Nokia N8 Camera Tricks

The Nokia N8 camera is packed with clever camera technology. From its ultra-quick mechanism to the smart software inside. Read on, and see how many of these N8 camera secrets you already knew.

Mechanical shutter inside
The Nokia N8 has a mechanical shutter, like a full blown digital camera. That means it’s faster to snap a shot when you press the camera key. In fact, it’s faster than humans are able to perceive. The Nokia N8’s shutter lag is just 150ms. The average human reaction time is 250ms, so unlike other camera phones, you won’t notice it.
Lag-free viewfinder
As well as having a blisteringly quick shutter, the N8’s viewfinder updates quickly to display smooth movement and really show what’s going on. There’s virtually no lag between what the camera sees and what’s shown on screen, so when you hit the shutter button, you get exactly what you see.
Fast auto focus
Nokia has improved the speed of the N8 autofocus dramatically, compared to rival camera phones. It’ll lock onto targets in around 350ms. Obviously that depends on how far away a subject is, and what the lighting’s like, but typically you’ll get a sharp shot in less than half a second.
The flashiest of flashes
The Nokia N8 packs a Xenon flash. That’s just like the one  you’ll find on a dedicated digital camera. Unlike LED flash, it’s ultra-bright and very fast, firing for between 1/3,333 and 1/200,000 of a second to freeze any subject you point it at. Forget motion-blur and smeary snaps, the Nokia N8 stops them dead.
Long range lighting
As well as being fast, Xenon flash has a much larger range than LED light bulbs. The Nokia N8 can illuminate a subjectaround 3.5m away outdoors, or indoors up to 5m away. Try a similarly-specced camera phone with an LED flash, and your subjects will be dark, featureless blobs, while the N8 cranks out quality pictures every time.
Large sensor means low noise
The Nokia N8 has lots of fancy optics, autofocus and flash wrapped around its camera sensor, but the sensor itself is also mighty special. It’s the largest ever crammed inside a mobile phone – and actually larger in size to most compact digital cameras at 1/1.83” and using 1.75 micron pixels. That might sound geeky, but it all means there’s less distortion and digital noise as it works its magic. In turn that means less grain and sharper photos.