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Windows Phone Camera Faceoff: Nokia Lumia 920 vs. HTC 8X

The latest crop of Windows Phones, the Nokia Lumia 920 and HTC 8X, bring together some of the latest technology with their cameras. Windows Phone cameras have progressed nicely through the years. We've seen new sensor technology to improve low-light performance, better software enhancements, and new stabilization mechanics come into play.
While the Nokia Lumia 920's Pureview camera has garnered a good bit of the Windows Phone 8 spotlight, the HTC 8X's camera has been lurking in the shadows. The 8X has a capable camera within its own right but how does it compare to the Lumia 920's heavy weight camera?

Let's look at the specs of both cameras.

• The Lumia 920 has a 8.7mp BSI sensor with optical stabilization. The Lumia 920 is fitted with a Carl Zeiss 26mm f2.0 lens.
• The HTC 8X has a 8mp BSI sensor without any stabilization. The 8X has a 28mm f2.0 lens. The HTC 8X also has a dedicated imaging chip that gives the 8X a smidgen more speed in acquiring focus, capturing the image and processing it. I can see this being a significant advantage as imaging chips develop but for now, the 8X is maybe a blink quicker than the Lumia 920.

Where Nokia has rather limited settings and relies on the Pureview processing algorithms, the HTC gives you control over effects filters (grayscale, negative, sepia, solarize), resolution (VGA to 8MP), white balance, exposure compensation, contracts, saturation, sharpness, ISO and face detection (on/off). It's a nice selection of controls and if you don't like messing with a cameras settings, each has an "auto" setting

 

 

The key feature that separates these two cameras is optical stabilization. While the BSI sensor combined with the fast f2.0 lens (lets more light through the lens) gives the 8X nice low light performance, without stabilization motion blur becomes a concern. The slower the shutter speed, the mNokia Lumia 920 (left) and HTC 8X (right) Night Photo Samples

The Lumia 920 has optical stabilization that keeps the camera sensor steady when such slight movements occur. This helps reduce (if not eliminate) motion blur when you use slower shutter speeds. For low light pictures, the Lumia 920 gets the nod. While the night photos from the 8X weren't bad at all, the Lumia 920 pulled in more light giving way to more detail in the images.  Opened up more of the shadows if you will.ore slight motions (breathing, finger twitch, shuffle of the feet, etc) will blur your subject