Camera Phones

This material is excerpted from the forthcoming book Displaying & Sharing your Digital Photographs. If you would like to be notified when the book is published click the link below to send me an e-mail: E-mail me when the Displaying & Sharing book is published To see the book's tentative table of contents, click the link below: Show me the table of contents for the Displaying and Sharing book

Imagine being on vacation and sending an instant postcard back to people stuck in the office, or to family members who stayed home. If that's not enough, how about sending photo enhanced messages to a list of people without the hassle of having your own prints made and then filling in addresses. Well you don't have to just imagine. You can do this now and it’s going to get even better and easier very quickly. One of the latest cell phone features is a still and often a video camera, either integrated into the phone or available as a separate attachment. For years a service called Simple Message Service (SMS) has been available that lets you use your cell phone to send short text messages up to 160 characters long through the network operator's message center, or to the Internet as e-mail. These new camera phones enhance this basic service with what's called Multimedia Message Service (MMS). Phones and services that support this service let you include still images, movie clips, and sounds along with words—all in one message.

The photos that you capture with your camera phone can be used in a number of ways:

Photos can be sent directly to other compatible phones.

A link to the photos can be sent by e-mail to anyone with an e-mail address. These people are sent a text message explaining how to view your photos over the Internet. The images themselves are stored in a secure, password-protected photo album at an on-line photo sharing service and visitors can even order prints.

Photos can be used as wallpaper or as a screen saver to personalize your phone.

Pictures of people can be added to their listings in your phone book. You can also see, or let others see who's calling with photo caller ID.

Photos can be stored in a personal and portable photo album. The days of carrying family photos in a wallet may soon be over as more and more people display them using PDAs or camera phones.

Photos can be uploaded to your own personal Web site called a photo blog (Web Log) where they can be seen by others using a PC or Web enabled cell phone. This "moblogging" or mobile weblogging lets you use your cell phone to instantly share photographs, text, audio and even video. Everyone can now be a reporter.

Photos can be uploaded to your own album on a photo sharing and printing service so people can view them and order prints.

Photos can be sent from a PC to a phone using a software program or Internet service.

Camera phones and photo messaging have taken off in parts of the Far East and Europe but it’s all still very new in the US. But all of that could change very soon. It’s been estimated that the sales of camera phones will soon exceed the sales of standard film and digital cameras (excluding single-use models) very soon. That will make them the leading kind of camera. Who would use this kind of service, other than people who love photography and/or gadgets? There may be more than you’d suspect at first glance. Contractors and designers can send photos to clients showing progress or asking advice; real estate agents can send the latest listings to prospective buyers or to the office; insurance claim representatives can process claims. The field is so new, unthought-of applications will surface as people get more familiar with the possibilities.

	T-Mobile's Sidekick™ (made by Danger at www.danger.com) has a phone for voice communication but is really an Internet device that can access the Web, let you chat using the AOL® Instant Messenger™ (AIM®) service, send and receive email, play games, and exchange mobile snapshots from a built-in camera. The color screen swivels up to give you access to a full QWERTY keyboard.
	Here's a photo taken with the Sidekick. It's not great, but not bad either.

There are a few problems with camera phones at this early stage of their development:

The images are small, often 640 x 480 (good for making 4 x 6 prints) although 3 megapixel cameras exist in some parts of the world.

The cameras are very simple. There is no flash and almost no creative controls although some phone cameras now have digital (but not optical) zoom.

Most people don't yet have phones that can receive and display photos so it's hard to share.

It’s often impossible to send photos to people who subscribe to another phone network or use a different kind of phone.

Pricing can be a bit steep, especially when charges are made to the recipient's phone.

Screens are small both in size and the number of pixels they contain and often have fewer colors to work with than a computer’s screen.

You can't choose any camera phone to use on any network. You can only use the ones they support. It's like choosing a digital camera based on what cameras to local drug store processes.

These initial shortcomings will be solved quite quickly. Phones will be able to take better and better photos and sharing them will get easier.

To do photo messaging, you need an MMS phone and an MMS cellular service. In cellular ads the term MMS is rarely used, appearing only in the detailed specifications. Each cellular service has coined it’s own name for their service, something that confuses a lot of people.

Although it varies from operator to operator, here are the typical steps you'd follow to send an MMS message:

1. Take photos with your phone’s camera and they are stored in an album.

2. Personalize one or more messages by adding text, a sound clip, or your own narration. A message can contain a number of pages with a photo and line of text on each page, and you can specify how long each page is displayed.

3. Send the message to a compatible MMS phone and the recipient gets a new message alert. The picture opens on the screen along with the text and the sound begin to play automatically. If you send the message to a non-compatible MMS phone the user is sent an SMS message telling them they have been sent a multimedia message and giving them a website address, and possibly a username and password, so they can view the message on the Internet.

As prices fall and cameras become embedded in more and more phones, one thing to think about is what the impact will be when everyone is always carrying a camera. A decade ago, maybe 1 in a hundred people you met were carrying a camera. In another decade, almost everyone will be. The impact of this is hard to imagine. Still images and videos of every "Rodney King" type incident will be captured. With phone logs, they will then be published immediately.

There is also a downside and there are early indications that the abuse of camera phones is a problem. Even Samsung, who makes camera phones, has banned them in its research and manufacturing areas to prevent industrial espionage. There are also cases where people are reported to have used them in public bathing areas and restrooms, courtrooms, and museums. Cell phone manufacturers, aware of a possible backlash have created cell phone etiquette campaigns asking customers to respect privacy and refrain from unauthorized photography. In addition, many people are pressing for handsets to sound an alert when the shutter button is pressed.

One trend to watch in cell phones is the addition of features usually found in personal digital assistants (PDAs). These new devices, called smartphones, often include Wi-Fi capability, java applications, a color display, polyphonic ringtones, a built-in camera, and support multimedia messaging (MMS). Some even have PDA operating systems such as Palm or PocketPC.