Stanford University and Nokia Research Center in Palo Alto have released an open-source digital photography platform called FCam (short for “Frankencamera”) for the Nokia N900. Developed as a part of Stanford’s Camera 2.0 project, it allows developers to create new capabilities for digital cameras to “overcome some of the shortcomings of their devices or create interesting new types of imagery.”
Right from the bat, the researchers have created a series of photo apps for the platform, some of which will be available as free downloads:
- FCamera – an example camera app that uses FCam libraries and drivers.
- Low-light Assistant – helps in situations where there is not enough light around. It captures two images in rapid succession and then automatically combines them, resulting in a photo that is both bright and sharp.
- HDR Capture – for situations where there is too much light. It takes up to three images with different exposure settings and combines them to an image that shows the details of both the foreground and background objects, without under or over-exposing any of them.
The question now is whether developers will embrace FCam. As we know, the N900 is the last Maemo powered phone and will most likely be superseded with a first MeeGo device later in the year. Porting FCam to MeeGo seems logical and then eventually some company will pick up the code for their apps…
[Via: Nokia Conversations]