Nokia announces winners of Future Capture contest; some amazing imaging apps are coming soon

Shortly after the Lumia 1020 launched, Nokia announced an open contest to developers around the globe. It was called Nokia Future Capture. The contest aimed for developers to dream up imaging apps and hacks to take advantage of some of the new hardware in the Lumia 1020. Nokia then chose ten ideas, flew the developers with those ideas to Sweden, and had a hackathon to see which ideas proved strongest. These are the results.

Let’s expand on the quick recap from above. The contest called for developers to submit ideas to Nokia around imaging. In July, Nokia released both their new Imaging SDK and a device to really push mobile photography – the Lumia 1020. The Nokia Future Capture contest was focused on giving developers the chance to push their creativity with imaging and photography. A developer could submit up to three ideas for an app or hack on those guidelines.

Nokia would then select the top 10 ideas. From there they brought the developers to Lund, Sweden for a hackathon. This hackathon was a place for those 10 winning ideas to be created by their developers. The contest was open to new ideas and apps/hacks previously created weren’t considered. This was an event to showcase new uses of the technology Nokia’s been creating.

The top prize? A Nokia Lumia 1020 and a trip to a Nokia event with all expenses paid (and VIP treatment). The top winner would also have their app promoted via several Nokia channels and the Windows Phone Store. Who won?

• 1^st Prize – Rudy Chen and Shida Li, Canada
• 1^st Runner Up – Jason Podwojski, UK
• 2^nd Runner Up –Matt Cavanagh, South Africa

What did Rudy and Shida create to win the hackathon? The duo created a “Smart Resizing” app. What does it do? It allows a user to “downsample” an image, basically editing or removing empty space in an image to produce a final result that is seamless.

The video below highlights the entire event, but you can get a glimpse of their app towards the end. We’re confident we’ll be hearing, seeing, and using this app in the not too distant future.

Congrats to both Rudy and Shida and all the developers who participated in the hackathon. We hope to see all apps make it to the Store soon. The details around all the apps are scarce at the moment. Nokia is going to continue to help all participants make those apps a reality.

Missed out on the Nokia Future Capture contest? Don’t worry, Nokia is announcing a new contest soon. We’ll share the details when they do.

Source: Nokia Conversations, Future Capture