Tuesday, May 22, 2007 Limpag: Impact of camera phones By Max T. Limpag Celltalk
HACKER. There’s an interesting story by the Associated Press (AP) on the birth, literally, of the camera phone. Philippe Kahn, whom the wire agency called a “tech industry maverick,” built the first camera phone during the birth of his daughter in 1997.
According to the story, his wife was in labor with their daughter when he decided to write a program in his laptop and wired his digital camera to his cell phone using a soldering iron, capacitors and other parts he asked his assistant to buy from a nearby RadioShack store. When their daughter Sophie was born, he used his contraption to share her photo over the cellular network to acquaintances. Today, most phones come with a built-in camera and not only don’t you have to solder parts, the image quality of camera phones is beginning to rival that of stand-alone units. Kahn told the AP that camera phones have “a massive impact because it’s just so convenient.”
ANYWHERE. Ask people around you and easily six out of 10 will have a camera phone. The Philippines may lag behind First World countries in the adoption of new gadgets but the cycle of replacing old phones means more and more people are now getting camera phones to replace their old units. In fact, more and more people now use phones as their main cameras. bOne proof of this is the brisk business being done by printing kiosks that accept photos via Bluetooth, infrared, CDs, and memory cards. Last year, these kiosks were as elusive to find as the perfect shot. Now, you can go to any mall and find a printing kiosk, with gigglyn teenagers waiting in line to print.
The camera phone has gone mainstream to the point that it is now being used in broadcast media. ABS-CBN made extensive use of user-submitted video, including those taken using camera phones, in their election coverage.
JUST THE START. Kahn said in the AP report that he thinks “the evolution of the camera phone has only just begun.” Indeed. Camera phones now have resolutions of up to 3-megapixels. This, for me, suffices for it to serve as stand-alone cameras. But work is underway to produce models that have even higher resolutions. What’s more, models such as the Cyber-shot line of Sony Ericsson contains such features as image stabilizers and Best Shot, where the camera takes nine successive shots and lets you choose the best one. These features aren’t available in many stand-alone digital cameras. I think we have come to a point that the phone, apart from being a communication device and our main digital organizer, now serves as our main camera. Unless camera manufacturers cut down prices on entry-level units, they’ll lose that market to phone manufacturers.
After all, if the price of a point-and-shoot digital camera is just a few thousands lower than a decent camera phone, most people on a budget would rather buy a new phone.
