[yawnmoth]

http://www.blackberry.com/developers/docs/5.0.0api/javax/microedition/amms/control/camera/FocusControl.html

That discusses, among other things, the ability to switch between auto focus and manual focus. One function, in particular, "returns true if the manual focus is supported by being able to set the distance (or NEXT or PREVIOUS or Integer.MAX_VALUE) with setFocus method."

My question is... which BlackBerries support manual focus? Most feature specs I've seen just say how many megapixels the camera is, however, I, personally, would prefer to buy a phone with manual focus than one without it. That the operating system supports it doesn't mean that it's widely supported in the hardware.

[takeshi]

Seems like it would be a question of having a camera app with that feature.

[jbairdjr]

I have never heard of a phone camera that had manual focus.
I would think the lens would be too big with that option (?)

[yawnmoth]

Originally Posted by takeshi

Seems like it would be a question of having a camera app with that feature.

If the API lets you do it I could just write my own app to do manual focus.

Originally Posted by jbairdjr

I have never heard of a phone camera that had manual focus.
I would think the lens would be too big with that option (?)

The LG Viewty has a manual focus. Only problem with it and its successor (I don't know if its successor has manual focus or not): the lack of a keyboard. BlackBerries have keyboards and the LG Viewty doesn't.

[Trimix]

Wirelessly posted (The Dacia Sandero of data plan)

I thought manual focus is just moving the camera closer or further away from the object you want to take a picture of??

[yawnmoth]

Originally Posted by Trimix

Wirelessly posted (The Dacia Sandero of data plan)

I thought manual focus is just moving the camera closer or further away from the object you want to take a picture of??

Not quite.

Say you're trying to take a picture through a window with some smears on it. With auto focus, the cameras likely going to focus on the smears and not on that which is outside the window. Sure, in that case, you could, in theory, go outside, but there are other instances, too, where you'd want manual focus.

Taking coins of things really small things is another example. Say you want to take a picture of a coin. If you want to get decent detail you'll need to hold the camera up close to it. Problem is, that kinda breaks some autofocus algorithms and they'll never be able to focus on the coin because they're looking for something that's farther back than that. In that case, moving closer when you're already too close isn't going to solve anything.