NEW YORK -- Would you trust a cell phone camera to capture your new baby's first moments of life?

Mark Lennihan, Associated Press, Post-Gazette The Samsung MM-A800 also features a 2 megapixel digital camera that has autofocus, a digital zoom function in 10 increments, a sliding cover to protect the lens, a choice of USB port or removable storage card to transfer pictures to a computer and a large color screen for viewing photos, as well as Web content. Click photo for larger image. Sample photo Click on this thumbnail to view a full-size sample photo of the New York City skyline, which was taken with the Samsung MM-A800 camera phone. Photo by Richard Drew of the Associated Press.

I wouldn't have when my first child was born three years ago but decided to risk it for my second when Sprint Corp. introduced the Samsung MM-A800, the first mobile phone in the United States equipped with a 2-megapixel camera.

Well, actually, I didn't take that big a risk.

To ensure there'd be no permanently blank pages at the very start of my daughter's childhood photo album, I also brought along a trusty film camera, which meant juggling two devices even as I played hand-holding husband and cord-cutting father -- truly rigorous battle conditions.

The upshot? Close, but only three-quarters of a proud father's cigar.

The camera-phone shots from the hospital and afterwards provided more than a few album-worthy pictures, but even those printed with blurs, blares of light and muddy contrasts. None came out as sharp or vivid as images taken by the film camera or the full-blown digital camera I used when my first child was born.

The A800's image quality was, of course, far superior to prints from photos taken with the low-resolution "VGA" cameras built into so many phones, as well as the 1-megapixel models that are becoming more common.

For comparison, I printed a series of identical shots from a Sanyo phone with a 1.3 megapixel camera, all abysmal.

The Samsung phone introduces some other nice touches to phone photography: autofocus; a digital zoom function in 10 increments; a sliding lens cap to prevent smudges; a choice of USB port or removable storage card to transfer pictures to a computer or compatible printer; and a big color screen that makes viewing pictures and Web content more pleasurable.

But all that is somewhat beside the point.

Since the digital photos taken by lower-end camera phones are already adequate for e-mail attachments and phone-to-phone picture messaging, the main advantage of a 2-megapixel camera phone -- one that costs $500 before rebates or $350 with a two-year Sprint contract -- has to be the ability to print out pictures as you might with any digital camera.

There's more to a digital camera than megapixels, so it's hard to know if the digital imperfections -- particularly at the overlaps between objects, people, colors and backgrounds in any given photo -- are a function of resolution or the image-processing module inside.

A standalone digital camera with the same resolution as the A800 might produce better shots because the image processor isn't competing for space within the guts of a cell phone. Nor are the photo components an additional manufacturing expense in a standalone camera as they are in a phone. Then again, Samsung now sells a 7-megapixel phone in Korea, so these tradeoffs seems to be fading.

I used three different online services to print my photos from the A800 just to make sure the image quality was a reflection of the camera.

The truest images were captured outdoors. Many of the indoor photos suffered from motion blur, a sign the photo sensor needs a real flash rather than the lamp installed on most camera phones. Flashes freeze motion, yielding sharp pictures. Here, instead of illuminating the entire picture with a dispersed burst of light, a visible spotlight often ringed the subject, casting a glare.

Most of the photos I printed were shot at maximum resolution, though a handful were inadvertently taken at one-quarter the top quality. I say inadvertent because -- inexplicably and unbeknownst to me since I pre-set the camera at top resolution -- the camera defaults to a half-megapixel resolution whenever this "slider" type handset is in the open position with its keypad revealed.

According to Samsung, this default was designed with picture messaging and e-mail in mind. While there's a kernel of logic here I find the explanation presumptuous and the inability to override this default maddening:

The assumption, an executive explained, is that when the phone is slid open, the user is planning to share the photo rather than print it, and thus needs the keypad to type in an e-mail address or phone number to which it will be sent. A high-resolution photo is overkill for that type of viewing, of course, as it takes longer to transmit over the cellular network -- possibly at an added cost to the sender.

Fair enough, but no reason to handcuff the user. And then there's the loss of spontaneity.

Maybe you're on the phone or dialing a number when you spot something you'd like to photograph. Even without having to close the slider, the camera takes at least five seconds to start up, and then you've got to slide the cap off the lens and line up the shot. Moment gone. (Admittedly, some digital cameras similarly take too long to "boot up.")

Despite such shortcomings, this experiment was hardly a disaster.

Clearly, the time has not yet come for non-photo buffs like myself to rely exclusively on a cell phone camera. But the Samsung A800 shows that's where we're heading sooner than later.

At nearly 2 inches thick, the A800 is a tad bulkier than I'd prefer for a cell phone. Nevertheless, I relished the opportunity to leave my camera home altogether, and frequently did so, knowing I had my phone to capture unexpected photo opportunities.

Let the photo enthusiasts carry around as many devices as they like. This point-and-shoot amateur looks forward to the day when all you need is one.

http://www.videogameslive.com/ Enriched by rising stardom, video game tunes go mainstream By Ryan Pearson The Associated Press LOS ANGELES -- Violinists playing sweetly beneath her, the video game heroine Lara Croft has two guns blazing and the full attention of 10,000 people at the Hollywood Bowl.

The animated star of "Tomb Raider" games, which have collectively sold more than 30 million copies, unflinchingly braves explosions on a giant TV screen that hangs, incongruously, above the Los Angeles Philharmonic orchestra.

At the bizarre yet beautiful debut performance of Video Games Live, the sotto voce murmurs of the "Tomb Raider" theme give way to choir-assisted crescendos then to more crowd-pleasing music and images from other games.

The spectacle, which promoters say will be performed by similarly topflight orchestras in more than 15 cities in the coming months, is just the latest sign that songs written for the interactive gaming world are blasting out of consoles and into the mainstream.

Orchestra concerts of music from "Final Fantasy" games -- a long-running role-playing series with a cult-like following -- have sold out venues nationwide.

Video games with their rising budgets are now attracting serious composing talent. Scoring for traditional television may soon enough be playing second fiddle.

Award-winning film composers such as Danny Elfman of "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and Howard Shore of "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy have written music for games. Shore recently completed work on the upcoming "SUN," an online role-playing game set in a medieval world of emperors and monsters.

And hit singles such as Green Day's "American Idiot" were heard on the hugely popular "Madden NFL Football" games even before they got radio play. The 2006 version of the game, to be released Tuesday, features songs from Foo Fighters, Rev. Run of Run-DMC fame and others.

It's all a sonic leap from the blips and beeps of "Pong" and "Asteroids" -- so memorably annoying they've come to define game audio for decades.

"The music in video games is basically maturing to the spot where it can live outside" of home systems, said Chuck Doud, music director for Sony Computer Entertainment.

Like movie scores, game soundtracks seldom top the charts, though a few have been big sellers.

The score from "Halo 2," an Xbox game that pits players against alien invaders, has sold about 100,000 copies since its release late last year. Sales of the "Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within" soundtrack have reached 47,000 copies since being released in 2003, according to Nielsen SoundScan.

Video game music's growing popularity is being driven by budgets that can now reach hundreds of thousands of dollars, spending that has climbed along with overall industry revenue.

In the United States, video game industry sales now exceed movie box office receipts. "Halo 2" generated more than $125 million in sales on its first day alone.

Composer Tommy Tallarico, co-creator of Video Games Live, says his music budget was about $300,000 for "Advent Rising" -- the first game in a planned intergalactic trilogy with dialogue and stories by science fiction writer Orson Scott Card.

Orchestras and choirs recorded Tallarico's 13th century Italian opera-inspired songs on a stage at the Paramount Pictures lot.

"In movies, you write to picture, you write to the scene, and it's considered background music," said Tallarico. "I consider us foreground music."

Indeed, the audio component of games is becoming an increasingly interactive part of the story. Games are programmed so scores react to virtual environments and player choices. Multiple sound backdrops shift with scenarios.

Instead of switching to entirely new music when a character, say, enters an eerie courtyard, the emphasis subtly shifts to a previously soft-playing track, using different instruments to ratchet up the tension.

The effect, Doud says, is that "all of a sudden it'll seem a lot more intense, but you can't really tell how it got there."

Maybe, just maybe, it's enough to keep people listening after spending dozens of hours playing a single game.

"That's what you're striving for, is to have the player hold off muting the music," said Garry Schyman, who composed an hour of 1950s sci-fi movie-style music for the alien invader game "Destroy All Humans!"

Schyman has also written scores for small films, documentaries and TV movies. Now he's anxious for more video game work.

"I had a blast," he said. "Plus, it pays well. They have the money for orchestras. Television these days rarely has money for orchestras."

A composer for video games is typically paid from $700 to $1,500 for each minute of music -- more if it's being produced for an orchestra, he said.

One fan of the music is Ben Krugliak, a 13-year-old who attended the Video Games Live show. His favorite song at the concert came from the original "Halo," and he still listens to the soundtrack on his iPod -- even after hearing the same "sad music" over and over while playing the game.

"Sometimes when I first got it, I listened to it before bed, because it just relaxes me," he said.

Krugliak said he came to enjoy the bands Nine Inch Nails and Jimmy Eat World while playing the racing game "Midnight Club 3: DUB Edition," which features their songs "The Hand That Feeds" and "Pain," respectively. Krugliak later paid to download both songs.

Such taste-making power has artists and promoters lining up to get spots on new games.

Some games, however, demand original scores.

"You will never hear a licensed tune in 'Star Wars' " games, Tallarico said. "The big epics are always going to have to have original music."

At the Video Games Live concert last month, Krugliak was selected to go onstage in the most high-concept part of the show -- a "Frogger" contest in which the orchestra adjusted its play on-the-fly to fit game action.

Navigating a frog across traffic and other obstacles in the classic Atari game, he outscored a middle-aged woman 1,970 to 170. The woman said she'd never played a video game before -- exactly the type of person Tallarico hopes to attract to the concerts.

He says parents who don't play might be surprised at the quality of in-game choirs and orchestras.

"Their eyes are going to be opened up to what an amazing art form video games and their music have become," said Tallarico. "It's not a bunch of bleeps and bloops."