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Lars Rehm
DPReview Administrator
Works as a
Technology Writer
Has a website at
http://www.larsrehm.com
Joined on
Nov 7, 2007
About me:
I am a former member of Dpreview's Seattle team and now a freelance technology journalist and industry consultant based in Europe. I write most oft the smartphone and mobile imaging content on the site and if you come through Berlin or Madrid there's a chance you'll see out me shooting with one of the latest smartphones. You can follow me on Twitter @larsrehm or have a look at my personal website for more info. |
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| Tjejmilen, Stockholm by Schjeldal from Running People | Living statue by Wildbegonia from An intermezzo in the “can we travel again soon ? "series, Now, Street performance – Living statues | Magic... by FVDS from Macro - Candle |
Great reading, Richard! Learned something there :)
Fotoni: Pop-up camera can resolve all the problems. No front camera needed because it can rotate, even 360 degrees if needed. You are 100% secure because pop-up would reveal it can record. No space needed from the front because pop-up goes inside the phone.
But no. Pop-up is not cool? So lets screw everything to have a bit cooler option. That is what phones are about. Gimping everything to make it look more cool.
Pop-up cameras have potential but they also come with a few challenges: the requirements to a front camera can differ quite a bit the main camera and it's not easy to optimize one camera to work well in both scenarios. For example, a big sensor is great for the main camera but usually means limited depth-of-field which can be undesirable for a front camera. The pop-up mechanism usually also means the device cannot be waterproof...
PinnyHead: Has anyone seen reliability data for the Android phones that have been shipping with periscope lenses? Even with a case, your average phone is exposed to a lot of shock over its life. The introduction of moving parts seems like a risky move if not done really well.
I've been using and knocking around my Huawei P30 Pro with periscope lens for well over a year now...no issues with the camera whatsoever...
Mark B UK: Do these cameras shoot RAW, and if so is this possible with all three lens options? I tire of reading smartphone reports on this site that omit this information, which is critical to keen photographers. Likewise, we need to know whether and to what extent phones are weather sealed.
@Johan Borg frame-stacking is the key, I am not sure if the P20 Pro did it (it's ancient by smartphone standards) but it provides benefits you can't get out of a single Raw frame...
Mark B UK: Do these cameras shoot RAW, and if so is this possible with all three lens options? I tire of reading smartphone reports on this site that omit this information, which is critical to keen photographers. Likewise, we need to know whether and to what extent phones are weather sealed.
@romasito, to be honest I haven't tried this on many phones recently but my P30 Pro certainly does Raw on all three cameras...that's a model from early 2019, so i'd expect newer models to do the same.
Mark B UK: Do these cameras shoot RAW, and if so is this possible with all three lens options? I tire of reading smartphone reports on this site that omit this information, which is critical to keen photographers. Likewise, we need to know whether and to what extent phones are weather sealed.
I haven't seen any high-end phone in the last few years that would not be capable of recording Raw. However, given none of the computational wizardy is applied to Raw files I really would not recommend using Raw on an phone these days. Even with the best Raw processing you'll always end up with more noise, less dynamic range and likely less detail as well than in the jpg.
twinfighter: so sad... the P30Pro comes with 28 mm equiv. f/1.6 camera. Now, the P40Pro got 23 mm equiv. and f/1.9. This is too wide for general photos and portraits and the new f/1.9 cancels the benefit of the new sensor. Now you have to crop every image
Afaik it is a 23mm lens but Huawei crops it 27mm. Basically this allows them to design a thinner lens that fits into the device and eliminates issues with corner softness and distortion. The sensor offers more than enough resolution for that.
Paul Trantow: No apostrophe in 'hard drives.'
thanks, fixed now :)
Calphate: Looks fantastic on paper just like my Insta360 One X
Then I found out that the battery can't last more than 3 min even though the temperature is still above 0 degrees, and that's just the beginning of a series of other problems
must be something wrong with your One X...I have used it extensively and can confirm the battery lasts A LOT longer than 3min. I would not know how long exactly because I have never run out...
pepegot: Still not an 8k camera. with an editor 5.7k video-not too good on a big screen. Good for cell phones. Does it have an editor for the computer or is it just a cell phone toy?
Insta360 has a desktop editing application...but that still doesn't get you more resolution...
ggc: I would like to understand how much is marketing and how much is a real improvement.... pictures from newer phones i have seen are something like 3 megapixel images, with a lot of blur from noise reduction and less detail than nowadays "old" real 12 megapixel phones. And some phones are even incapable of shooting at night at base iso with real long exposures. Tele and wide cameras often without raw.
Is this an improvement?
I am really not sure which new phones you are looking at. I think the image quality and detail from the latest high-end phones is pretty amazing and way ahead of anything that was released only a couple of years ago. If you shoot Raw on your phone, you don't take advantage of most of the computational imaging functions and with the multi-frame night modes there really is no obvious reason to shoot long exposures unless you are after some motion blur effect...but even for that there are computational imaging features that work amazingly well (for example on the latest Huaweis).
dr.noise: I don't see how the second display uses the USB port in any of the photos. The display attaches from the side and the USB port is on the bottom. How do they connect? Don't understand what's going on.
Exactly, the 2nd display is integrated into case (and cannot be removed from that case). The G8X slides into that case and connects to it via its USB port.
cdembrey: " ...should leave a sizeable profit margin for Apple, even after adding overhead expenses into the calculation."
Apple spends Billions on R&D, buying new technology, licensing new technology, etc, etc. An iPhone is much more than a camera.
...well, those are the overheads I mention...
GodSpeaks: I'll wait for the reviews of a production phone using this periscope camera before passing any judgements.
The Huawei P30 Pro uses a very similar system already...also the OPPO Reno but you'll probably find more test reports for the Huawei :)
entoman: What's the difference between having a 64MP sensor that combines 4 (tiny) pixels into one, to produce a 16MP output.... and having a 16MP sensor with pixels that are 4 times larger?
As far as I can see, the result, in terms of noise levels, dynamic range and detail, would be exactly the same.
Hey noisephotographer, where are you based? Anywhere in Europe by any chance? I'd love to meet up for a beer (or other beverage) sometime. I am sure it would be an enlightening conversation (for me of course!)
entoman: What's the difference between having a 64MP sensor that combines 4 (tiny) pixels into one, to produce a 16MP output.... and having a 16MP sensor with pixels that are 4 times larger?
As far as I can see, the result, in terms of noise levels, dynamic range and detail, would be exactly the same.
Here is a pretty good article on the subject: https://www.gsmarena.com/quad_bayer_sensors_explained-news-37459.php
madeinlisboa: More candies to play with. Each new camera has a new "feature" to convince lambs to waste another thousand euros. How naive to pay such amount for software specific to a hardware. I feel sorry for you
@madeinlisboa you should consider updating to a current model, it might be an eye-opening experience, especially from a camera point of view ;)
madeinlisboa: More candies to play with. Each new camera has a new "feature" to convince lambs to waste another thousand euros. How naive to pay such amount for software specific to a hardware. I feel sorry for you
Personally I would not upgrade my phone just for this feature alone. Nonetheless, it's great to see how mobile manufacturers come up with these clever ideas, driving innovation in imaging, something the 'traditional' camera makers seem to have stopped doing quite some time ago. This is just one feature but bundle it with all the other computational imaging methods and you can see why people have stopped buying compact cameras.
Jefftan: "Unlike the long exposure options on the Huawei P30 Pro"
referring to "night mode"?
no, there's a light painting mode with several sub-modes (traffic trails, light graffiti, silky water, star trails) that works pretty well handheld. Night mode is not designed to simulate long exposures.
NJOceanView: I still ache for the day Sony puts this technology into their RX100 and turns the entire P&S camera segment on its head.
difficult, as the RX100 does not have a mini-computer attached to it ;)