Smartwatches have been a thing for nearly a decade at this point, letting users view notifications, control media playback, and occasionally even make phone calls Dick Tracy-style from their wrist. But one thing that hasn’t really taken off, despite the occasional attempt from one watch maker or another? Smartwatches with cameras. Now it looks like […]
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Sony’s $1800 Xperia PRO-I is a high-end camera that’s also a smartphone, I guess
Sony makes high-end cameras. Sony also makes smartphones. So it’s no surprise that the company also makes the cameras used in many smartphones, including Google’s highly-rated Pixel smartphones. Up until recently, Sony’s own phones weren’t really known for stand-out camera capabilities though. But earlier this year the company changed that by introducing the Sony Xperia […]
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Would you pay $300 for a webcam that isn’t awful?
Even the best USB webcams on the market these days struggle to compete with a decent smartphone camera when it comes to image quality, focus, lighting, and all the other stuff that goes into a high-quality video. One solution is to just use your phone or DSLR camera as a webcam, but that can take […]
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Samsung built a 200MP smartphone camera sensor
This year smartphone chip makers including Samsung and MediaTek started making processors capable of supporting camera resolutions up to 200 megapixels. But up until now there was nobody actually making 200MP cameras for smartphones. Now there is. Samsung’s new ISOCELL HP1 image sensor can capture still images up to 200 megapixels or record 8K video […]
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A clunky (but useable) method for recording video on a PinePhone
Most smartphones ship with software capable of taking advantage of all the device’s hardware. But the PinePhone isn’t most smartphones. It’s designed to be an open platform for developers and when it first began shipping there was only some very basic software available. Among other things, there was no working camera app. Now there is. […]
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1 Comment on Leica launches its first smartphone in Japan (but it’s really a re-branded Sharp Aquos R6)
Leica launches its first smartphone in Japan (but it’s really a re-branded Sharp Aquos R6)
1 Comment on Leica launches its first smartphone in Japan (but it’s really a re-branded Sharp Aquos R6)Camera maker Leica has been partnering with smartphone makers for years, with companies including Huawei, Panasonic, and Sharp shipping phones with Leica-branded cameras. Now Japanese wireless carrier SoftBank has introduced the first Lecia-branded smartphone. The Leica Leitz Phone 1 is available exclusively in Japan, where it goes up for pre-order June 18 for ¥187,920 (~$1700). The phone […]
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Sharp Aquos R6 is a smartphone with a 1 inch camera sensor
At a time when most flagship Android smartphones have the same processors and similar screens and other tech, one way device makers are still trying to stand out is by focusing on the camera. Sometimes that means multiple cameras. But in the case of the new Sharp Aquos R6, it means one cameras with a really […]
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Megapixels 1.0 released, bringing hardware accelerated graphics to the camera app for Linux phones
2 Comments on Megapixels 1.0 released, bringing hardware accelerated graphics to the camera app for Linux phonesPine64’s PinePhone has a 5MP rear camera and a 2MP front-facing camera. But when early versions of the phone began shipping, there wasn’t any software that would actually let you snap photos. So developer Martijn Braam created Megapixels, which wasn’t the first camera app for the PinePhone, but which has certainly become the most fully-functional. It’s […]
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ZTE Axon 30 Ultra coming in May with a 144 Hz display and three 64MP cameras
The ZTE Axon 30 Ultra goes on sale in China next week for about $720 and up. But ZTE also plans to launch this high-end phone with a few distinctive features globally in May. So if you’ve been holding out for a phone with a 144 Hz AMOLED display and a camera system that includes […]
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Sony Xperia 1 III and 5 III smartphones feature variable telephoto lenses
Sony makes high-end cameras. Sony makes high-end smartphones. And Sony makes the smartphone camera image sensors found in many of the best phones for snapping photos, including Google’s Pixel series. But Sony’s smartphones have historically been… just fine for taking pictures, although things have started to look up recently. So it’s interesting to note that […]
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Roundup: Librem 5, Precursor, Fedora, Gentoo, Nemo Mobile, and GNOME 40
Developer Martign Braam, who created the Megapixels camera app and many other Linux apps for the PinePhone, PineTab, and other mobile Linux devices, recently wrote an article asking whether folks who are buying Linux phones really want Linux phones. As I’ve mentioned, folks who are looking for an Android or iOS-like experience with access to […]
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Oppo Find X3 Pro smartphone doesn’t hide its unusual camera system
For a few years phone makers had been doing their best to hide their camera bumps and offer phones with a back surface that was as smooth as their front. The Oppo Find X3 Pro doesn’t do that. The phone has a gigantic camera bump on its back covered in a single sheet of glass. But […]