GLOBAL – Today, Nokia announces that the Nokia 808 PureView will start to hit the shelves in May. The Nokia 808 PureView is the first smartphone to feature Nokia’s award-winning PureView technology, with a high-performance sensor, exclusive Carl Zeiss optics and amazing imaging algorithms that together create pure pixels, pure clarity, pure control. Pure genius!

The roll out will begin shortly, with Russia and India being among the first to receive this new smartphone. Additional countries will be announced in the near future.

As well as receiving Best Mobile Device at Mobile World Congress 2012, the Nokia 808 PureView has also picked up the Best Imaging Innovation for 2012 from the Technical Image Press Association (TIPA).

Jo Harlow, Head of Smart Devices at Nokia, said:

“PureView has completely raised the bar on imaging performance for the whole smartphone industry – and Nokia is not stopping here. We’re going to carry on developing PureView for our future smartphones in ways that will again revolutionize the imaging experience.”

The Nokia 808 PureView uses a large, high-resolution 41-megapixel sensor with high-performance Car Zeiss optics and new pixel oversampling technology to create stunning photos that have never before been possible on a smartphone.

Plus, The Nokia 808 PureView also includes full HD 1080p video recording and playback with 4X lossless zoom and the world’s first use of Nokia Rich Recording which enables audio recording at CD-like levels. Previously, this has only ever been achievable with external microphones – not now, though.

Audio playback on the Nokia 808 PureView is first-class. Featuring exclusive Dolby Headphone technology, the sound delivered from your Nokia 808 PureView transforms stereo content into a personal surround sound experience over any headphones and Dolby Digital Plus for 5.1 surround playback is also included.

Need more proof that the Nokia 808 PureView is the best cameraphone on the market? Take a look at these new images from the official flickr set taken with the Nokia 808 PureView.

Click any of the images above to be taken to the Nokia flickr page, where you can see them in full resolution.

Also announced today, Nokia and Carl Zeiss have agreed to continue their exclusive partnership, a collaboration that has resulted in a whole series of best-in-class cameras on Nokia smartphones.

“Carl Zeiss was a crucial partner in the creation of the first PureView experience,” said Jo Harlow, executive vice president of Nokia Smart Devices. “The benefits of our ongoing collaboration will be more PureView innovation and further advancements in smartphone imaging in the coming months and years.” 

Are you looking forward to the Nokia 808 PureView and its technology? How will you use it? Let us know, in the comments below.