Blackberry Venice live unit pictured, packs an 18MP OIS camera

It was about time the BlackBerry Venice followed the numerous leaks with a live appearance and today's the day. The Canadian company's foray into the Android realm is apparently imminent, now that a working device has shown up, in this case in the hands of the folks over at Techrum. While we already had a general idea how the smartphone would look, we're now treated to detailed (well, 0.5MP, but still) images of several key features.

And what's the single most revered Blackberry feature, if not the hardware QWERTY keyboard? Only here, it's hidden behind the display and slides out of obscurity only when needed. Sure, you'll be provided an on-screen one for less intense typing.

In a departure from tradition, the power button has been moved to the left side. In all fairness it would have been ridiculously out of place on the top plate of a tall, slider-type device. That spot has now been reserved for the SIM and microSD slots.

    
Hands-on with the Blackberry Venice

The headline feature may turn out to be on the back though, and that's the camera. An 18MP unit, the main shooter boasts optical image stabilization and fast focus, so we'd speculate there's some phase detection tech. The lens is also joined by a dual-LED flash.

Finally, the images reveal what looks like Android Lollipop, but that's hardly any news, given that KitKat is two years old and Marshmallow hasn't been launched yet.

    
BlackBerry Venice in the flesh

Android-based BlackBerry Venice to be launched by T-Mobile!

BlackBerry Venice is the codename of an unannounced smartphone that should be one of BlackBerry's first devices to run Android. Not long ago, we heard that the Venice should be available at some point via AT&T. Now, @evleaks has it that the new handset is also going to be sold by T-Mobile (though there's no word on exactly when this should happen). 

According to previous rumors, BlackBerry is planning to announce the Venice in November. We've already seen renders reportedly showing the new handset, and you can check them out for yourself in the slideshow below.

The BlackBerry Venice is supposed to be a high-end slider with a full QWERTY keyboard, and a 5.4-inch Quad HD (1440 x 2560 pixels) display that seems to be slightly curved at the edges - similar to the screen of the Samsung Galaxy S6 edge. Other features might include a six-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 808 processor, a 18 MP rear camera, a 5 MP front-facing camera, and 3 GB of RAM.