15 June 2009

Nokia Beta Labs Has Just Released
Major Update For Nokia Photo Browsers

The folks over at Nokia beta Labs have just released a major update to its popular Photo Browser for 3rd and 5th Edition devices.

The just released update fixes known beta issues and brings number of improvements including the menu addition which you can bring up by long press in the grid view.

Additionally, there is an option to send image, deletion, rotation, folder sorting in the grid view and all these new features are accessible from the new pop-up menu. Furthermore it improves rendering, image processing as well as the overall speed and UI stability in general. The zoom image quality is also improved but it requires a few seconds to load the better and sharper image.

Unfortunately it seems that this will be the last and final update for the 3rd edition devices and in future releases, they will be mostly focused on the touch devices.

Anyway, as its name suggest, Nokia Photo Browser is photo browsing application that pretends to replace the quite boring and slow default gallery application on 5th edition devices. It’s designed to be finger friendly and easy to use application, whenever you want quickly browse through your images.

User interface is optimized for touch controls and designed to give fast access to all your photos with a number of eye catching features, including stunning 3D effects, transitions, intuitive zooming controls and very, very handy fisheye magnification. This cool feature called “MagGlass”, makes image zooming to feel and look more real and analog.

Photo browsing should be fun! That is why Photo Browser introduces new ways to do photo viewing like; “Face browsing” which uses face detection technology to find people faces from pictures and just by finger flick you can zoom-in people faces in image.

Interactive 3D wall like preview provides a visually stunning and easy way to search and view thousands of photos by displaying content on a single, ever-expansive wall and helps you find what you're looking on a faster and easier way.

Nokia Photo browser is great application that brings a simple and intuitive user interface and many innovative features is a huge departure from the default Nokia gallery application.

Nokia Photo Browser is still prototype application and it has some limitations. Dev team working hard on improvements, adding new features and increasing the usability continuously.

Nokia Photo Browser is an experimental photo browser that makes your viewing experience quick and fun:

• Pleasing visual effects
• Intuitive touch UI
• Magnifying glass
• Face browsing

Touch UI Controls

• Strokes, drags, and taps should work as you’d expect

In the single image view:

• Long press to start the magnifier
• Double-tap will start the regular zoom
• Double-tap on a face will start the face browsing
• In the face browsing mode, a stroke will travel between faces

Keys

• Press hang-up key to exit the Photo Browser

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Application is currently only available for S60 5th edition devices such as Nokia 5800 XM and upcoming Nokia N97 but they’ll also release Photo Browser for S 60 3rd edition devices shortly.