iPhone Part IV - Camera

There are various schools of thought, when it comes to the success of the iPhone. Personally, I feel this success stems from Apple’s ability in making a product ‘seemingly’ out of this world. What I mean by this is, in a very rational way, the iPhone appeals to most, not because it gives them that technological edge over others, but because it manages to integrate its existing technologies better than the other phones. The embedded iPod music player is a great example.

Features
When looked at phone from a utilitarian point of view, I have to admit that the camera just fails to grab my attention. That said, I daresay, I still enjoyed every bit of my shooting spree. The 3.5-inch screen definitely had something to do with it.

The iPhone boasts a 2 megapixel camera, and for purposes limiting to the phone itself, it does wonders. Beyond that? Well let’s see what our performance tests show. Before that, let me also point out a few missing elements that leaves a lot to be desired

Not having flash, for instance! Every phone, worthy of so much hype, should in my opinion have a flash. This one doesn’t. Also this one doesn’t allow you to zoom, or take videos. In a strict sense, it’s simply a point-and-shoot camera phone. I still like the way the animated shutter blades close in on the screen every time you take a picture.

The iPhone allows you to instantly share your pictures through email, and also gives you a fair amount of control. You can set it as a wallpaper and crop it to reduce the size. The interface allows you to look at the thumbnails of the all the pictures taken, you can simply click on one and swipe your fingers for the next image. When attached to a computer, you can sync your pictures through iTunes to send your images across or retrieve any file. The good thing, at least when it comes to the camera, is that when the phone is connected to the PC via USB the only external portion of the device that shows up is the image gallery. You can easily copy paste your files directly from here.

Performance
At first, the camera appeared to have brilliant color reproduction. Which, in a way is true, but I think this stays so only while viewing the pictures on the phone. The colors sure are vibrant, but not accurate. The reds are slightly dulled, and the green badly splayed.

With no flash, the camera is quite susceptible to blurs in low light conditions. In fact, not having a flash is a bad move, since this limits the functionality of the camera to a large extent. What I mean is, if you have the “iPhone” why should you stay shy of clicking a few snaps of your dinner guests?

All the pictures we clicked had a green hue to them and were plagued by purple fringing. Yet, there were some commendable pictures. However, it’s purely hit or miss. The pictures can serve you well for web purposes or for use within the phone itself.

Conclusion
Clearly, having no flash and no video shooting capabilities makes the iPhone lose the edge on a few other phones that sport 2 megapixel cameras. The presence of the camera, to me seems more of 'for the sake of it', than as a great tool. However, we like how the camera works, making good use of the phone's interface. Personally, I think the iPhone fails to provide a great camera.