Nokia's desire to be known as the best mobile-imaging company is being proved today with the announcement of RAW image file support for its two premier devices, the Lumia 1020 and Lumia 1520. In describing the breadth of new possibilities opened up by the unprocessed pics, Nokia underlines that "the image stays totally natural." That will mean a fair bit of unhidden imaging noise and other flaws that JPEG processing usually tidies up for you, but this move undeniably opens up a whole new avenue for photographic creativity with Nokia's phones.

Just as significantly, Nokia is also announcing a new "Refocus" feature for its PureView devices. Like Lytro, this allows you to shift the focus of your photo after the fact, as illustrated nicely by Nokia's Refocus website. The company hasn't yet detailed how it achieves the effect without dedicated hardware as with the Lytro cam, though it's reasonable to expect it's done by combining a quick series of shots, with each one focusing at a different distance — rather like the Focus Twist app for iOS. In any case, it looks like a cool feature and should be rolling out to all PureView devices in November.

Update: Check out our hands-on with the Refocus app to see it in action and learn more about the way that it works.