Nokia has a lot riding on their new Windows 8 smartphones. The CEO has said that if Windows 8 tanks, “that’s it.” The company will die. In fact we’re a little surprised they even got this far.
That’s a lot of pressure, and they’re in such deep crap that the temptation to make their phones look better by any means necessary must be incredible.
On the other hand, Nokia should also know better than to fake a video showing off their product’s capabilities. After all, they’ve been around for years, they know exactly what happens to companies that do this on the Internet. You’d think, anyway.
Nokia showed this video to demonstrate just how effective their new image stabilization technology is in their new smartphones:
The problem? The video on the right is cropped down from a DSLR video. And how did Nokia get caught? Because of a reflection, caught by the Verge:
As you can see in the video above, there’s a curious reflection in the window of the trailer in the background. It’s not a young man riding his bicycle alongside the cheerful model, but instead a big white van with a lighting rig and a cameraman standing in the doorway — with what appears to be a large camera rig. Whatever he’s holding, we can reasonably agree it’s not a Lumia 920.
Yeah, that’s not an embarrassing rookie mistake or anything, either. In a few hours, Nokia had been shamed into admitting that the video was a “simulation,” although they also refused to admit they’d been busted for faking it.
The really sad thing here is that, well, this is a real comparison, quickly cobbled together by Nokia…
Is that as good as their “simulation”? No. But I’ve worked with OIS systems and frankly, for a camera so tiny with lens elements so small, that’s some incredible video. That’s a really good system Nokia should be proud of. And it wasn’t good enough. Scared much, guys?