Which Digital Point And Shoot Cameras Are Better Than Samsung Galaxy S7 Camera?

With the very latest Android superphone in my easily, in this instance the Samsung 'Galaxy S7 edge', equipped with a f/one.vii 1/2.six" 12MP OIS-equipped camera, what'southward an AAWP writer to do but pitch this new technology against some established photographic camera champions from the world of Windows Phone and Windows 10 Mobile? In this case the similarly-sized Lumia 950 and the slightly smaller and much older 'classic' Lumia 1020. Heading into this particular headline imaging characteristic and writing this paragraph, I accept admittedly no idea which of the 3 will emerge the winner. No idea at all...

Tempting though it is to practice any comparison as a two-way feature, using our comparator technology, whichever Lumia I pick to go up confronting the S7 volition prompt howls of protest that I picked the incorrect ane. So a three way test information technology is, Galaxy S7 edge versus Lumia 950 versus Lumia 1020. Android 6.0 vs Windows ten Mobile vs Windows Phone 8.i, though it's really all most the hardware and imaging software, of form.

The usual added complications about matching resolutions (and, to an extent, fields of view) apply, of course. Happily, the 8MP default (oversampled) resolution of the Lumia 950 and the 9MP resolution (in 16:ix, of course) of the Galaxy S7 are good matches for each other. Leaving the lower 5MP oversampled resolution of the 1020 equally the odd one out, though with the option to autumn back on the underlying 34MP resolution should it feel embarrassed by lack of detail. I've tried to mix and match all of these sensitively, as needed, in the test shots beneath.

As usual, my tests span a wide diverseness of subjects, distances and light levels, trying to really exercise the range of these devices. And as usual, click whatever 1:1 image ingather in guild to download the original JPG, e.g. for your own analysis. Plus I'chiliad scoring each image/crop out of 10 equally we go along, in order to arrive at a definitive winner.

Test no. ane: Into hazy sunday, landscape

A regular bailiwick of mine, the Herald at my local aviation museum, here shot into hazy dominicus to run into how the phone cameras would cope. Hither'due south the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

And here are crops/links from, in lodge, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

The images here do a good job of showing off the various imaging priorities, at to the lowest degree in terms of algorithms. The Lumia 1020 photo is very natural and realistic, while the 950 sacrifices some of this with artificial sharpening and then the S7 (border) goes the whole pig, with large amounts of sharpening - the aim for the latter two is to await adept on the phone screen, to the user, whereas the 1020'southward shot looked slow on its own screen yet superior here on the level playing field of a spider web folio.

Nearly people would probably prefer the 1020'southward way of doing things at the end of the solar day, every bit information technology means you become a superior JPG that yous can do more than with, which is why I'g marking it up here. Don't worry about the field of view or resolution differences, since I could insert the 1020's 34MP ingather as well, should I deem it necessary. Oh, go on and then:

Scores: Lumia 1020: 10 pts, Lumia 950: 8 pts, Milky way S7: 7 pts

Examination no. 2: Blue heaven, natural detail

E'er a test of how skilful a smartphone photographic camera'due south algorithms Really are, looking at the incredible textures and fragile detail in nature, here set against a pure blueish sky. Hither'south the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

And here are crops/links from, in guild, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

The differences in algorithms are even more pronounced than for the aeroplane instance. Here you lot tin the outcome of the Samsung Galaxy S7 edge'southward sharpening on a discipline which has fine detail. When yous await closely, the effect is really, really ugly. In contrast, the Lumia 1020, even at pixel level, feels almost like you lot're looking through a window at reality. While the Lumia 950's image is somewhere in between the two extremes and represents a compromise betwixt getting the paradigm 'pure' and optimising it to wait 'super sharp' on the telephone screen.

Scores: Lumia 1020: 10 pts, Lumia 950: 8 pts, Galaxy S7: 6 pts

Test no. iii: Sunny macro

A tiny, delicate flower, lit by the sun, very tricky to get the focussing right - the 1020 was hardest because of the larger optics, but both the S7 and 950 had to have a few cracks at getting the shot. Hither'southward the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

I did something a little different here - because I wanted to bear witness the whole width of the blossom below (along with bokeh), I pre-scaled the images below by a factor of effectually ii before producing the crops here. Hither they are from, in order, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

At that place's not much to choose between the images hither, though the S7 perhaps edges it (no pun intended!) - more saliently, the S7 only needed a couple of seconds and two tries to get the shot, while the 950 took iii of each and the 1020 had to be backed away and PureView zoom used earlier I was finally able to lock focus.

Scores: Lumia 1020: 7 pts, Lumia 950: 8 pts, Galaxy S7: ix pts

Test no. 4: Catchy macro, dew on spider'south web

Really, really hard to become focus on the delicate web and not on the background. Hither's the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

And here are crops/links from, in guild, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7. Note that information technology proved just about impossible to get exactly the same framing and view of the drops from phone to phone, and so concentrate more on the detail than the matching of the frames!:

In that location's a very articulate pecking guild here as well, with the 1020 doing a great job of focussing, thank you to Lumia Camera's ability to focus 'manually', though having to utilize all the PureView zoom in gild to get close in the outset place proved a limiting factor and the particular isn't that impressive. The Milky way S7 camera does meliorate in terms of detail (looking in particular at the fish eye reflections in the larger drops) simply comes with a heavy caveat that I had to trick the autofocus into getting the shot by focussing on my hand, in front end of the shots and so quickly whipping the hand abroad and snapping - the S7's algorithms kept wanting to focus on the groundwork!

Meanwhile the Lumia 950 managed to auto-focus and preserve bully detail, only look at the reflections in the drops and marvel.

Scores: Lumia 1020: half dozen pts, Lumia 950: 10 pts, Galaxy S7: vii pts

Examination no. 5: Sunny zoom

Time to use the zoom facilities in each phone camera properly, shooting the front end of the Gannet from the museum fence - about 30 metres away. Here's the overall scene (every bit shot by the 1020):

And hither are crops/links from, in order, the Lumia 1020 (using its ii.5x PureView lossless zoom), the Lumia 950 (using office 2x PureView zoom and a little lossy digital zoom on top) and the Samsung Milky way S7 (using mainly digital zoom):

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the digital ('make most of information technology up') zoom on the Galaxy S7 edge produces much uglier results than the largely PureView (i.e. smart cropping into the high resolution sensor) zoom on the 950 and 1020. This crop comparing shows, perhaps more than any other in this feature, the strengths of the Nokia concept of a physically large, high resolution sensor rather than using lower resolution and relying on software tricks.

It'south not all doom and gloom for the S7, equally nosotros'll meet below, but its results with even a little small 2.5x zooming, as here, show approximations to detail and - again - a very ugly representation of the natural world - look at the bushes behind the airplane. The Lumia 950 does well enough, but the 1020 shows that for this utilise case it's completely in a grade of its own.

Scores: Lumia 1020: 10 pts, Lumia 950: 7 pts, Galaxy S7: v pts

Examination no. 6: Low indoor lighting

Depression light is where the going gets actually tough for camera phones, of class. In this instance a table lamp with 40W bulb and a guitar in the foreground. Hither's the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

And here are crops/links from, in society, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

Very unlike results then. The Lumia 1020 doesn't really nail the focus and clarity, merely does a reasonable chore with colouration, the Lumia 950's advanced colour correction algorithms do an astonishingly good job of reproducing the subject area with almost daylight colours, while the S7 gets closest to how my own eyes see the scene, i.e. tinged heavily with the incandescent low-cal.

The 950 wins in terms of clarity, for sure, with ameliorate particular - see the would strings, for example.

Scores: Lumia 1020: half dozen pts, Lumia 950: 9 pts, Galaxy S7: 7 pts

Test no. vii: Ultra low light

The ultimate examination of how much low-cal each smartphone camera can larn, even in the toughest weather. This is a impress in our living room of a New York city scene (I recall) and I'd fabricated the room virtually black. To my naked eyes, I couldn't see ANY item on the print. Here'south the overall gear up-upwardly (as shot by the 1020), though note that this phone photo makes information technology seem MUCH lighter than information technology really was.

And here are crops/links from, in order, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

Even allowing for this being a impress from a deliberately 'pointillated' (is that a give-and-take?) painting, it's clear that the f/ane.seven discontinuity on the Galaxy S7 helps it a lot here. Moreover, it focussed instantly, even in this very low calorie-free, whereas the 1020 and 950 had to be gear up to use the LED flash for focus aid.

The 950'southward f/i.9 aperture means that it gathers quite a fleck more than light than the 1020 in its i/5s exposure - the 1020 needed a full ane/3s and notwithstanding produced a darker result. Overall, a definite win for the Galaxy S7, which has enough light gathering power (at least, for static scenes) to work miracles in low light.

Scores: Lumia 1020: vi pts, Lumia 950: 8 pts, Galaxy S7: 10 pts

Exam no. eight: Political party fourth dimension

My standard moving-subject-in-low-light test, with me laughing while the shutter is fired. In typical party weather condition, lowish light and with flash definitely needed. Here'south the overall scene (as shot by the 1020):

And here are scaled crops (because even I wouldn't intendance about pixel purity from this sort of shot!) from, in order, the Lumia 1020, the Lumia 950 and the Samsung Galaxy S7:

Both the Lumia 950 and Galaxy S7 went for 1/100s exposure here, with the effect that, unusually for LED-flash camera phones, the moving subject area is more or less frozen - nosotros actually are getting to the signal where I can terminate my Xenon flash ranting, at least for this use case (backup wink outdoors remains Xenon's last holdout!)

The 1020 shot is still the best, but the other 2 phones really aren't that far backside.

Scores: Lumia 1020: 9 pts, Lumia 950: vii pts, Galaxy S7: 8 pts

Verdict

Before calculation upwardly the points and declaring a winner, I should betoken out, non for the commencement fourth dimension, that camera phones aren't just virtually the best photograph quality anymore - at that place's likewise how fast the photographic camera function can be launched, how fast focus is acquired, how quickly multiple shots tin be taken and how many extra features (like HDR) are available natively. Not to mention 4K video, 8MP frame extraction and a dozen other uses for imaging in the modern smartphone earth.

And it's most of these that the Lumia 1020, from 2013, lacks, of course. Try out the 2 2016 phones as cameras and y'all come abroad with a dramatically amend experience in terms of speed and capability. That the 950 pips the 1020 for quality likewise seals the deal for most AAWP readers, at any rate. Here are the summed scores across my demanding tests:

1. Lumia 950: 65/80pts
2. Lumia 1020: 64/80pts
3. Galaxy S7: 59/80pts

The Samsung Galaxy S7 edge score is slightly disappointing. Information technology's terrific in low calorie-free and its autofocus speed is unparalleled, but the ugliness of the oversharpening downwards at the pixel level really lets it downward for anyone who wants to produce insanely good images on their telephone. The S7, like the 1020 and 950, tin also shoot in RAW format and at least users can then process images earlier all of Samsung's consumer algorithms have done their dirty work.

Overall a slender victory for the Lumia 950 then, which is proving a surprisingly good jack of all trades phone camera in terms of both performance and quality.

Source: http://allaboutwindowsphone.com/features/item/21306_Smartphone_camera_head_to_head.php

Posted by: larsonourst1973.blogspot.com

Share this post