5 ms·

Android based camera from Nikon: Coolpix S800

29 points by esolyt 14y ago

deleted 14y ago
[deleted]
beering 14y ago
Every new device launched with an obsolete version of Android is part of the price that Google pays for making Android as free as it is. And frankly, I don't see the market for a slow, buggy Android experience tied to a Nikon camera.
- esolyt 14y ago
  Actually that is the reason these devices can launch at all. Nothing was stopping Nikon from using Ice Cream Sandwich. Apparently, they just don't care that much about the user experience. Those who do are free to use the latest version of Android.
- soperj 14y ago
  They probably wouldn't have launched at all if Android wasn't as free as it is. It'll be interesting to if this will work.
- revelation 14y ago
  This is not a slow, buggy Android that happens to come with a camera. This is first and foremost a camera. And when its running Android, that can be win win for everyone involved, if Nikon makes the hardware sufficiently open. Anything is probably better than having to flash your custom firmware through a freaking IR led.
  - esolyt 14y ago
    But still, people are going to run apps on it and they are going to see the user interface everyday (which was vastly improved with Ice Cream Sandwich). They would never release this with Gingerbread if they really cared about user experience.
pigubrco 14y ago
Interesting...the one nice thing I do like about the Google+ app running on Android is how it automatically uploads my pictures to a private folder online. Many times, I have come back from long hikes but the pictures remain in my slr for a few days because I was too lazy/tired to upload my pictures from the SD card to the computer. Having this functionality to automatically upload your pictures once you get home would be nice.
- miahi 14y ago
  For the "antisocial", you can do the same with Dropbox.
  - esolyt 14y ago
    In fact, I prefer Dropbox's Camera Upload. With Dropbox, when I go home and sit in front of my computer, I find my photos as actual files existing on my computer. Google, on the other hand, is trying to make it very convenient to share them on Google+ and very inconvenient to download and store them locally. They don't even sync it to Google Drive as files. They are trying to eliminate the concept of "file" from the users' mind, just like Apple.
- CrazedGeek 14y ago
  Eye-Fi[1]'s Wi-Fi enabled SD cards already do this, and it's beautiful. Only downsides are cost and that you have to turn the camera on once you get home. [1] http://www.eye.fi/ http://www.eye.fi/
kawera 14y ago
Finally, apps for cameras. Thom Hogan has been advocating this for some time now[1] and the success of the CHDK[2] somehow shows us that a lot of photographers may be interested in this. I hope Nikon starts a trend with this camera and go all the way to Android enabled DSLRs. [1] http://bythom.com/design2010.htm http://bythom.com/design2010.htm [2] http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK Some ideas: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/august31/levoy-opensource-camera-090109.html http://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/august31/levoy-opensource...
pjmlp 14y ago
Does this really make sense? I mean, a camera is for taking pictures and the corresponing OS should only care about the job of taking pictures and show them later on. Why do I need a fullfledge Android system running on my camera? This seems more like a toy experiment.
- akashshah 14y ago
  There are so many things a camera could do that it can't right now: * Sharing photos on Facebook, Twitter * Post processing pictures (like Instagram) * Automatic backup to Dropbox * Live stream videos
  - pjmlp 14y ago
    That is what computers are for.
- soperj 14y ago
  I'm sure people had the same complaints about smart phones.
- GuiA 14y ago
  >Does this really make sense? I will ask the same question, but for a different reason— non-DSLR cameras are just becoming obsolete. Go to any touristy place, and you'll see more people using smartphones (and surprisingly, tablets) than point&shoot. No teenager today would want to buy a p&s when they can use their phone, which produces similar (or better) image quality and already has apps/sharing/etc.
  - ars 14y ago
    There is no way a phone can make an image of comparable quality to a reasonable p&s. Just the size of the lens and imaging element alone should tell you that.
    - GuiA 14y ago
      I enjoy photography a lot, and own a m4/3, a DSLR, and an iPhone 4S, several film cameras and polaroids. Most of my "everyday" shots (ie. shots of friends and family at events, etc.) are taken with my iPhone. It performs better than would be desirable in all situations. That's what people care about.
cageface 14y ago
This kind of thing is the reason I've started boning up on Android development. With the sheer volume of phones on the market and the versatility of the OS in completely unexpected applications I think there's going to be a lot of demand for people with Android skills in the future.
- zalew 14y ago
  yep, same here
- TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
  I'd love to learn it, but Java and XML scare me away.
  - cageface 14y ago
    It feels kind of verbose some times but with a good IDE like IntelliJ it's really not that bad. Hopefully Kotlin will take off on Android and eliminate a lot of the verbosity. Obj-C on iOS isn't much better really though.
scotty79 14y ago
I was seriously let down that my new washing machine doesn't run on android.
sadlyNess 14y ago
This might only work if it remains a camera; tactile buttons, a non attention-stealing screen, its own app store(custom camera apps), and the apps function more like plugins/addons than apps. Otherwise it'll be just another android phone with a better camera instead of a simpler CDHK.
wisty 14y ago
Some random camera stats: The iPhone has a 1/3.2" sensor (9.7x crop factor), a 4.28mm length f/2.4 max aperture. That's like a 43mm f/23 full frame (basically, apature scales with crop factor just like length); or a 26mm f/14.5 APC-C. Compared to a 1/2.3" sensor (which the S800 is likely to pack) it's like a 6mm f/3.3 lens (43mm full frame, as they don't like to mention how apature scales). The advantage of a S800 will be the range (25mm -> uselessly long without a tripod and good light), compared to the 43mm prime iPhone; apature and image quality will be similar. Also, the Nikon will have niceties like vibration reduction, a flash (maybe), smarter focusing / metering, better processing (maybe). The real question is, who would want one? I'd say - people with dumb phones who carry cameras; and hipsters who want to be seen with a camera while they play Angry Birds on the bus. It might be bigger in non-US markets, where phones don't appear so cheap (due to hidden carrier costs).
- arrrg 14y ago
  Does aperture scale with the crop factor? I don’t think that’s the case. f/2.3 will always let the same light in. As you (hypothetically) scale up the focal length (the numerator), you also scale up the pupil size (the denominator), so the aperture remains constant. The effect on DoF is different, sure, but not on light – and I think with those kinds of cameras you are more interested in their ability to let in light than their ability to produce shallow DoF (that’s pretty much a given for any small sensor camera).
  - Gring 14y ago
    If you scale up everything, the aperture stays constant, correct. But since the larger sensor can work with much more light, it therefore has a much higher S/N-ratio. If you switch that camera to a higher aperture, you get less light, leading to a lower ratio again. So the lower S/N-ratio of the smaller sensor could be estimated as a higher aperture. Whether the numbers calculated by wisty are correct, I don't know, though.
    - arrrg 14y ago
      Please don’t do that. That’s just confusing the issue and highly misleading. The f-number is a property of the lens and nothing else. The S/N ratio of the sensor is independent of that. It’s correct: smaller pixels tend to have a lower S/N-ratio, which mostly means that you can’t turn up the gain as much as with sensors that have larger pixels (you can’t increase the ISO by as much) and you will see more noise at the same gain. But that’s no law of nature. It’s possible to have a crappy large sensor and an excellent small sensor. It’s the sensor that matters here – and there are many more variables involved there. Sensors with pixels a certain size don’t have a certain S/N-ratio only depending on pixel size. And any exact mathematical formula (like f-number scaling with crop factor) doesn’t make sense there, not at all.
dave1010uk 14y ago
Could anyone who knows about optics say how this compares to Nokia's 808 PureView camera/phone? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_808_PureView http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_808_PureView
theDaveB 14y ago
I use to be a press photographer (now develop mobile apps) and I can already think of some really useful apps I would love to have had on my camera to help with the job. Dave
fyolnish 14y ago
There's a rumor site focusing exclusively on Nikon? : o
- lmm 14y ago
  That isn't really any crazier than a rumour site focusing exclusively on Apple
- rrreese 14y ago
  Not only that, there are rumour sites for most of the camera systems: http://www.canonrumors.com/ http://www.canonrumors.com/ http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/ http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/ http://www.fujirumors.com/ http://www.fujirumors.com/ etc
  - Gring 14y ago
    Don't forget http://leicarumors.com/ http://leicarumors.com/
Nicole060 14y ago
Adding android to their p&s cameras is not what I expected from them. Nikon has a huge problem to tackle and adding android to their p&s is not the solution. While Nikon makes great DSLR (but not necessarily better than the competition), their point and shoot cameras aren't any good. Not when compared to the Canon S95 in the cheap segment. Or the Fuji X10 in the expensive segment. Nikon can't even get the mirror-less interchangeable lens system right : what were they thinking with the Nikon 1 ? the sensor is way too small, much smaller than the already small sensors of the Four Third system from Olympus/Panasonic and the size of the sensor is one of the most important thing to consider when it comes to image quality. Canon obviously knows better than Nikon and their entry to that market will feature an APS-C sensor. Whatever it is that Nikon does, they do not understand photography anymore, apart from the few who work in their DSLR division.

29 points by esolyt 14y ago

deleted 14y ago

[deleted]

Every new device launched with an obsolete version of Android is part of the price that Google pays for making Android as free as it is. And frankly, I don't see the market for a slow, buggy Android experience tied to a Nikon camera.

esolyt 14y ago
Actually that is the reason these devices can launch at all. Nothing was stopping Nikon from using Ice Cream Sandwich. Apparently, they just don't care that much about the user experience. Those who do are free to use the latest version of Android.
soperj 14y ago
They probably wouldn't have launched at all if Android wasn't as free as it is. It'll be interesting to if this will work.
revelation 14y ago
This is not a slow, buggy Android that happens to come with a camera. This is first and foremost a camera. And when its running Android, that can be win win for everyone involved, if Nikon makes the hardware sufficiently open. Anything is probably better than having to flash your custom firmware through a freaking IR led.
- esolyt 14y ago
  But still, people are going to run apps on it and they are going to see the user interface everyday (which was vastly improved with Ice Cream Sandwich). They would never release this with Gingerbread if they really cared about user experience.

pigubrco 14y ago

Interesting...the one nice thing I do like about the Google+ app running on Android is how it automatically uploads my pictures to a private folder online. Many times, I have come back from long hikes but the pictures remain in my slr for a few days because I was too lazy/tired to upload my pictures from the SD card to the computer. Having this functionality to automatically upload your pictures once you get home would be nice.

miahi 14y ago
For the "antisocial", you can do the same with Dropbox.
- esolyt 14y ago
  In fact, I prefer Dropbox's Camera Upload. With Dropbox, when I go home and sit in front of my computer, I find my photos as actual files existing on my computer. Google, on the other hand, is trying to make it very convenient to share them on Google+ and very inconvenient to download and store them locally. They don't even sync it to Google Drive as files. They are trying to eliminate the concept of "file" from the users' mind, just like Apple.
CrazedGeek 14y ago
Eye-Fi[1]'s Wi-Fi enabled SD cards already do this, and it's beautiful. Only downsides are cost and that you have to turn the camera on once you get home. [1] http://www.eye.fi/ http://www.eye.fi/

kawera 14y ago

Finally, apps for cameras. Thom Hogan has been advocating this for some time now[1] and the success of the CHDK[2] somehow shows us that a lot of photographers may be interested in this. I hope Nikon starts a trend with this camera and go all the way to Android enabled DSLRs. [1] http://bythom.com/design2010.htm http://bythom.com/design2010.htm [2] http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK http://chdk.wikia.com/wiki/CHDK Some ideas: http://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/august31/levoy-opensource-camera-090109.html http://news.stanford.edu/news/2009/august31/levoy-opensource...

pjmlp 14y ago

Does this really make sense? I mean, a camera is for taking pictures and the corresponing OS should only care about the job of taking pictures and show them later on. Why do I need a fullfledge Android system running on my camera? This seems more like a toy experiment.

akashshah 14y ago
There are so many things a camera could do that it can't right now: * Sharing photos on Facebook, Twitter * Post processing pictures (like Instagram) * Automatic backup to Dropbox * Live stream videos
- pjmlp 14y ago
  That is what computers are for.
soperj 14y ago
I'm sure people had the same complaints about smart phones.
GuiA 14y ago
>Does this really make sense? I will ask the same question, but for a different reason— non-DSLR cameras are just becoming obsolete. Go to any touristy place, and you'll see more people using smartphones (and surprisingly, tablets) than point&shoot. No teenager today would want to buy a p&s when they can use their phone, which produces similar (or better) image quality and already has apps/sharing/etc.
- ars 14y ago
  There is no way a phone can make an image of comparable quality to a reasonable p&s. Just the size of the lens and imaging element alone should tell you that.
  - GuiA 14y ago
    I enjoy photography a lot, and own a m4/3, a DSLR, and an iPhone 4S, several film cameras and polaroids. Most of my "everyday" shots (ie. shots of friends and family at events, etc.) are taken with my iPhone. It performs better than would be desirable in all situations. That's what people care about.

cageface 14y ago

This kind of thing is the reason I've started boning up on Android development. With the sheer volume of phones on the market and the versatility of the OS in completely unexpected applications I think there's going to be a lot of demand for people with Android skills in the future.

zalew 14y ago
yep, same here
TazeTSchnitzel 14y ago
I'd love to learn it, but Java and XML scare me away.
- cageface 14y ago
  It feels kind of verbose some times but with a good IDE like IntelliJ it's really not that bad. Hopefully Kotlin will take off on Android and eliminate a lot of the verbosity. Obj-C on iOS isn't much better really though.

scotty79 14y ago

I was seriously let down that my new washing machine doesn't run on android.

sadlyNess 14y ago

This might only work if it remains a camera; tactile buttons, a non attention-stealing screen, its own app store(custom camera apps), and the apps function more like plugins/addons than apps. Otherwise it'll be just another android phone with a better camera instead of a simpler CDHK.

wisty 14y ago

Some random camera stats: The iPhone has a 1/3.2" sensor (9.7x crop factor), a 4.28mm length f/2.4 max aperture. That's like a 43mm f/23 full frame (basically, apature scales with crop factor just like length); or a 26mm f/14.5 APC-C. Compared to a 1/2.3" sensor (which the S800 is likely to pack) it's like a 6mm f/3.3 lens (43mm full frame, as they don't like to mention how apature scales). The advantage of a S800 will be the range (25mm -> uselessly long without a tripod and good light), compared to the 43mm prime iPhone; apature and image quality will be similar. Also, the Nikon will have niceties like vibration reduction, a flash (maybe), smarter focusing / metering, better processing (maybe). The real question is, who would want one? I'd say - people with dumb phones who carry cameras; and hipsters who want to be seen with a camera while they play Angry Birds on the bus. It might be bigger in non-US markets, where phones don't appear so cheap (due to hidden carrier costs).

arrrg 14y ago
Does aperture scale with the crop factor? I don’t think that’s the case. f/2.3 will always let the same light in. As you (hypothetically) scale up the focal length (the numerator), you also scale up the pupil size (the denominator), so the aperture remains constant. The effect on DoF is different, sure, but not on light – and I think with those kinds of cameras you are more interested in their ability to let in light than their ability to produce shallow DoF (that’s pretty much a given for any small sensor camera).
- Gring 14y ago
  If you scale up everything, the aperture stays constant, correct. But since the larger sensor can work with much more light, it therefore has a much higher S/N-ratio. If you switch that camera to a higher aperture, you get less light, leading to a lower ratio again. So the lower S/N-ratio of the smaller sensor could be estimated as a higher aperture. Whether the numbers calculated by wisty are correct, I don't know, though.
  - arrrg 14y ago
    Please don’t do that. That’s just confusing the issue and highly misleading. The f-number is a property of the lens and nothing else. The S/N ratio of the sensor is independent of that. It’s correct: smaller pixels tend to have a lower S/N-ratio, which mostly means that you can’t turn up the gain as much as with sensors that have larger pixels (you can’t increase the ISO by as much) and you will see more noise at the same gain. But that’s no law of nature. It’s possible to have a crappy large sensor and an excellent small sensor. It’s the sensor that matters here – and there are many more variables involved there. Sensors with pixels a certain size don’t have a certain S/N-ratio only depending on pixel size. And any exact mathematical formula (like f-number scaling with crop factor) doesn’t make sense there, not at all.

dave1010uk 14y ago

Could anyone who knows about optics say how this compares to Nokia's 808 PureView camera/phone? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_808_PureView http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nokia_808_PureView

theDaveB 14y ago

I use to be a press photographer (now develop mobile apps) and I can already think of some really useful apps I would love to have had on my camera to help with the job. Dave

fyolnish 14y ago

There's a rumor site focusing exclusively on Nikon? : o

lmm 14y ago
That isn't really any crazier than a rumour site focusing exclusively on Apple
rrreese 14y ago
Not only that, there are rumour sites for most of the camera systems: http://www.canonrumors.com/ http://www.canonrumors.com/ http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/ http://www.sonyalpharumors.com/ http://www.fujirumors.com/ http://www.fujirumors.com/ etc
- Gring 14y ago
  Don't forget http://leicarumors.com/ http://leicarumors.com/

Nicole060 14y ago

Adding android to their p&s cameras is not what I expected from them. Nikon has a huge problem to tackle and adding android to their p&s is not the solution. While Nikon makes great DSLR (but not necessarily better than the competition), their point and shoot cameras aren't any good. Not when compared to the Canon S95 in the cheap segment. Or the Fuji X10 in the expensive segment. Nikon can't even get the mirror-less interchangeable lens system right : what were they thinking with the Nikon 1 ? the sensor is way too small, much smaller than the already small sensors of the Four Third system from Olympus/Panasonic and the size of the sensor is one of the most important thing to consider when it comes to image quality. Canon obviously knows better than Nikon and their entry to that market will feature an APS-C sensor. Whatever it is that Nikon does, they do not understand photography anymore, apart from the few who work in their DSLR division.