In praise of the cell phone.

Sometimes a dedicated camera is not the right choice, and I do not have a camera with me constantly. Now that I have a choice of focal lengths on my iPhone, I find it much more useful. Things like this little set are much easier to do without getting noticed, with a cell phone. I always have it with me, so I can catch the unexpected. The quality is not bad too. Fine for internet, and I do not think I will ever make a huge print of this demo, that I came across by chance, whilst out shopping.

Or maybe this crop.

I wondered why one of the protesters, wanted to keep the church out of her panties.

With today's modern cameras just about any digital camera can output at least decent looking images, especially in good light.

Personally I use my phone camera to take snapshots when I have no other option.

Especially when needing different types of flash (bounce, fill, off-camera etc) I prefer to use my dslr.

Most people choose to use a phone camera as their main and/or only camera and that is fine as it is their choice to make if the phone camera gives them the image quality that meets their needs.

When I see professional photographers turning up to weddings and major sporting or other events with just a phone camera in hand then I will consider taking them more seriously.

The pictures my family like most, are the pictures of my cat. My phone camera is great when I catch the cat doing something interesting. I can post funny ones to my son to make him laugh, almost in real time.

A phone camera is great for those everyday moments, that we might like to share.

Or when I was out on site, on a farm, and sent a picture of a new friend to my wife.

I doubt anyone would disagree, especially when no other camera is an option at the time.

In 2023, the total number of cameras shipped worldwide had decreased to less than 8 million units (*).

In 2023, the total number of smartphones shipped worldwide had increased to over 1100 million units. Yep, more than one billion.
That's ~150 smartphones vs. one traditional camera.

(*) compared to over 110 million cameras in 2011

The dedicated camera has returned to levels that were normal before the digital camera boom.

The dedicated camera is still essential for certain types of photography and photo usage. The user base is obviously much smaller.

For a lot of casual photogrphy my latest iPhone has replaced the Lumix LX100, even if that camer is still very useful sometimes.

Hi,

I use a camera the most often in my electronics lab,. documenting failures. The cell phone cam is the most used. After that,.a Kodak DCS 760c, which is a Nikon F5 with a 6 MP digital back, is used on a copy stand with macro lenses. I call that my MacroScope. Some times I need to get in a lot tighter and so use a 5-50x Leica microscope with a 2 MP Kodak DCS body.

Out and about, the cell phone cam is used somewhat, but I use either a full frame Nikon or a Pentax 645 digital medium format camera more often.

BTW, when I worked at Ericsson, I had a Nikon Coolpix 100 I carried everywhere for documenting things. It became my trademark. And also inspired the first cell phone camera, the CommuniCam to go on our T68 pocket phone. That hung onto the system connector on the bottom of the phone. The next turn of the development crank put the camera into the phone itself. Where it has remained.

Stan

fascinating post. Have you got a picture of the Communicam?

Hi,

I still have boxes of the things I worked on. Somewhere on a set of shelves I call the SOE. Shelves of Obsolete Electronics. So,.being lazy, I eyeballed the web instead of pulling out a T68 and a MCA-20.

And it went on one of these with the lens pointing toward the rear so the screen was the viewfinder.

These were done while we we still just Ericsson but right before we got into that joint venture with Sony. So the bulk of those products were sold as Sony Ericsson in blue or white (the Ericsson ones being gray or gold).

The camera was interesting as it fit the bill for something to carry all the time but wasn't a great camera. It was VGA. And one could either cable the phone to a computer to pull the shots off or use the Bluetooth connection.

Stan

Thanks, for this item from the not too distant past.

Hi,

You are welcome. But that was a long, long time ago from the electronics R+D perspective.

That was GSM for telephone and GPRS for data. As in 2G or, if we are being generous, 2.5G. Ancient history given I am now working on 6G radio system R+D....

Nothing stands still for long.

I would have to dig one out of its resting place and read the date code to be certain, but my westware is saying the T68 was Y2k.

Stan