The Really Mobile Project - Latest Comments in Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Mark Guim — Thu, 14 May 2009 22:17:24 -0000

How about recording it on VGA mode on the 5800/N97 to zoom out a little bit, and then publish it as widescreen when editing the video later like on iMovie?

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Julien — Thu, 14 May 2009 18:26:28 -0000

That saving "tech/effort/cost" on such things wouldn't have an impact on the "angle" of the picture, besides of course using a different lens.
What matters here is the width of the lens, and on the N97, it is wider than on the 5800. You can have the device closer to you when taking self videos for example.

I took a picture couple days back but I lost it.
I'll take an other one tomorrow.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Thu, 14 May 2009 16:46:13 -0000

I'm not sure what you mean?

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Julien — Thu, 14 May 2009 16:35:30 -0000

James, can you tell me how we could do that?
Cause honestly, I don't see where it would be possible and provide such a "side effect".

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Mark Guim — Thu, 14 May 2009 16:17:24 -0000

How about recording it on VGA mode on the 5800/N97 to zoom out a little bit, and then publish it as widescreen when editing the video later like on iMovie?

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Julien — Thu, 14 May 2009 12:26:28 -0000

I took a picture couple days back but I lost it.
I'll take an other one tomorrow.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Thu, 14 May 2009 10:46:13 -0000

I'm not sure what you mean?

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Julien — Thu, 14 May 2009 10:35:30 -0000

James, can you tell me how we could do that?
Cause honestly, I don't see where it would be possible and provide such a "side effect".

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

juliancooling — Tue, 12 May 2009 17:30:12 -0000

Mr Facts on Demand.

Actually this might make a good point of comparison in a phone face-off: Nokia great lens and pixel count but impossible angles. iPhone bad a everything optical and now proven by Smithian science.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

juliancooling — Tue, 12 May 2009 11:30:12 -0000

Mr Facts on Demand.

Actually this might make a good point of comparison in a phone face-off: Nokia great lens and pixel count but impossible angles. iPhone bad a everything optical and now proven by Smithian science.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

SteveRowlands — Mon, 11 May 2009 18:40:01 -0000

Ordinarily, I would have agreed, and gone down the same route. However, I just fancy something a bit different to the norm for a change. I figured that if I hate the N97 when it comes, I'll be able to eBay it at a fair rate, and buy an unbranded N86 instead. :-)

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Mon, 11 May 2009 18:30:32 -0000

See I'm more of a photo fan too - which is why I'm waiting for the N86.

:)

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:58:55 -0000

Doubtful. Can't see the logic myself.

More likely stripped down 'normal' recording to save tech/effort/cost.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:53:30 -0000

Whatever it's called, it's crap on the 5800 and it looks like the N97 is no better either!

:P

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Nico — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:29:30 -0000

That's why I said "for a fixed sensor size". The correct term is indeed "field of view", but focal lenght is more commonly used as a measure of the view angle of a lens.

But yeah, what Ben said :)

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Ben Smith — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:24:42 -0000

Dan Lane: Yellow card.

:-)

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Ben Smith — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:20:59 -0000

As irritating as this is - and obviously I witnessed it first hand - could this be a design decision. Nokia decided most people filmed stuff 'far away' and preferred the 'zoomed' effect?

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Ben Smith — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:19:03 -0000

I think you're both right (ish) - for a certain sensor size 'field of view' is directly proportional to 'focal length', although what James is complaining about is actually the 'field of view'.

The impact on the 'field of view' of the sensor size is called the 'field of view crop factor' or 'focal length multiplier'.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

DanLane — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:16:52 -0000

Breaking news: Steve Litchfield in being wrong shocker!

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

stevelitchfield — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:05:28 -0000

No, it doesn't, although admittedly I was wrong too 8-)

Focal length is the intra-camera distance from the centre of the lens to the centre of the sensor etc.. Not sure what the distance I was talking about is called: maybe 'focal point'?

Anyway, the thing James was talking about is, apparently, termed 'field of view'.

So now we all know!

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

"The Masses" a.k.a M — Mon, 11 May 2009 17:03:38 -0000

Interesting article (and discussion). I tend to carry a large wide-angle lens with me for my HD camcorder. It's quite surprising how much nicer the final results are, especially for large vistas, indoor scenes and group photos or videos.

I used to own a SD Canon camcorder that 'suffered' from an extremely tight angle, it was horrible to use, most indoor video was useless.

As for Nokia devices... The best lens combo that I've ever witnessed was the N93i. But then that isn't too surprising as it was the last to feature optical zoom.

I'd better stop now as I'm starting to get depressed just thinking about the stagnation of video capture in the mobile industry. Help me Omnia HD, you're my only hope! ... Just make sure you fix the frame rate Samsung or they'll be hell to pay!

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

Nico — Mon, 11 May 2009 16:47:29 -0000

Uh... actually, no. Focal lenght is the right term. It means exactly "how wide the angle of the lens is" (at least for a fixed sensor size). Here's something from good ole' photo.net:

http://photo.net/learn/fov/

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

SteveRowlands — Mon, 11 May 2009 16:39:26 -0000

This is quite a concern of mine, but I don't think it will put me off buying an N97. However, James is right to bring this subject to light, as I'm sure it will irritate the shiv out of some people.

For me, I can put up with this irritation because I shoot photo's rather than video's.

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

SteveRowlands — Mon, 11 May 2009 12:40:01 -0000

Re: Nokia's N97 & 5800XM: The trouble with 16:9

James Whatley — Mon, 11 May 2009 12:30:32 -0000

See I'm more of a photo fan too - which is why I'm waiting for the N86.