[galavanter]

One exciting thing about the camera comes from this item

http://mobiledivide.com/2009/01/28/p...ces-09-part-2/



That's impressive!

It is indeed. The quick turnaround and space bar shutter button are very appealing.

[meballard]

Higher megapixel counts in a cell phone camera can actually hurt image quality. With the size of the sensor needed for a cell phone, going to high pixel counts actually makes it harder to get a good picture. I'm sure doing auto-focus in hardware probably would've caused space problems as well.

Whether Palm found the right compromise in quality vs space etc remains to be seen, although the initial comments from people who have seen it takes pictures have been quite positive. Any other speculation is purely that, speculation.

I've seen normal size digital cameras with 5MP resolution that took worse quality pictures than 3MP cameras from another manufacturer. A Gateway camera my parents had for a while had auto-focus and optical zoom, but the pictures looked really bad.

[galavanter]

Any other speculation is purely that, speculation.

Surely you aren't including the fact that a a lens that can focus is preferable to a fixed focus lens which then over sharpens through software to correct the resulting blur.

[meballard]

Surely you aren't including the fact that a a lens that can focus is preferable to a fixed focus lens which then over sharpens through software to correct the resulting blur.

Yes, I am, it depends on the lens and the sensor. A software focus can potentially be better than another lens and sensor with a hardware focus, especially considering the size of the sensor and lens in a cell phone.

[galavanter]

Yes, I am, it depends on the lens and the sensor. A software focus can potentially be better than another lens and sensor with a hardware focus, especially considering the size of the sensor and lens in a cell phone.

All due respect but I find that statement disingenuous. So you are saying software correction can be better if the autofocus doesn't focus and the lens and sensor we are comparing it to suck. I'll have to grant you that one.

But ALL THINGS BEING EQUAL, this is never and has never been the case. The laws of depth of field just don't work that way.

[meballard]

All due respect but I find that statement disingenuous. So you are saying software correction can be better if the autofocus doesn't focus and the lens and sensor we are comparing it to suck. I'll have to grant you that one.

But ALL THINGS BEING EQUAL, this is never and has never been the case. The laws of depth of field just don't work that way.

I'm saying it all depends on the components. If a significantly smaller sensor would've been needed to fit an auto-focus lens, then you could end up with worse quality that a software focus. Or perhaps spending more on the lens requires putting in a cheaper sensor. Whenever putting something in a phone, there is always a trade-off, and it remains to be seen if Palm made a good tradeoff in this case.

[ADGrant]

Yes, I am, it depends on the lens and the sensor. A software focus can potentially be better than another lens and sensor with a hardware focus, especially considering the size of the sensor and lens in a cell phone.

How many cameras with "software focus" have you used.

[rulk]

Well actually I thought I saw somewhere that the hardware in the Pre supports up to 14mp for the Camera but the software that was installed in the phone was designed to be what the majority of people would use on a phone. With the limitations of transfer speed, memory usage, speed to save the picture and such my understanding was the Pre's mp count was determined to be as it is but could be upped dramatically by third party software if someone wanted to. But as others have said, the optics involved may be a limiting factor as well. Wish I could remember where I saw that article but I am assuming it was 14mp... Could have been more.. I just remember it was higher then the 12mp kodak camera I bought recently...

In the end I guess they decided on a happy middle of the road for cell phone cameras... If the higher mp hardware rumor is true then you could upgrade the definition of the camera with a simple software upgrade with a likely loss of something be it simply storage capacity, speed in saving the picture or whatever.

[cary328is]

People get too hung up on how many megapixels a camera is, like it's the only factor that determines the quality of the picture. The quality of the lens and CCD are far more important.

Excellent point! Megapixels come more into play when you're blowing up a pic for printing. My old 2mp camera takes great pics and people can't tell if it was from a higher mp cam or not. Besides I don't think palm intended this to compete in the cam area although it's already higher mp than most other phones out there

[johncc]

The OMAP3430 CPU can handle sensors up to 12 mp, but if Palm has fitted a 3 mp sensor then software won't be able to get around that.