If you watched the launch event for the Nokia Lumia 1020 then one of the most amazing moments was when Imaging Marketing Manager Kristina Björknäs literally found a needle in a haystack using the 41-megapixel zooming powers of the PureView camera.

Now, we’ve got hold of the photo Kristina captured and used, and we can let you try that demo again for yourselves.

Let’s start with the full-sized image (you can download this, if you want, by clicking through on the picture). At this point, the needle is pretty much invisible.

 

So let’s zoom in. Here we’ve zoomed half-way into the image. You’d be excused, though, for still not spotting the needle – it’s pretty tiny. And note that, unlike other smartphone cameras, the details aren’t being ‘pumped-up’ using manufactured pixels.

Let’s get a little closer.

Aha – there it is. But the shocking thing is, we’re still not seeing every detail that’s been captured by the camera.

Finally, here we are, at 100% detail. And still no pixellation whatsoever.

One last thought. If we were to publish the whole image at full zoom, then at a standard 75dpi resolution, you’d actually need a monitor that was 95-inches wide to see the whole thing!

So there you have it, the Nokia Lumia 1020 is so powerful when it comes to picking out details, you can literally use it to find a needle in a haystack!

Note that this picture was taken with prototype hardware and software.