Samsung U900 Soul

When it comes to the Soul’s 5 megapixel auto-focus camera, the one thing I was really impressed with was the Panorama mode that stitches the images (3-6 shots) together on the fly. The stitching may not be absolutely accurate, but it’s not too bad either. There are options for taking mosaic and multi shots too.

The white balance wasn't too accurate. In a cloudy environment (quite normal in Mumbai these days), if you were to switch the white balance to Cloudy, you’ll end up getting very brownish tones as compared to a more natural look in Auto.

Close ups in Macro mode are not up to the mark. The lens doesn’t seem to be able to focus on the main subject in the shot, and even with the Image Stabilization switched on, it’s still a little difficult to get the focus right.

In Sports mode, the images look weirdly stretched and skewed. Check out the image below for a better idea of what I mean. Just to make things clear, I was in a moving vehicle. I have often taken pictures this way before but I’ve never seen anything like this.

On the whole the camera has plenty of features on offer, and the normal images are not too bad. On a closer look, however, you’ll notice a bit of a patchiness in the colors.

The U900 Soul’s battery life is nothing to write home about. On average you’ll get it to last a day and a half, including calls, messaging and a little media tossed in. With regard strictly to talktime, I managed to get about 2 hours and 45 minutes out of a single full charge. I’m not too impressed.