Lenovo Malaysia launches the VIBE Shot – a camera centric smartphone

Driven towards a market that has a need for a premium smart phone with a good camera, the VIBE Shot promises to be a stylish and powerful pocket companion for capturing those special life moments. An attempt at being Lenovo’s first camera smartphone crossover device, it’ll join the list of other devices that the company has released – upping their game from budget options to a more luxurious label.

Built to look like a camera, albeit sporting a 5-inch FHD (1920 x 1080) IPS display on the front, the phone features a camera button solely to improve usability for instant camera activation and photo taking. You’ll get a 16-megapixel sensor on the rear and a 8-megapixel front facing shooter on the smart phone – including a 16:9 BSI sensor and optical image stabilisation.

Packing a tri-colour LED (an industry first) and an infrared auto-focus that Lenovo assures to be on par with laser auto-focus. A detailed breakdown of the infrared auto-focus follows:

20 milliseconds for range finding
150 milliseconds for fine tuning
24 frames per second focusing
IR auto-focus’ range finder is limited to 50 cm
Switches to infinity focus when it exceeds range

We’ve yet to test the camera’s prowess yet but be sure to check again once we’ve received a unit to review.

A readily available quick switch toggle gives users an ability to choose from the easier Auto mode, or the more in-depth Pro mode. Smart Composition is said to be the headliner of the Auto Mode – with an automatic scene detection and onscreen “point and shoot” built-in. The latter of the two modes, hands shutterbugs the tools to manually control settings of photos, like aperture, shutter speed and ISO settings – a great combination that could supplement those creatively inspiring photos.

Designed to look like a regular point and shoot, glass is apparent on both sides with metal keeping it together in the middle. Housing a 1.7GHz Octa-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 615 processor (64 bit) and mated with 3GB of RAM, the VIBE Shot should handle camera tasks just fine, while providing a fluid user experience. We’ll be getting the 32GB internal storage variant, expandable up to 128GB with a MicroSD card slot and it’ll also be equip with Dual-SIM slots (LTE ready).

Out of the box, the VIBE Shot runs Lenovo’s own VibeUI on top of Android 5.1 and is powered by a 3,000 mAh non-removable battery. Measuring just 7.6mm thick, the VIBE Shot should please those who find it a burden to slip point and shoot’s in their pockets. The VIBE Shot will be available in Carmine Red and Graphite Grey at RM 1,399 and comes with a VIBE Xtension Selfie Flash (worth RM 99) for free. The camera centric mobile device can be found at all Lenovo Smartphone Retail Partners from today onwards.

Lenovo VIBE Shot Hands-on Video