Happy Friday #TeamBlackBerry!

On deck this week, five tips for the BlackBerry 10 camera, such as how to geotag photos and how to access your photos and more from a DLNA compatible device.

1 – Use different Shooting and Scene Modes

The BlackBerry Z10 has lots of options to help you capture the perfect picture depending on your situation, so after opening the camera make sure you review the various options available to you.

For example, in addition to the Normal shooting mode, you also have the option of using a Stabilization or Burst shooting mode. Stabilization is great if you’re like me and can’t keep still when taking pictures. Burst on the other hand is a great way to capture the perfect action shot, such as your dog catching a tennis ball or jumping into the family pool (ed – make sure you are out of the splash zone!). On top of Shooting Mode options, you also have several Scene Modes available to you such as Action, Whiteboard, Night and Beach or Snow.

To access these options tap the icon with three dots that appears in the bottom right corner and customize the settings to your desired preferences.

Read more at the Inside BlackBerry Help Blog »

Watch all the action below and hear how Arun uses the BlackBerry 10 camera to capture every moment, even with two very active kids at home who just won’t sit still.

[ YouTube link for mobile viewing ]

Have you ever had trouble getting the moment just right? Are you looking forward to having the BlackBerry 10 camera and time-shift feature make that a thing of the past?

Photographers are a unique and highly creative bunch — they come in a wide variety of shapes, sizes, backgrounds, skill levels, and styles. BlackBerry® smartphone cameras and the apps that drive them can say the same thing—that they are unique, creative, and are far from one-size-fits-all. So, what are some of the most useful photography apps for #TeamBlackBerry users? Let’s take a look at a few:

Camera Plus By WickidApps
For active shutterbugs looking to snap and email photos from their BlackBerry smartphone in batches, WikidApps’ Camera Plus can be a big help. This app allows you to capture, preview and email up to 25 photos or about 5MB of data. Camera Plus also allows you to preview and remove individual photos from an album, then email the album off to a recipient. One caveat to this app: Sending large amounts of data may result in extra charges not covered by your data plan, so consult your agreement before utilizing Camera Plus through your wireless carrier.

Simple Depth Of Field Calculator By Arvinder Channey
In photography, Depth of Field (DOF) is the distance between the nearest and farthest objects in a scene that appear acceptably sharp in an image. Arvinder Channey’s Simple DOF Calculator for BlackBerry calculates Depth Of Field, Near Depth of Field, Far Depth of Field and Hyperfocal distance. It also supports a variety of camera formats and does not require a keyboard to operate. This app is not for the casual photographer, but if you’re looking to move from amateur photographer into semi-pro, you may want this in your toolbox.

FlickrShow By Motek Americas Inc.
FlickrShow (formerly Screen Charger) is a fun little app for showing off your photography on your BlackBerry smartphone, and it delivers a few fun options as well. For example, FlickrShow replaces the standard clock screen that you see when you start charging your phone battery with pictures publicly available through photo-sharing site Flickr® and controlled by parameters that you set (no Flickr account required). You can include photos by user, tags, location and more to create a pretty sweet slideshow. This app also rocks because it’s free!

If you use these apps on your BlackBerry smartphone – or have suggestions for others – please share them here or, better yet, post a photo!

Greetings #TeamBlackBerry! I hope everyone has enjoyed the summer so far – anybody have any big plans for the last bit of the season? Based on the number of responses to our tweet “What would you say you do most on your #BlackBerry?”, I’d say you’re all planning to stay very busy, and a big part of what you’ll do is stay in constant touch with your friends and share all that’s happening. Below, see the Top 5 BlackBerry® apps according to #TeamBlackBerry. (BTW: For my end of summer vacation, I’m planning a little bit of a Europe trip, including Amsterdam, Munich, Interlaken, Marseilles, Monte-Carlo, Ibiza, Barcelona, UK, and Ireland! Good thing I’ve got the BlackBerry® Travel app installed to help keep my plans in order. Download it now and take it for a spin if you’re a travel warrior like me!)

#1 – BlackBerry Messenger (BBM)

When it comes to must-have apps on a BlackBerry® smartphone, BlackBerry® Messenger™ (BBM™) was the most mentioned – no surprise! Currently I use BBM to keep in touch with my friends locally and globally (I’ll do so especially on my Euro-trip), and it sounds like many of you do this as well. As a bonus tip: Did you know that you can use BBM over Wi-Fi®*? If you use BBM in different countries, just sync up to an accessible Wi-Fi network and enjoy BlackBerry Messenger!

Download BBM right now!

#2 – Email

The second most popular application selected by #TeamBlackBerry members to use on their BlackBerry smartphone is email. The ease and speed with which a BlackBerry smartphone delivers your email to you was a big winner. No surprises here: this is what BlackBerry smartphones are known for!

#3 – Twitter for BlackBerry smartphones

#TeamBlackBerry loves to tweet, and that’s why Twitter® for BlackBerry® smartphones comes in at number 3 in our list of the Top 5 BlackBerry apps. Twitter® for BlackBerry smartphones allows me to see what all my Twitter friends are up to, and to let them know what I thought of the latest episode of Game of Thrones (Ned!).

Download Twitter for BlackBerry smartphones

#4 – BlackBerry Camera

I know from firsthand experience how important it is to take photos on the go, and a BlackBerry smartphone allows you to do this quickly and easily! So it’s not surprising that at number 4, #TeamBlackBerry members selected the BlackBerry smartphone camera as one of the apps they use most. BTW, have you taken a look at our Tips and Tricks for taking photos on your BlackBerry smartphone blog post? Also, be sure you visit our BlackBerry Images albums on Flickr®, which are populated with pictures that you guys submit to us on Twitter! (A highlight is the BlackBerry Travels album – I’m sensing a travel theme, here…)

#5 – Facebook for BlackBerry smartphones

Finally, a huge number of you use your BlackBerry smartphones to check up on your Facebook® profile, upload pictures and chat with your friends while you’re on the go. I know I use the app extensively day in and day out, especially to share cool pictures I take with my friends. Be sure to check out our post on Facebook for BlackBerry smartphones v2.0, and then download Facebook for BlackBerry smartphones!

Take care #TeamBlackBerry, until next time!

*Data plan required.

Taking photos using a BlackBerry® smartphone with v6.0 device software or BlackBerry® PlayBook™ tablet is really quick and easy, and allows you to capture great photos in plenty of different environments. Today I’d like to provide an overview of some of the options available when taking photos so you can customize them as you see fit, as well as take advantage of some options you might not have previously used.

For this post, I’ll be focusing on BlackBerry® 6 device software, so if you are using an earlier version of BlackBerry device software, check the user guide for more information on available camera options. If you don’t know which version of BlackBerry device software you are currently using, check out our post on How to Identify your BlackBerry Device Software version.

Read more at the Inside BlackBerry Help Blog »

The events team has been hard at work giving BlackBerry PlayBook demos to CES 2011 attendees at the BlackBerry Booth. I grabbed my main man Jeff to give an overview of some of the PlayBook’s core multimedia features, such as the front and rear-facing cameras and Photos app, and using the HDMI output to display rich content on large screens (great for presentations!). Jeff also gives a sneak peak of BBM via BlackBerry Bridge, which allows you to pair your BlackBerry smartphone with the BlackBerry PlayBook. Cool stuff!

Post a comment and let us know what you think.

Our team has been working hard to enhance the overall multimedia experience in BlackBerry® 6, and we’ve packed a lot of changes into the upcoming release. I’m very excited to be able to provide some more details about this aspect of BlackBerry 6 today.

In pulling together this update, the multimedia team focused on delivering an intuitive multimedia experience right out of the box – so whether you are a power user or new to mobile multimedia on BlackBerry smartphones, you can easily find and use the enhanced multimedia features.

There’s too much to talk about in just one post, so with that in mind, I picked some of my favorite new BlackBerry 6 multimedia features. Look for the Inside BlackBerry team to dive deeper into some of these features in future blog posts.

Music Album Art and Discovery

The minute you’ve loaded your music library to your BlackBerry smartphone via BlackBerry Media Sync, you’ll notice that we’ve added album art virtually everywhere for instant and easy recognition of your favorite albums. You will be able to navigate your music by using the interactive carousel to swipe through the album art. You will also quickly find other selections from the same album/artist by selecting the album or artist name for the song currently playing!

Organize Your Photos

With BlackBerry 6, we will also provide multiple dynamic ways to view and organize your photos, so thousands of photos can be organized intuitively. For example, photos will be able to be grouped by event or by date. You will be able to view the full picture or a slide show of pictures with transitions. BlackBerry smartphones with touch support are designed to easily zoom in on an area of interest with the “Pinch to Zoom” feature. BlackBerry 6 will also allow you to select groups of pictures to share, copy, paste or delete.

Streaming, Sharing and Searching for Videos

Searching through videos on your BlackBerry smartphone has been made easier in BlackBerry 6 with the new thumbnail view. There will also be more ways to view videos in BlackBerry 6. You will be able to opt to play video in various sizes (Original, Fit to Screen, Full Screen), plus instantly share your videos with the world using the new integrated YouTube® video uploader. Or perhaps you want to watch some online videos – no problem! The new universal search feature in BlackBerry 6 has been designed to enable you to search Internet video sites such as YouTube, and to enjoy higher quality YouTube videos when using Wi-Fi.

New Camera Controls and Supported Scene Modes

With BlackBerry 6, we focused on perfecting the point and shoot experience. Users can capture photos quicker and better than ever before with a variety of new features in BlackBerry 6. New onscreen controls means there is no need to hunt through menus for your favorite options. You will be able to access and review camera pictures, set popular options and pick from a variety of scene modes, all directly from the camera screen. You will also be able to capture video using the video camera application on the device.

New Podcasts App!

With the BlackBerry podcasts service, users will be able to experience the convenience of searching, subscribing and playing entertaining audio and video podcasts directly from their BlackBerry smartphone. This service will be preloaded with BlackBerry 6 in North America and is completely mobile (so no PC required) – and all of the content is available for free! Stay tuned to Inside BlackBerry for an upcoming post on the BlackBerry podcasts app.

Finding New Multimedia Content and Apps

If you have not yet loaded any multimedia content onto your BlackBerry smartphone or are looking for something new, no problem. Select “Explore Music Apps”, “Explore Video Apps” or “Explore Picture Apps” from the main menu screen within the media player, and you will be provided with a direct link to quickly discover popular media apps from each of those categories from the BlackBerry App World™ storefront (app availability dependent upon your region and carrier). This is one of many ways to start enjoying media right out of the box.

BlackBerry Desktop Software and Media Sync

On top of continued support of iTunes & Windows Media® Player music sync and 2-way photo sync, BlackBerry 6 has been designed to enable you to sync videos to and from your BlackBerry smartphone (BlackBerry to PC, or PC to BlackBerry). Plus there are now greater music sync options: in addition to playlists, users will have more flexibility and will also be able to sync by individual artists or genres. Stay tuned to a future post on Inside BlackBerry about BlackBerry Desktop Software with Media Sync.

I’m very excited about the new multimedia experience that will be offered in BlackBerry 6! Post a comment and let us know of the multimedia features that you use today, or those that you’re most looking forward to in BlackBerry 6.

Probably the biggest one is that you can easily share photos with friends or your online communities. After you’ve taken your photo, you can start sharing it within two clicks.

Here’s how:

After taking your photo, select the “send as” icon on the screen.  If you can’t find it, you can also select “send as” from the menu.  You can find the menu by pressing the menu key – this is the key with the “BB” on it.

Once you have selected the “send as” options, you can select where you want the photo to go.

Most devices have email, Messenger Contact (BlackBerry Messenger) and MMS (also known as picture SMS).  You can also send photos to Flickr, MySpace, Facebook, GoogleTalk, Yahoo! Messenger, and Windows Live Messenger.

Try sharing photos from your device today by downloading one of the social networking and instant messaging applications.