How good is the front camera on the Galaxy S2?

We recently had a look at how the photographs taken with the 8MP main camera on the Samsung Galaxy S2 look, and lets admit, they look impressive, vibrant and sharp. As well as that camera however the phone also features a front facing camera this really more used for video calls rather than as a still camera. This doesn't mean you can't use it as a 2MP still camera to take photos with. The photographs in this entry have all been taken with this front camera.

Sadly when you're using this camera mode you'll notice that the only thing you can really get a good focus on is yourself (see the picture of me to the right hand side).
Whilst you can take photographs of others things, like this wardrobe picture to the left you'll notice a number of issues. Firstly, as the wardrobe picture shows, your angles are hit and miss, you can't actually see the image you're taking a photo of, unless your taking a photograph of yourself. This means your pictures are given stupid slants and your miss things. It sort of looks like a drunk has taken it because you've effectively taken the photo "blind".

This picture to the right however shows an even bigger problem however, the pictures are often too dark. Unless you're taking a picture of your own face you do need a really good lighting source as there is no flash on the front camera. This moans not only are shots taken "blind" but they are then given a "dark" look which sort of further distills the quality of the image.

Whilst the images of the wardrobe and the person on the couch are really poor photographs it does need to be said that this is the best to take a self shot image. It allows you to see yourself before taking the photograph and get the image right, however for anything else you're best off using the main camera to take photographs as it is a much more complete camera (and not just a higher quality one).

How to use the front camera to take a photo on Samsung Galaxy s2

One of the questions I've been asked was how to use the front facing 2MP camera on the Samsung Galaxy S2 android operated smartphone to take photographs. This is one of the great things about the phone in that it does have a pretty solid (not spectacular admittedly) front facing camera for "self shooting".

The easiest way to access it is by pressing the little icon you can see in the top left corner of the image to the side. The icon that looks like a camera in a recycle icon. This automatically sets the camera into the self shoot mode and to take a photograph in this mode you just press the usual shoot button (the large button to the right side).

An alternative way to access "Self shoot" mode again starts with you accessing the camera then opening the settings menu (hit the little cog icon) and turning "Self shot" on. This is a little bit more effort but does the exact same thing.

Now the problems with self shot are numerous. Firstly you can't use a number of the features the Samsung Galaxy S2 normal camera does have and you will only get a maximum of 2MP (the main camera is 8MP) you also won't be able to turn on the flash or film video with the self shot mode. Though if you do just want a quick and easy photograph of yourself with out fiddling about (and giving yourself finger cramps) this is the way to go.