What is the best camera phone

February 3, 2007

Although its easy to look at a camera phone and decide how good the image quality will be from the resolution its not quite that simple. Sometimes the number of megapixels isn’t the only factor to consider when buying a camera phone. Unfortunately without testing each phone first it’s impossible to choose. Thankfully GSM Arena has tested 2 of the best camera phones to see which is really the best.

Until the Nokia N95 is released the LG K920 is the only 5MP camera phone on the market and it’s being tested here against the very popular Sony Ericsson K800i and the Nokia N73. Both mass market phones albeit at the high end of their respective ranges.

All the cameras produced great results as you would expect but each had subtle differences resulting in marked contrasts in the image quality. If you want to see the full results visit the link at the end of this post, a quick summary is below:

The Nokia N73 produces over-saturated, over-sharpened, high-contrast photos. For the untrained eye these photos have more punch, more “wow” factor. When shooting a dull scene this approach produces more pleasant results. The problem comes when the scene is colorful and contrasty. Then the extra processing can lead to unnatural looking photos. It’s quite ironic that Nokia N73 won its fans taking the idea of the so called “Sony colors” to extremes. Some years ago Sony used to boost the color saturation of their digital cameras as an extra advantage over their rivals. They don’t do this anymore in their recent models.

On the other hand Sony Ericsson K800 has more laid-back approach - the photos aren’t over processed, which ensures better results if you are going to edit them later.
It’s not fair

LG KG920 shows at the same time better resolution, correct colors and lower noise levels. Although the phone manufacturers don’t publish the specs for the sensor used in their camera phones, photos like this make us think that KG920 have a sensor with larger physical dimensions than the ones used in the phones, maybe this is the same sensor used in some low-level digital cameras. The colors of K800 are quite off (especially the green), while N73 has e serious problem with the yellow - the oversaturation sometimes comes at a price, look at the yellow cube.