Future creatives make our screens sing

Every Nokia Lumia comes with a batch of high-quality lock screen images pre-installed. These amazing images are shot with Nokia devices, but where do they come from and how are they chosen?

The answer is a great example of Nokia encouraging and developing young artists.

David Harrigan from Nokia Design spoke to us about the process back in January last year. At the end of that conversation, he told us that he planned to work with students to develop the range through a programme called Future Creatives.

That’s now happening and the beautiful lock screen images that ship with the Nokia Lumia 925, Lumia 928, Lumia 1020 and Lumia 1520 are the fruits of this process: they are shot by photography students using the amazing Lumia 1020.

Click through on the images in this post for the full-size versions.

Global vision

“We’re currently working in six different locations across the world, on every continent. We’ve approached art departments at universities, and offered to commission their students to produce photographs for us.”

Aside from the excellent work that’s resulted from the programme, there are a few extra aspects that make us really proud.

“It’s giving students an understanding of what it’s like to work professionally. We give a full, detailed brief, as we would do with any professionals we hired. If their work is accepted, then that can be a huge thing for their CVs and portfolios when they come to apply for jobs in the field.

“We also pay professional rates and that’s quite a lot of money when you’re a student. There’s one young woman, in particular, who has been able to pay off all her student fees from creating images for Nokia.”

What makes a good lock screen?

“The images are intended to be proof of Nokia’s imaging leadership. They are shot using PureView technology, and the main thing we’re looking for are pictures that really show off the amazing screen technology that we are incorporating into our devices. Pictures that make the screens sing.”

“They also need to work in harmony with the user interfaces on these devices, of course. They shouldn’t obscure any of the information that needs to shown on the lock screen.”

“We want a degree of spontaneity in the images, so we encourage the students to use the devices to keep a digital diary, a record of what’s going on around them. We ask them to take shots from their window. And think about the small things that matter to them.

“With six different locations that are spread across the world, that process has resulted in lots of variety and different interpretations.”

Hyper driven images

There are three major themes to the images that the students are asked to pursue, David explains, these being…

“We’re looking for images that are hyperfocal – really showing off the range and power of the camera, perhaps using the macro mode, for example.

“Then there are images that are hypernatural. These show the environment around the photographers, in a way that throws it into relief somehow.

“Lastly, we look for the hyper-real. These might be traditional landscape shots that stand out for their composition, lighting or colour.”

We hope you’ve enjoyed the images created for these new devices, and maybe like them even more now you know where they’ve come from.

The colleges we’re working with:

Lahti University of Applied Sciences – http://www.lamk.fi/english/design/Sivut/default.aspx

Arts University Bournemouth – http://aub.ac.uk/courses/ba/ba-photography/

School of Visual Arts – NYC – http://www.sva.edu/digitalphoto

China Central Academy of Fine Arts – http://www.cafa.edu.cn/

London College of Communication – http://www.arts.ac.uk/lcc/courses/undergraduate/ba-hons-photography/

Michaelis School of Fine Art, University of Cape Town – http://www.michaelis.uct.ac.za/