R5 Owner's Perspective on Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra

S21 does raw again? On all lenses? Previous devices didn't do that.

What I need on smartphones is a decent Auto Mode where I could set a minimum shutter speed to freeze the action. But the devices always assume I want to take a static shot and is going to offer me 1/25 as shutter speed.

Manual mode is also not alternative, as you would have to keep an eye on the light to not over and underexposed, nothing for fast point and shoot usage.
 
Yes the smartphone camera is the most popular camera in the world and the new sensor together with computational photography allow them to take great photos especially in good llighting and now even bad lighting. Cameras will become more niche as you can see the sales number continue to drop off. I also use my smartphone camera all the time particularly when I have a telephoto on my DSLR and I need a normal/wide angle shot. The shots have come out well enough. I do think of my smart phone as another camera that I use and I am looking to upgrade my current one as the new ones have better telephoto capabilities. They are all tools for you to use.
 
There are two things that smart phone cameras yet able to match large cameras. (1) Long telephoto shots, and (2) extreme shallow depth of focus of a f1.2 lens. Periscope telephoto lens is able to get around the thickness issue and comes close to your long tele-zoom. Smart software is able to fake the shallow DoF.

What is left is the ergometric of buttons and dials to let you have full control on a large camera. Smart phone users don't even want that. They prefer to scroll thru the filters to select what they see is good.
You left off the most important thing. (3) Image Quality. Even the best cell phone is still a long way off from getting close to the Image Quality of my PEN-F (which is now almost 4yrs old).

To the OP, If all you do is look at images on a 3" wide cell phone, why even spend $1200 on a cellphone. Get $400 galaxy phone and call it good. Download Lightroom Mobile and you'll have eveything you need.
 
In 2019 I decided to give it a go just using a smartphone. I sold my m4/3 kit and 1" compacts and bought the highest end phone camera at the time (iPhone 11 Pro Max). It was liberating to not have a camera bag. And in many situations, the image quality was plenty good enough. Certainly could keep up with the 1" compacts.

But there were just too many situations where it wasn't good enough for me. Or it took an OK picture, but it looked over processed to death by the camera algorithm. Or the fake bg blur had rough cutouts. And the wide and tele lenses were clearly not as good as the main camera, which meant my limited focal range was even more limited. Plus, I just started missing the real control and experience I had with an ILC. So 9 months later I went camera shopping and ended up with EOS R system. Ironically switching to a phone made me end up with an even bigger camera and sensor than I had before.

But I still really enjoy having a high end phone camera. It's an awesome travel and walk around PnS for daylight and takes very good stabilized HDR video. It's something I ALWAYS have on me if I need a picture of something. I don't feel like I'm going to come back with only garbage if I take just the phone with me. With the night mode, I can even take pics after dark that look good on a tablet or laptop screen. It's definitely the best pocket camera I've ever owned. But I probably won't spend $1250 on a phone ever again.
 
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There are two things that smart phone cameras yet able to match large cameras. (1) Long telephoto shots, and (2) extreme shallow depth of focus of a f1.2 lens. Periscope telephoto lens is able to get around the thickness issue and comes close to your long tele-zoom. Smart software is able to fake the shallow DoF.

What is left is the ergometric of buttons and dials to let you have full control on a large camera. Smart phone users don't even want that. They prefer to scroll thru the filters to select what they see is good.
You left off the most important thing. (3) Image Quality. Even the best cell phone is still a long way off from getting close to the Image Quality of my PEN-F (which is now almost 4yrs old).
For a very limited band of photography, phones are very close to 4/3. That would be daylight, deep DOF shots with the main wide camera module. I would say the DR is even better and detail is really close. I often prefer my phone for mid-day outdoor shots of scenery/travel because the Auto HDR is so good.
To the OP, If all you do is look at images on a 3" wide cell phone, why even spend $1200 on a cellphone. Get $400 galaxy phone and call it good. Download Lightroom Mobile and you'll have eveything you need.
Smartphone pictures still look good on slightly bigger screens like iPads and small laptops. Or printed in a photo book.
 
There are two things that smart phone cameras yet able to match large cameras. (1) Long telephoto shots, and (2) extreme shallow depth of focus of a f1.2 lens. Periscope telephoto lens is able to get around the thickness issue and comes close to your long tele-zoom. Smart software is able to fake the shallow DoF.

What is left is the ergometric of buttons and dials to let you have full control on a large camera. Smart phone users don't even want that. They prefer to scroll thru the filters to select what they see is good.
You left off the most important thing. (3) Image Quality. Even the best cell phone is still a long way off from getting close to the Image Quality of my PEN-F (which is now almost 4yrs old).
For a very limited band of photography, phones are very close to 4/3. That would be daylight, deep DOF shots with the main wide camera module. I would say the DR is even better and detail is really close. I often prefer my phone for mid-day outdoor shots of scenery/travel because the Auto HDR is so good.
I still haven't seen a phone yet that comes close. (And I'm not even talking about using my high-res mode, that's a topic for another time.) Now I know my iPhone 8 isn't the top of the line phone, but it's camera isn't too far off from those - far closer than than any phone to a M43 camera is. On its best day under perfect ideal conditions, it still isn't a match for my daughters EM10 with the kit lens (not that pancake one). Any extra thing I do to the image just increases the difference. Same goes with my Pen-F, but even more so. My son has a OnePlus, can't remember the model, but it's new an huge and has 3 cameras, and while fine for many people. Still doesn't come close to my Pen-F+PL12+60. I will say, the one area where phones do a better job is the In-camera panorama. I'm disappointed Sony took that out of their mirrorless cameras - stupid move. My NEX-7 took some great panoramas. I know it can't be that hard to implement.
To the OP, If all you do is look at images on a 3" wide cell phone, why even spend $1200 on a cellphone. Get $400 galaxy phone and call it good. Download Lightroom Mobile and you'll have everything you need.
Smartphone pictures still look good on slightly bigger screens like iPads and small laptops. Or printed in a photo book.
Yep, as long as the images are small I will agree that phone pictures can still look "good". I just choose to not settle for "good". Others mileage may vary.
 
For a very limited band of photography, phones are very close to 4/3. That would be daylight, deep DOF shots with the main wide camera module. I would say the DR is even better and detail is really close. I often prefer my phone for mid-day outdoor shots of scenery/travel because the Auto HDR is so good.
Very accurate comment. This is exactly my experience with smartphone cameras, but you express it in words more succinctly than I could.
 
One of the below pictures is taken with a Huawei smartphone and the other with 5DIII + EF 16-35 f/2.8L II USM. Below ISO 800 smartphones give very good details, and as tkbslc said, better dynamic range in many cases.

579006c81df74a72a544e76924283b6f.jpg

3671bfad26a24b0793d4e8334a57808b.jpg
 
As I thought more about this, I thought about buying my new iPhone after hanging on to the 6S for just way too long (I hate setting up new phones, and this also applies to integer iOS updates because there are always new settings that default to enable features that track me and drain the heck out of my battery). Still, my third battery was becoming nearly useless and the speaker was developing a bizarre glitch (on top of being the absolute worst iPhone speaker that I believe has ever existed).

I keep up with phone technology so I had no delusions about the new camera module on the 12. And my neighbor has a 12 Pro Max, so I've seen what that one can do already. Certainly better than my 6S, but still basically trash compared to my R or G7XII or just about any camera I've ever owned since 2003. Yep, I'd still rather shoot with a 10D than a modern phone's camera.

The 12 mini is much more responsive, I enjoy the two zoom levels (wide angle is hella distorted), and overall it's better than the 6S. Also, a dumpster fire is technically better than a pile of tires on fire but I'm not going to brag about either one. In good light the noise is still terrible, noise reduction turns images into impressionist oil paintings, there's no REAL zoom, and it's still just a camera with a tiny sensor glued onto the back of my phone.

And yet I have over 5,000 images on my phone. Most carried over from my previous models, and that pales in comparison to the number of images I've taken on proper cameras, but I bet I've deleted 5,000 images from phones and even that total number taken on phones over the space of 13 years is still a fraction of my photography.

Why? Because I use the phone to take pictures I might not otherwise take. It's right there and I'm a photographer, so pictures get taken. I'd say 90% are of my cat being cute or a meal that I want to remember (not post on social media.....I'm not one of those people) or maybe just random stuff that I want to document but does not require a good image.

Everyone talks about being able to use the phone's camera as a real photographic tool. They talk about all the amazing images captured on phones. And that's really wonderful and true. But let's not count all the hits and forget to count the misses: of the billions if not trillions of images taken on phone and then perhaps posted to the internet, I'd bet that 99.99% are either pure garbage or they are meaningful only to those who took them and maybe to some with whom they are shared (do you actually care about most photos your "friends" post on Facebook or Instagram????). And just because I think they have little to no appeal, I STILL believe that it's a wonderful thing that people are engaging in photography. Heck, 99% of my images aren't great even when I'm trying my hardest to not suck.

Photography is great even when the photographs aren't. :)
 
One of the below pictures is taken with a Huawei smartphone and the other with 5DIII + EF 16-35 f/2.8L II USM. Below ISO 800 smartphones give very good details, and as tkbslc said, better dynamic range in many cases.

579006c81df74a72a544e76924283b6f.jpg

3671bfad26a24b0793d4e8334a57808b.jpg
Yeah, the 5DM3 is not known to be a DR powerhouse, and shooting RAW would have let you retain more highlight detail, still, not even using lightroom, just using the poor tools in FastStone, I brought back tons of detail in the glass, looked a lot like the phone's image that way. And even cameras like the EOS R have 2 full stop more DR than the 5DM3. But what I really didn't like about the phone's image are here...

What's going on with the severe smudging on the phone image on the left?  A lot of the detail is just...gone.
What's going on with the severe smudging on the phone image on the left? A lot of the detail is just...gone.



I know there are resolution differences, but the 5D has the extra detail without the smudging, watercolor-like detail destroying effects that the phone has.
I know there are resolution differences, but the 5D has the extra detail without the smudging, watercolor-like detail destroying effects that the phone has.



Also thinking about it, shooting at ISO800, you also lost a bit more DR too.



--
NHT
 
In 2019 I decided to give it a go just using a smartphone. I sold my m4/3 kit and 1" compacts and bought the highest end phone camera at the time (iPhone 11 Pro Max). It was liberating to not have a camera bag. And in many situations, the image quality was plenty good enough. Certainly could keep up with the 1" compacts.
It's an absolutely alluring notion for photographers: a tiny camera that's part of a device you're going to have with you at all times anyway that is just as good or better than a camera.

The marketing pushes this propaganda HARD. They show commercials of amazing vistas (on your fairly low-res 1080P television or tiny phone screen, mostly) that say "shot on <some phone>" and we want to believe it. They don't mention they used the phone on a custom rig with a huge cinema lens, cranes, and entire crews of people to make sure that scene or even that image looks stunning. Or they take images that are themselves amazing and seem to imply "hey, it's so easy to get shots like this if you just have a phone" despite the fact that you'd probably have to buy a plane ticket in order to find such an amazing view or subject.
But there were just too many situations where it wasn't good enough for me. Or it took an OK picture, but it looked over processed to death by the camera algorithm. Or the fake bg blur had rough cutouts. And the wide and tele lenses were clearly not as good as the main camera, which meant my limited focal range was even more limited. Plus, I just started missing the real control and experience I had with an ILC. So 9 months later I went camera shopping and ended up with EOS R system. Ironically switching to a phone made me end up with an even bigger camera and sensor than I had before.
:) That's awesome. Don't know what you've got 'til it's gone and all that.
But I still really enjoy having a high end phone camera. It's an awesome travel and walk around PnS for daylight and takes very good stabilized HDR video. It's something I ALWAYS have on me if I need a picture of something. I don't feel like I'm going to come back with only garbage if I take just the phone with me. With the night mode, I can even take pics after dark that look good on a tablet or laptop screen. It's definitely the best pocket camera I've ever owned. But I probably won't spend $1250 on a phone ever again.
 
Marco Nero wrote:
.
Do what you will.
Do what you will, indeed. I consider smart phone screens the 21st century version of 4"x6" drugstore prints. For those a Brownie, or later an Instamatic, was a plenty good enough camera — anything better was overkill. At 8'x10" prints there was a noticeable difference between the two camera types, but most people didn't enlarge past snapshots and didn't care. For those who did care, you needed a better camera. And you still do.
 
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One of the below pictures is taken with a Huawei smartphone and the other with 5DIII + EF 16-35 f/2.8L II USM. Below ISO 800 smartphones give very good details, and as tkbslc said, better dynamic range in many cases.

579006c81df74a72a544e76924283b6f.jpg

3671bfad26a24b0793d4e8334a57808b.jpg
For details, if you enlarge the base of the statue the better resolution of the 5DIII shows. not to mention other visual qualities. For social media, no problems! It's all about what you want and what satisfies you. Happy image making.
 
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Agree. Even my 10 and 12 year old Canon ELPH 500 HS W/24-100MMand Canon Powershot G9 /28-200MM makes photos look as good as any cellphone on a 3" cellphone screen or 12x18 in. print. How about my $174 US Fuji X-A20. The point is that cellphone cameras have a ways to go even with all of the background processing.



G9
G9



Fuji X-A20
Fuji X-A20



Canon ELPH 500 HS
Canon ELPH 500 HS
 
I kind of like those example photos. They have a modern art flavor to them. I can see where someone with a little creativity could use these quirks as interesting photo effects.

The last one is easy to avoid. Just turn off the vibrate option and/or silence the ring.
 
I know that this subject has been beat to death, but the vast majority of people will never need an R series or other mirrorless or DSLR camera and I am reluctant, but depressed, to say that I can only see the continued death spiral of the traditional camera industry.
I never understood why so many people assume a shrinking market is a dying one. There are plenty of examples of shrinking markets that stabilize and remain healthy albeit smaller and there are also plenty of examples where a market dies completely.

To me it seems obvious that a phone will never replace dedicated cameras for certain applications. Thus it seems much more likely that the camera market will stabilize at some point and mainly higher-end cameras will remain.
 
I am, and have been, a Canon film camera and DSLR camera owner/user since the 1990's. I currently have, among other Canon cameras, an R5 with the RF 100 - 500 mm lens and love the combination. Very, very nice operability characteristics, performance and image quality. This is the best camera I have ever owned and hope to keep it indefinitely.

Having said that, the combination costs over $6K US and it weighs at least 5 lbs. I have to make a definite point to carry it around while looking for wildlife photo opportunities.

I just read about the new Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra that was introduced today and it is quite sobering. Four cameras, raw capability, AI processing, 4K video, etc. and it costs "only" $1200 US.

I know that this subject has been beat to death, but the vast majority of people will never need an R series or other mirrorless or DSLR camera and I am reluctant, but depressed, to say that I can only see the continued death spiral of the traditional camera industry.

I live in Florida, within several miles of the Gulf Coast. Many people go to watch and photograph sunsets. Virtually everyone is using a smart phone or tablet to do selfies against the setting sun or to take pictures of the sunset itself.

Ten or more years ago, people would see me with my DSLR and ask me to take pictures of them with their digital cameras. Now, no one asks to have their picture taken. Quite a change!
Ehh. Yeah, smartphones have all those capabilities, and the pictures smartphones take look great on a small smartphone screen. They start to fall apart when I pull it up on my 1440p monitor, and I imagine it's even worse when you view it on a 4K monitor. And I'm not even pixel peeping yet, just smeared details, etc.

The main benefit of a smartphone is convenience. I use mine a lot for casual photography, mainly of my child, as I always have it with me. But when I want to do more serious photography, out come the big guns.

And a smartphone simply can't create the effect of thin DOF with nicely blurred backgrounds. They try do it with computational photography, but it looks a bit artificial.

The IQ and dynamic range of modern full-frame sensors is still a lot better than those small sensors used on smartphones.

Eventually the market decline will stop and there will be a steady base for enthusiasts and pros. A much smaller market for the manufacturers, but there will still be one. And well, with many emerging markets becoming more and more prosperous, there could eventually be some growth again.
Do people look at the sharp decline in smartphone sales over the last couple of years and predict we’re on our way to an agrarian society, shunning technology?

When the smartphone market had no more untapped markets and the tech was mature, that crazy graph started a downward trend. Predicting that is like saying the sun will rise tomorrow.
 
I know that this subject has been beat to death, but the vast majority of people will never need an R series or other mirrorless or DSLR camera and I am reluctant, but depressed, to say that I can only see the continued death spiral of the traditional camera industry.
I never understood why so many people assume a shrinking market is a dying one. There are plenty of examples of shrinking markets that stabilize and remain healthy albeit smaller and there are also plenty of examples where a market dies completely.

To me it seems obvious that a phone will never replace dedicated cameras for certain applications. Thus it seems much more likely that the camera market will stabilize at some point and mainly higher-end cameras will remain.
I would agree. But the question is how many companies will be able to "right size" for the new market, will their shareholders tolerate it, and how many companies will that market handle?
 
There are two things that smart phone cameras yet able to match large cameras. (1) Long telephoto shots, and (2) extreme shallow depth of focus of a f1.2 lens. Periscope telephoto lens is able to get around the thickness issue and comes close to your long tele-zoom. Smart software is able to fake the shallow DoF.

What is left is the ergometric of buttons and dials to let you have full control on a large camera. Smart phone users don't even want that. They prefer to scroll thru the filters to select what they see is good.
You left off the most important thing. (3) Image Quality. Even the best cell phone is still a long way off from getting close to the Image Quality of my PEN-F (which is now almost 4yrs old).
For a very limited band of photography, phones are very close to 4/3. That would be daylight, deep DOF shots with the main wide camera module. I would say the DR is even better and detail is really close. I often prefer my phone for mid-day outdoor shots of scenery/travel because the Auto HDR is so good.
From a different thread about the rf 24-240mm and the lens electronic processing making a much better lens:

Alas I fear those who make IA software and apply it to photos that anyone would automatically delete due to lost focus, bad exposure and other such issues that were previously thought lost beyond all hope, and fix them up just fine.

I can imagine the day is close at hand when you can use a cell, whisper "Rf 28-70mm, set at 68mm , ISO 100, with max bohek background"
or even less information and out pops an image better than ever than gotten from an R5 with the 28-70mm lens.

Or "Rf 100-500mm, set at 450 with 2x extender", and out pops another great image better than u could have ever gotten from your Rf lens and R5.

Plus no worries about dropping it off a high shelf or into water. Just remember to put it back in your shirt pocket and not leave it somewhere.

Alas, that "technical advance" destroys the magic and enjoyment from the art of creating great images.

Atleast for me.

But those days are going by faster and faster although there was a time when I thought they would never end.

There was a Sixties song by the Who that had a chorus of I hope I die before I turn 30.

Then ten years later, it became 40.
Then later 50 and then later 6o.

To add:
The latest Galaxy is not there yet, but cell phones are getting closer and it seems to be only a matter of time before the question is "is that from an R5 with a 100-500mm or from a cell phone?" the answer would be the "only way to know for sure is to check the photo data properties".

And I forgot: If you lose it in the house or some where else, just call the number. If it still has battery power, easy find. Even easier if phone locator is still turned on.

I have lost mine several times. When my spouse would call it, I could hear it ringing but still could not find it until she says just look in your front shirt pocket.

Oh yeah...hell getting old. Should have turned on the vibrator.
The phone vibrator that is.
 
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I know that this subject has been beat to death, but the vast majority of people will never need an R series or other mirrorless or DSLR camera and I am reluctant, but depressed, to say that I can only see the continued death spiral of the traditional camera industry.
I never understood why so many people assume a shrinking market is a dying one. There are plenty of examples of shrinking markets that stabilize and remain healthy albeit smaller and there are also plenty of examples where a market dies completely.

To me it seems obvious that a phone will never replace dedicated cameras for certain applications. Thus it seems much more likely that the camera market will stabilize at some point and mainly higher-end cameras will remain.
I don't think we will end up with smartphones at one end and ultra expensive ILCs on the other. I see a merging of both technologies where a segment of smartphones will branch off and assume some of the format and hardware of dedicated cameras with these devices being controlled with smartphone tech tweaked to serve this new form factor. What will hopefully push this to happen is the dedicated camera users getting affordable capable hardware they desire. Along with a slice of smartphone users who want better imagining capability getting more capable imaging devices than a typical smartphone can deliver. This will be the new enthusiast and hobbyist segment. It will also serve professionals who don't need, or can't use, expensive, heavy gear. This would include professionals who need to shoot, manipulate and upload content fast from about anywhere.

I think this is happening much quicker than we realize. The S21 Ultra is already moving toward being one of these types of devices. It has changed the form factor of a smartphone to a degree by prioritizing the function and capability of the camera section at the sacrifice of a slim, smooth skin. This might be a pivotal moment toward these new hybrid devices eventually coming to market.
 
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