Mobile phones are moving into digital cameras. Or vice versa. The Sony Ericsson is a splendid mobile phone. But as the name Cyber-shot suggest, it is also a splendid digital camera.
At one time some photographers went around saying four megapixels was enough. Perhaps that is true for someone who always frames the shot to within a small percent. But not true for most amateurs who shoot and then improve the shot in editing. For that you need all the resolution you can get and eight megapixels is very handy. If you crop a picture by half, what you have is the same resolution as a shot on a four megapixel camera.
The Sony Ericsson C905 has been around for a few months and although it is not inexpensive — something under, but not a lot under, $600 — you can look at it as a seriously good camera and a good mobile phone.
Yes, it is a little heavy at 136 grams but paste a mobile to a digital camera and you will probably come in something close to that.
The mobile — which we should get out of the way early for this is about digital cameras — is good for texting as it has a slide-out keyboard. It is a question of taste. There are those who are very comfortable with the iPhone on-screen keyboard. And there are those who prefer a keyboard, no matter how minute, with real keys.
Note that this Sony Ericsson also has GPS built in so it is possible, with the right geo-tag software, to have a place as well as a date and technical details stamp on any picture you take. Finally, on the phone side this is available not just in the United States but also in Australia and the UK — probably other places as well — and the price seems to be settled as something just under $600.
Now to the camera part.
This dual machine takes better pictures than any other mobile phone/digital camera combination currently on the market. Being number one in a sector is never easy and it is London to a brick that many others will be trying to knock the Sony Ericsson out of that spot. No sign of anyone doing so up until now.
The Sony-Ericsson has a built-in flash which is probably a must-have feature for some users. More importantly it has built-in features which will improve the shot even thought this requires some adjustment in thinking on the part of the user.
Take the feature that is called BestPic. It give you seven chances to capture the magic moment. It takes three images as you press the button, plus the image you think your are getting and there another three afterwards. Keep the pictures you want, bin the rest.
It has auto focus which homes in on the subject in the center of the screen which may not be approved by purists but works very well for most shots.
Instead of waiting until you are working with the picture in, say, PhotoShop on your computer you can use a built-in program called Photofix to improve pictures by adjusting brightness, light and contrast.
There is anti-blur software built in and Sony Ericsson claims you can leave your tripod at home. In fact, this is not the sort of device you would be using with a tripod so that addition will probably prove very useful.
It comes equipped with a 2GB memory stick which might, to advantage, be considerably larger capacity. Which is not a great problem.
There are probably other features which could not be accessed in the time it was available. But this is a very complete digital camera and will handle most situations.
In a sense this device shows us one of the ways of the future. Whereas the iPhone concentrates on the phone part and bungs in a fairly low resolution camera to round it out. The Sony Ericsson C905 Cybershot concentrates on both.
It is truly a superior mobile phone in that it has a keyboard and handles every kind of connectivity. And it is a most wonderful digital camera working at a resolution that currently leaves its competition for dead.
