hesitate to buy a phone that they have not had the chance to hold in their hands.
http://www.easypolls.net/poll.html?p=5010c2d8e4b0026fdd124312
Australian 808 poll..
where can we get the red 808 online ?
Most reviews mention ISO 64..where is it ? ISO setting does not show it ??