[barareklam]

I have been thinking what to do with my brand new Lumia 920 because I am dissapointed with picture quality. They are simply not sharp, and I am not talking only daylight or night pictures. In my case MOST of the pictures are not sharp. However all Macro pictureas are sharp, and one of a hundred both daylight and low light ARE sharp.
My previous phone is Nokia N8 and wife have Iphone 4s so I know what to expect from a phone.
I have dowloaded app called Camera Easy and that app simply take SHARP pictures.
Here are two comparison, two sharp are of course taken with Camera Easy app, and two not so sharp pictures are taken with default Nokia Lumia 920 software. ( I have bought Camera Pro as well, but pictures have same quality as Nokia Lumia 920 default software, not sharp).
However there is one bug in Camera Easy app, it can save images in own folder somewhere on Lumia 920, but they are not listed on camera roll or albums???

(reason why I am covering my eye is because I took over hundred of pictures and looking in flash light that many times will hurt my eyes.... so some protection )

NOKIA, dowload this app and learn how to do things correctly :)

[david90531]

No Camera Easy in my marketplace.... strange.

[pdskep]

Have you downloaded the firmware update yet?

[ton_pkt]

Wow, your default camera gave a terrible blurry images.

That's pretty strange since I and lot of users here don't get the same result as yours.

Did you update the OS already?

[david90531]

Yea my camera definitely take much better photos than yours.. must be something wrong with it I think

[barareklam]

Have you downloaded the firmware update yet?

Not yet, looks like I will have to wait until february 2013 :(

[JackYoung]

I've updated my phone already. Tried the camera easy app myself.
Ran some minor tests regarding sharpness and I can verify that there is a slight difference.

Pictures from the native camera app appears to have slightly more blurry edges and sublte noise issues compared to pictures taken from the 3rd party app.
Pictures from the camera easy app appeared to have greater sharpness, though that's really all it offers.
App wasn't intuitive enough and pictures can't be saved onto your regular saved pictures gallery (as OP already stated)

Will not be keeping this app, but glad to know the camera does have the potential to be better.
Would be appreciated if Nokia took note.

[gnrthx]

Thanks for the heads up, I'll try it up!

[barareklam]

Yea my camera definitely take much better photos than yours.. must be something wrong with it I think

Hmmm.... So it is possible that my phone have faulty camera? I was thinking that L920 produce blurred images. What do you guys think? If it is fault with my L920 maybe I should take it to Nokia care? Do you think I got faulty unit?

[JackYoung]

Hmmm.... So it is possible that my phone have faulty camera? I was thinking that L920 produce blurred images. What do you guys think? If it is fault with my L920 maybe I should take it to Nokia care? Do you think I got faulty unit?

You mentioned that you haven't had the chance to update the phone?
If that's the case, then I don't think you have a faulty device.
Initially, before the update, my Lumia would consistently produce pictures with blurry edges and not-so-sharp details.
In other words, that's just how it is.

Unfortunately, the camera just doesn't live up to the hype.
It's a good camera, don't get me wrong, but I guess with all the talk before the device came out, I really was expecting much better.

[snakebitten]

Might just be my lack of photo savvy, but many folks have remarked about the quality of the pics I have been taking with this phone. Not saying it's SLR quality, but for a cell phone its remarkable.

[JackYoung]

Might just be my lack of photo savvy, but many folks have remarked about the quality of the pics I have been taking with this phone. Not saying it's SLR quality, but for a cell phone its remarkable.

I have my gripes mainly because I am a previous iPhone user and comparatively, the iPhone 4 (not even the 4s) just had crisper pictures.
The Lumia does take pictures with greater detail and can handle lighting much, much better, but I feel the lack of sharpness is crucial when talking about picture quality.

As a cell phone camera? Yes, remarkable.
As a cell phone camera is this day and age, and also as compared to the competition? I think Nokia can do better.
I say this not in spite, but rather in trust, because I KNOW Nokia can do better.
I wouldn't have bought a Lumia if I didn't think so ;)

[decheng1218]

cant find the app you told

[barareklam]

cant find the app you told

Camera Easy,
From Bulldozer, don't know why You can't see it?

[Big Supes]

My 710 takes better shots than those originals...

[barareklam]

Might just be my lack of photo savvy, but many folks have remarked about the quality of the pics I have been taking with this phone. Not saying it's SLR quality, but for a cell phone its remarkable.

My Nokia N8, more than two years old, takes much much better pictures. That is one of the reasons why I am so dissaponited. Please take a look at some pictures that I posted on this forum, thred "pictures taken with Lumia 920" think they are on page 31, ,search for my name, barareklam.
Pictures/Videos taken with your 920!

[Aldiggi]

Its just funny cause in the viewfinder right before you snap the pic its crystal clear but when it processes and saves then you get the blur. This is an easy fix guys its just when are they going to polish this out.
Sent from my Lumia 920 using Board Express

[George Ponder]

Nokia's Creative Studio will let you sharpen the images in the matter of seconds... the softness that some notice is not anything to lose sleep over. Luckily the softness is fixable.

Even DSLR's will take a soft image from time to time.

[Rico]

How much sharpening is too much or too little is a very subjective thing. I've found that before the Portico update, shots were a little softer than I'd like, but largely fixable with Nokia Creative Studio. After the update, sharpness is increased and the white balance/color temperature is much more accurate. Saturation seems the same. My biggest gripe with the camera is that there's no sharpness, contrast, or saturation controls for people who want to tweak their default settings one way or another. If you're coming from an iPhone or a Galaxy S3, you'll probably hate the lack of sharpening and saturation if that's what you're used to, but in my experience the Lumia 920 shots look much more natural.

[barareklam]

How much sharpening is too much or too little is a very subjective thing. I've found that before the Portico update, shots were a little softer than I'd like, but largely fixable with Nokia Creative Studio. After the update, sharpness is increased and the white balance/color temperature is much more accurate. Saturation seems the same. My biggest gripe with the camera is that there's no sharpness, contrast, or saturation controls for people who want to tweak their default settings one way or another. If you're coming from an iPhone or a Galaxy S3, you'll probably hate the lack of sharpening and saturation if that's what you're used to, but in my experience the Lumia 920 shots look much more natural.

I'll suggest you to look at pictures in this thread where I post some portraits taken with my Lumia 920,
Pictures/Videos taken with your 920!
How much sharpening I want? Well look at that picture which I posted in same thread, but this time, picture is taken with my two years old Nokia N8.
Please, to all of you that claims that some post process sharpening can fix this issue, if you really think that, please download some of my pictures from that thread and do it and post your result here on forum. I promise you if you can show that I can give you job to develop Photoshop CS 8, or whatever dream job you want in which ever imaging company you want!

Make this picture with women same sharp as picture with a man. You can use whatever you want. Please post your result here and you will get the job of your dreams!

[misterRafter]

search for 'cameraeasy'! in the store you'll find it. All one word. I'll test it

[misterRafter]

right, tested it. Camera Easy does sharpen up the images slightly. A bit better than the standard camera!

[Quist2012]

I too want to reiterate what the OP is saying here: THIS IS NOT AN ISSUE OF SHARPENING THE IMAGES.

This is an issue of the standard camera either not capturing information or basically corrupting the information from the sensor, wiping out fine detail completely. Since the information is not in the photo (i.e. not just hidden behind poor rendering) no post-processing can ever fix the picture. The Camera Easy app, however, allows the photo to retain the actual information that the sensor captures. With those pictures, you can sharpen them further, or pretty much do whatever you want with, because most of the information is actually intact.

Needless to say, I have the exact same issue. I also didn't want to wait for the OTA update and installed various versions of the Portico update on Nokia's Navifirm servers and the pictures do not improve. This is true of the Belgium Proximus, unbranded Belgium, unbranded Hong Kong and T-Mobile Germany updates on my phone.

Could our phones be defective? Maybe, but if so, why is Camera Easy doing so well with the hardware we have?

I'm at a loss to explain this, but needless to say, the failure of the Portico update to fix the camera on my 920 leaves me very disappointed. (Lastly, I should mention that my phone is Swedish unbranded - 059Q9H4 RM-821_CV_Sweden...White.)

[Brutos UK]

How do you get the pictures off the phone to do a comparison ? They just disappear when I save them to the gallery and they don't show up using the file browser when connected to a pc ? But just by flicking between the apps the easy camera app appears to have more noise, which probably means it's just sharpening the pictures more.

edit; After taking a few outdoor pics I would say the standard Camera takes better pictures due to the more precise focus when touching the screen.

[barareklam]

How do you get the pictures off the phone to do a comparison ? They just disappear when I save them to the gallery and they don't show up using the file browser when connected to a pc ? But just by flicking between the apps the easy camera app appears to have more noise, which probably means it's just sharpening the pictures more.

edit; After taking a few outdoor pics I would say the standard Camera takes better pictures due to the more precise focus when touching the screen.

Yes, they can't be saved in camera roll or albums for some reasons. I just took screenshots. Power button and windows button at same time.