Nokia N95 + PhotoShow: Vietnam Veterans Memorial 2007 tribute

Three times during the week I went to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. to take photos (see above) with the five megapixel Nokia N95 that I received courtesy of Nokia as part of the Nokia Bloggers program. 

I wanted to create a musical slide show similar to the one I created comparing the photos from Research in Motion's BlackBerry 8300 "Curve" with its 8100 "Pearl."

I have now posted a Vietnam Veterans Memorial slide show on PhotoShow as well as embedding it here (see below).  There are almost 60 photos with each one displaying for six to ten seconds.

By the way, I think it looks much better if you click "Full Size" -- that gets you to the PhotoShow Web site -- and then click "View Large" in the site's viewer to watch the, duh, larger size (assuming you have a broadband connection and a fast enough computer). 

Also, Internet Explorer sometimes streams better for me than Firefox (my browser of choice).  But it could be just my computer.  (The music is off by default, but available by clicking the speaker icon.)

N95 versus digital/film cameras

Using the N95 -- or any camera phone -- makes me realize how much I miss digital and film cameras with their optical zoom and wealth of settings.  The N95 has an optical digital zoom, but who uses that?!

At the Vietnam Veterans Memorial I really missed having an optical zoom because there were photos I simply couldn't get or I had to severely crop areas of photos to get the exact image I wanted that was blown up with reduced resolution.  Luckily, the N95 is five megapixels so that higher resolution helped tremendously in producing acceptable cropped images.  I'm a big fan of cropping!

(All of the images in this slide show were taken on "Automatic," although for a few photos I used the "Vivid" color setting -- but didn't notice any difference.  I didn't use the flash.  Except for those that were cropped, none of the images in this show were modified in any other way.  No brightness, contrast, sharpening, etc.  I want you to see what the N95 produces without software enhancements.)

The lack of an optical zoom and no image enhancement are reasons you'll see images that don't look anywhere near, uh, "picture perfect."  But in this slide show I wanted to convey a certain emotional element, so I have used photos that (I believe) are good enough but not necessarily good because of being too dark, poorly focused, etc. (see below).

(Frankly, I might have been able to get a better shot if I didn't snap it so quickly.  I really wanted to take more and closer photos of that veteran, but it wouldn't have been appropriate.)

Being human

I could have moved closer (the N95 lens is fairly wide angle) or shot more images of certain people, but the human being part of me (I won't discuss the other parts!) uncharacteristically won out against the photographer in me and rebelled against sticking the N95 into someone's face.  The Memorial is a sad place for a lot of people, especially during this Memorial Day weekend, and I didn't want to act as if the visitors were tourist attractions.

So I shot some photos from afar and ruthlessly cropped photos (see below) to get small segments larger images.

And, some of the images would have been better if I were a better photographer.  My incompetence, unfortunately, figures into the image quality.

Good quality images

However, egomaniac that I am, I think a few photos are pretty good, such as the one of the "wall" at the top of this article.  Also, many images I shot were static and no movement was involved (except for mine, sigh, especially when I was crouching to get an object on the ground).

Indeed, the N95 can take very good photos; it's my favorite camera phone and favorite cellular phone in general.....for the time being. 

(Courtesy of Nokia I have the 3.2 megapixel N93 that has a 3x optical zoom, and it would have been interesting to compare the same photos taken with that.  But I didn't want to juggle another camera; I also took the two megapixel BlackBerry 8300 but didn't use it for these Memorial photos.)

PhotoShow online versus desktop

For the slide show comparing the BlackBerry 8300 with the 8100 I used Simple Star's online photo slide show application.  When I posted/embedded the slide show I noted that I would prefer more control.

Simple Star's public relations firm read my article and, as a result, Chad Richard, Simple Star's CEO, was nice enough to send me a link to download the company's $39.95 desktop version, PhotoShow 5.  So that's what I used for this Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

PhotoShow 5 is easy to use (I didn't read the manual, but I will) and it does offer much more control than the online applications.  I think I'd like even more control, such as being able to display individual images for more than ten seconds and more up/down/left/right pan-and-zoom options. 

(I'm a pan-and-zoom kind of guy.  Too much time watching Ken Burns documentaries.

Good software

But overall, PhotoShow 5 is an easy-to-use and fun package that can produce great musical slide shows (my efforts notwithstanding!) with lots of special effects, interesting transitions, etc.  There are loads of standard templates plus ways to customize slide shows.

Indeed, I can see that many people wouldn't want to spend the time to select the parameters for every image and, instead, just use a template.  It can take a long time to pick the timing, special effect, transition, music, etc. for every image.

As I mentioned previously, I like PhotoShow's online selection of music;  PhotoShow 5's selection includes all the online selection plus additional ones.

I expect I will produce more PhotoShow slide shows using other camera phones.

Comments

[patrick dodds]

I think the sentence above should read "has a digital zoom, but who uses that!?"
Thanks for the review - looks a great camera / phone combo though I've heard it has battery issues?

[Alan A. Reiter]

Hi Patrick,

Yep, you're absolutely correct. The N95 has only a digital zoom. I have corrected it. Thanks for pointing it out.

(No matter how many times I proofread a weblog article I all too often make mistakes.)

As for the N95's battery issues, that's also a problem. I haven't done battery testing but it doesn't seem to last as long as some other phones.

During one photo session I took around 60 - 70 photos (I don't remember the exact number) with the N95 and the battery died after about three hours of shooting.

[Kevin Lenard]

I've been testing the camera on the unit i bought and found that, without optical zoom it was necessary to keep it on 5 mp to allow for cropping. I also found it necessary to always secure a green focus-lock frame within the frame (not red) before shooting to ensure both accurate focus and exposure.

To work around the battery life problem I simply bought a second battery which I swap out and recharge when the alternate is dead, then switch back to the partially used one. This way I always have a full battery back up.

I also bought a slightly oversized belt pouch that carrys the phone, extra battery and hands-free headset in the space at the end.

[Alan A. Reiter]

Hi Kevin,

As I wrote, I miss an optical zoom, too.

As a matter of course I shoot photos at the highest resolution the camera phone or digital camera will allow, in great part because I like cropping and the more pixels the greater the leeway for cropping.

As for making sure the focus indicator is green, that's certainly a good idea. However, I have found that even when it's red -- and I'm really not sure why it doesn't turn green -- the photos often come out fine.

The N95 isn't known for good battery life and purchasing an extra battery makes a lot of sense.

[Kevin Lenard]

Dear Allan,

You might want to erase that ad immediately above, if for no other reason than sending a message about this kind of piggyback abuse.

I discovered the problem with my focus lock (the green vs. red focus indicator on the N95) when a friend bought one and I was finally able to compare unit to unit. The focus on my N95 is broken and gives blurry results on distant shots unless pre-focus-locked on a subject closer to camera.

Cheers, Kevin

[reiter]

Hi Kevin,

Thanks for pointing out that advertising spam. I always get notices of comments, but I guess I didn't take care of it immediately and forgot about it. I erased it as soon as I read your comment.

I'm glad you were able to find out the problem with your N95. By the way, there's a firmware update for the N95. You might want to check it out, if you haven't already done so.