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[azurelunatic]

The point of a camera phone is more stealth than anything else. One has deniability and might have been checking a message. An actual camera is blatant.

Comments

[suckswhen.livejournal.com]

is this azure!spy? lol

[wibbble]

Several EU countries, and Japan, I think, require cameraphones to make a noise or flash a light when taking a picture. Most new Nokias do this with no way to turn it off.

The stealth aspect worries people - there's rules about taking pictures without permission.

[azurelunatic]

More like Azure!unintentionallyhilariousworkplace.

[azurelunatic]

There's a difference in tact between a noisy flashy camera and a discreet little cellphone red-light-blink.

I like "environmental" pictures better than candid shots of people I don't know particularly well. But the "yes, I *am* taking pictures of the copy machine, because I'm here half the day lately" explanations are ones that while perfectly legitimate, I'd prefer to avoid with the subtlety of a non-obvious phone rather than a "Hi! I am Taking A Photograph!!" camera.

[wibbble]

The light on the Nokias is not discreet - it's a bright LED, which flashes before you take the picture (even if you have the flash off - it's not as bright as a proper 'flash' flash). Similarly, the noise that some of them play is loud and definitely not discreet, and most handsets don't allow the sound to be turned off, or made quieter.

Expect to see this becoming standard across all phones as more places pass laws about it and manufacturers find it easier to just make all their devices unsubtle instead of trying to sort it out by region. At the moment, even with the noisy Nokias, it's nowhere near as bad as whipping out a dSLR - but it's only a bit better than a standard compact digital camera. The main thing still in favour of the phone is that until you take the picture, it at least doesn't look like you're about to take a picture.

[wibbble]

I should add that I'm speaking as someone who's had to field lots of complaint calls about the newer handsets being really, really obvious when you take a picture - and also as someone who nearly blinded themselves on an N73 taking a picture of their eye when they didn't realise that a 'notification' flash was going to go off.

[azurelunatic]

I far prefer lights, even reasonably bright LEDs, to noise.

[wibbble]

At the moment it seems a bit random as to if a handset will flash a light or make a noise. The one I have signed out from work makes a noise by default (as well as flashing a light), but you can change and turn off the noise. Some flash a light /and/ have a noise you can't turn off.

The handset I paid my own money for (a Windows Mobile handset) doesn't force either.

The only way to be sure any particular handset wouldn't do this would be to test it.

[azurelunatic]

My camera phone has an optional noise, and no light, not even if you want one.

[wibbble]

The LED-based flashes on cameraphones are pretty much all crap anyway. They're more useful as a torch than as a camera flash.

Once again, I kinda wish my phone had no camera: it would make it a little smaller and lighter, and since I usually have a second (borrowed from work) phone with me with a good camera, I don't need one on this. (And with bluetooth, I can get the high quality pictures from my work phone onto my own phone easily if I want to post them to the internet or something.)

[azurelunatic]

I'm reasonably happy that Ruby's camera has settings for different lighting situations. Even though I thought it was a bit of a shite camera at first, the lighting settings make it ten times better than the dedicated digital camera I bought a year previous at the same price.

[wibbble]

The image quality on my point-and-shoot digital camera is still better than most of the Nokia handsets I've played with: it's got a bigger, better-quality, lens and a proper Xenon flash. On the other hand, the image processing and scene modes/settings are better on the phone I've currently got from work (a Nokia 7390, which is at the high-end of the mid-range, if you see what I mean).

Top-end cameraphones can be really good. Just generally from people other than my employer, though.

Having said all that, even a simple VGA resolution camera with a cheap lens and not even an LED flash can still be useful in good lighting. The image posts I've made to my LJ have mostly been from this kind of phone. My new phone has a 2 megapixel camera, but the resolution is let down by a cheap lens and poor image processing.

Everyone at work is dying to get their hands on the N95: top of the line with a 5MP camera, a really good lens, and enough processing power and storage space that it could actually produce good pictures.

[crisavec.livejournal.com]

there's rules about taking pictures without permission.

Not in the US. There are laws about USING photos without permission, but if you're in a public venue and someone is taking photographs, you have no legal right to tell them to stop.

[wibbble]

I did mention Europe and Japan, which is where the cameraphone companies are based and where their strongest markets are. So even if there's no laws in the US, you're still going to be affected by this.