Nokia N97 - Camera Review

The Nokia N97 sports a 5 mega pixel camera with a maximum image resolution of 2592x1944. It has Carl Zeiss optics and a dual-LED flash. This has become a standard in terms of high end phones with some newer phones taking even bigger and braver steps in the camera department. By all means we know that the N97 doesn't have the best camera in the Nokia range, but I was curious to see how good the camera was…

The camera does lack a lot of the modern features like face and smile detection, blink protection or touch focusing, but I am confident that the software has evolved well enough for Nokia to have mastered the 5MP range of cameras.

Reading around about how the camera was reviewed by users I wasn't very pleased by what I found. Many users feel that the N97's camera is a few firmware versions away from where it should be… I decided to therefore put the camera to the test. My test place was the local zoo in (Colombo Sri Lanka). This presented various scenarios for different lighting, different zooming levels of Images and Videos. I was impressed overall, but wanted to share it with the mobile community here for your comments. I had to keep the camera set to auto due to the dense crowd. I would like to hear the community's comments on the pictures and quality of pictures.

The Nokia N97 packs a 5MP camera with Carl Zeiss optics. This together with Nokia's experience with 5MP cameras should about ensure that they have mastered the 5MP range. The biggest competition it had to deal with would probably be the Nokia N82.

The camera lens is protected by a cover that needs to be manually opened when you need to take a picture. I do understand that an auto mechanism would have cost Nokia more money, but for the amount this unit cost it would have been having one.

When you are in a scenario where you have to take multiple pictures it got quite frustrating for me to have to flick the switch every time i wanted to take a picture.

The camera application can be loaded with the camera button. On a crowded day when you want to keep moving it was frustrating to switch it on and wait for the application to load up in order to take my picture. I found that sometimes the key lock would be on or that i would be back in the home screen for pressing the camera button one time too many. I wonder if this is due to the slower hardware or if the camera software needs to be optimized further.

The camera’s interface is like that of the 5800 which has been utilized and built for good touch input. The options button seemed to take a second too many to load up once the camera interface loaded. If I had forgotten to open my lens cover I was surprised that the camera remained in the primary camera instead of switching to the secondary one like my 5800 used to do (This error doesn’t happen all the time and sometimes it switched on the secondary camera like it should). I wonder if the software can detect if the back cover is open since its manual. I was also very surprised to find that the camera allowed me to take a picture while the back cover was still close…

Opening the camera cover at the back also made me wonder if I will leave a fingerprint in front of the lens every time I opened and closed it. The interface has a dedicated flash button, the options button and camera features along with the exit and take picture button. Information about the storage is also available along with a touch optimized zoom. The camera features include a scene switcher sequence shots, a timer and various adjusting features. Options are also available to quickly share your contents on Ovi. Nokia should have added the image quality button in here as well in my opinion. The flash button takes you to the options for the flash. I would have preferred if I can switch the options with just pressing the button instead of having an extra screen, but that’s just my opinion.I decided to leave my camera in auto mode through the whole process. I didn’t think stopping and changing modes would be easy on a crowded day, and I was also very scared I would drop my device somewhere I couldn’t retrieve it from.Following are the photo samples for you guys to check and comment on:

• N97 Photo Samples

I am quite impressed with the results. But having used the N82 and even the SE K850i, I can honestly say that I missed the Xeon flash. Again the cost of the unit made me wish that Nokia had given the fans all that they could have for their flagship. Even an 8MP camera wouldn’t have been a bad idea. I was impressed with the camera's functionality and it matched up to the quality of the N95 (probably a little better in my opinion). I had read somewhere that there were some color issues in certain lighting which I did notice, however The camera had two very obvious issues:

1. Zooming
2. Focus

I had to zoom into take certain pictures which when don't under direct sunlight turned out pretty bad. Some pictures which i zoomed in lower light turned out much better.The auto focus frustrated me to a great length when i tried to take pictures of animals behind cages. The auto focus would always focus on the caged bars which made me wish i had the touch focus of the 3GS available to me on my N97.The next big test for me was the flash, which i knew would disappoint me. But i was surprised to find it did an OK job. I wondered if taking a night vision shot in the aquarium would have been better. The Dual-LED flash does a pretty impressive job in low light. I don't think it would make a big impact it the room was pitch dark. But it was good enough.

Conclusion

Since I purchased my first 5MP phone the N95, I was very impressed with what Nokia provided with their cameras. It’s been a long time since the N95 had been out and we have seen Nokia reach its highest potential with the N82. With the recent release of the N86, Nokia has taken its camera’s to the next level. While the N97 cannot come close to competing with the N86, I wish the flagship Nokia device had a little more under its hood. Xeon flash, with separate LED for Video would have been nice. A mechanical shutter would have made taking pictures easier and more fun instead of the manual mechanism. I even preferred the N82’s cover to this design. Touch focusing was badly missed. Knowing that an older Sony Ericson (G900) had touch focusing made me realize it not asking Nokia for too much to have provided it.I am going to keep my fingers crossed and hope that the N97 will rule the roost for some time. I hope that a few firmware updates later we will have the best (probably 2nd best) 5MP device in the N97. I know the N97 will never replace your trusty digital camera in most scenarios. But I am confident that it will keep most of us happy.