LG Viewty Smart: first impressions of LG's Viewtyful cameraphone
The success of the original LG Viewty was largely down to the fact that it took some pretty nice pictures. So naturally as soon as we got our hands on the LG Viewty Smart, we checked out what the camera was capable of.
The LG Viewty Smart is a touchscreen which features an 8-megapixel camera. The camera comes with a Schneider-Kreuznach lens, auto focus, 3 x digital zoom plus an abundance of photo options which we spent the morning playing around with.
Going into camera mode, you're greeted with five icons at the top which allow you to switch between normal and macro mode, change flash settings, adjust contrast and set auto focus. From here you can also access a menu wheel of options, which give you a range of colour effects including black and white (listed here as 'mono'), sepia, negative and emboss - you can see our results, taking pics of our desk keyboards and a haul from a hotel minibar.
Focus options include standard spot and manual as well as face tracking. There's smile detection, although for some reason this is included in a separate menu (Shot Mode), which we found baffling.
There's a fun 'Art Shot' mode, which allow you to take pics in colour, monochrome or with a 'warm' or 'cool' tint. The Viewty Smart then frames the photo with a dark gradient, as if the edges of the picture had been burnt.
We didn't like the haptic feedback of the Viewty Smart, nor the annoying beep sound which accompanies every confirmed press and click.
Fortunately you can adjust these in the settings; we turned the 'feedback volume' all the way down to 1 (the lowest setting before 'off') and turned the beeping off completely -- we found that this provided a much less intrusive and a more enjoyable experience. A full review of the LG Viewty Smart along with the rest of its features will be available soon.
