Camera Phones Plaza

There has been a camera phone war going on this summer, with the introduction of the Sony Ericsson K800i, Nokia N73 and N93, and the LG KG920. The list is not going to stop here, though; we are still waiting for devices from Samsung, Benq-Siemens, and ASUS. LG showed off its first 5 megapixel cameraphone, the SV550 (also known as the KV5500 and LP5500) back in May 2005, and since then, its PR mailbox had been flooded with enthusiastic petitions asking for a GSM clone. It has taken the company more than a year of hesitation before introducing the SV550's GSM counterpart, KG920, outside Korea. This delay is mainly due to the shortage of suitable camera modules, especially when domestic demand was so high. Production cost also plays a role, due to both the camera module and the Qualcomm MSM6500 chipset that the phone is based around being so expensive.

After the success of the Chocolate series of handsets, LG hopes to ride on the wave of its suddenly increased brand awareness, and launch the "ultimate" camera phone. Today we will see if the KG920 can live up to the company's expectations.

The KG920's camera specifications appear top notch on paper: a 5 megapixel CCD sensor, autofocus, and Xenon flash. Before going on to how the photos came out, let's talk about the camera application itself.

Typically, it takes slightly more than 2 seconds for the camera application to start. The camera screen is very informative, but you can turn off all the icons if you find them distracting. The camera menu contains almost all the settings you can find on an average consumer digital camera. You can make use of various shooting modes such as night and sports depending on the situation, and you can pick the most accurate white balance setting from incandescent, fluorescent, sunny, cloudy, or shade. You can also specify the ISO setting, selectable from ISO100, 200, and 400. You can apply frames and filters if you wish.

The camera also gives you options for red eye reduction and whether on not the flash will fire. Popular tools such as a self-timer and date stamps are all in place. LG also gives you access to more advanced settings such as autofocus and metering modes (average or centre) if you are into that kind of thing. If you can't be bothered with all the settings, you can simply set everything to auto. I do need to mention the sluggish response in the camera menus, though, which is the same problem found on the older LG P7200. This has destroyed an otherwise pleasant experience with the well-designed application.

The 5 megapixel sensor allows you to shoot at resolutions up to 2592x1944 pixels. The video mode isn't weak either, recording at a decent 320x240 and at a smooth 30fps. (sample videos here). Depending on the amount of compression you choose, a 5 megapixel photo ranges from 250KB to 2MB. In terms of speed, the camera takes less than 2 seconds to focus, and about 7 seconds to resume to camera mode including saving a 2MB file.

The KG920 is a strong performer in terms of Multimedia. The camera quality is amongst the top in the market today. The wide range of music formats supported pleasantly surprises me. Of course, the phone is not without its bad spots: we would love to see some kind of picture editing tools and background MP3 playing capabilities in the future.

Rerad full review on mobileburn.