visigoth

2 hours ago, kye said:

Not likely to happen soon.

This is because the most basic tests don't reveal things like NR vs sharpening and charts don't reveal things like temporal NR.  If you're wanting RAW-like performance and aren't willing to shoot RAW, and don't want to buy/test/sell models yourself, then I'd suggest doing what the rest of us do and waiting for many people to get the camera and test it in the various ways that they do and then reading and reviewing all the feedback and reviews we can get our hands on so that we have some confidence that we understand the good and the bad and the quirks of something before purchasing.

Otherwise we're subject to the manufacturers PR gimmicks where they say a camera has X and Y and Z, but it's not until a good reviewer gets it and discovers that it can't do X and Y together and that X and Z only happen simultaneously with setting A enabled and setting B disabled, etc.

That's what I've been doing, of course.  But Andrew said, "Still looking to branch off my interest from EOSHD and mirrorless cameras so I should get into enthusiast smartphone camera reviews..."  And I'm suggesting he do precisely that.

A few possibilities:  this site could partially morph into a phone review site. The problem is that the name is confusing enough as it is:  very little here has to do with EOS, as far as I can determine.  Another thought is to approach DXO, to see whether they might be convinced to take a serious reviewer on board.  Perhaps the best option would be to find an established magazine, in print or on the web, that would be open to publishing a column by an expert that concentrates on smartphone reviews for actual photographers. 

Back in the Pleistocene Epoch I used to write for Wired; I no longer know anyone there, or I'd make an introduction.  But there are all sorts of appropriate places these days, including YouTube channels. And you're not limited by the genre of publication:  I could see this on a photography site, a tech publication, a general magazine (New York, etc.) — *everyone* is interested in smartphones.  It's a matter of cold calling — which sounds daunting, but it's how most things happen. 

On 10/27/2021 at 12:50 AM, Andrew Reid said:

It doesn't stack up today because the computational photography, quad bayer and high-speed readouts have overcome the shortcomings of smaller sensors. That's pretty much why, when the iPhone 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max came out, nobody could tell the difference in the images! That's despite the 12 Pro Max having a considerably larger sensor.

Quad bayer is an important step, makes bigger difference than upping the chip size and pixel size.

Currently the best image quality in smartphone land is:

Xiaomi Mi 11 Ultra

Huawei P40 Pro Plus

In that order.

I have the Xperia 1 II and it's got a decent main sensor in it and natural image processing. It's nothing all that special though and the other camera modules are very middle of the road in that.

I can shoot 1/5 at ISO 100 in low light on the Mi 11 Ultra, in RAW, and the shots are pin sharp. The reviews didn't do it justice, they don't know how to do anything but point and shoot. It's got a lot of unexplored options and a Pro mode, and if you turn HDR to manual, most of the time it's better off off. Also for the best JPEG/HEIFs you need to disable RAW.

Anyway it is interesting to see where this stuff is going.

With the Cinema video modes and such advanced photo features.

Still looking to branch off my interest from EOSHD and mirrorless cameras so I should get into enthusiast smartphone camera reviews because the existing guys aren't photographers, they're tech social media influencers and that is a different skill set - marketing and presentation. I don't think they even talk about RAW in the reviews and the phone review sites don't bother testing it either, because again they're not really that knowledgeable about photography. Anybody who is, point me to them and I'll reach out.

We could really use a reviewer who has the right priorities as a photographer.  I'm sick of DXOMARK advising me to buy phones that crank up the noise reduction and sharpening to produce smeared, detail-deprived JPEGs. I did look into the Mi 11 Ultra, and decided against it only because it's not the most elegant implementation of Android, even if the camera is apparently lovely.  My solution was to buy a Pixel 6 Pro, and install a modified GCam that — unlike the stock camera app — allows granular control of noise reduction (luma and chroma); sharpening of various sorts; HDR levels; and a bunch of other parameters that I frankly don't understand. 

Through experimentation, I've managed to create a camera that shoots JPEGs with sensible sharpening and HDR, and a perfectly acceptable level of analog-like noise that preserves as much detail as the RAW files.  The sensor is not quite as large as the Mi 11 Ultra's, but Google's computational approach is state of the art.  One drawback:  the RAW files are lousy.  For some stupid reason the algorithm applies lens correction *twice* in Lightroom or Photoshop, so that complex distortion is reintroduced (and there's no way of shutting this off, or correcting it after the fact).  That said, the JPEGs are the best I've experienced on a smartphone.  For years I used a modded Pixel 3 XL, also with great results.

I'd be truly interested in your take on the Pixel 6 Pro's video.  I'm not qualified to judge it — my work has always been in still photography.  From what I can tell, the modded GCam doesn't permit you to alter the video parameters from stock.  So it would be nice to know whether you think the phone with stock app holds its own with the other devices out there, in terms of image quality, stabilization, sound quality, etc.

This is a thread over at the XDA forums that discusses this GCam mod in considerable detail:

https://forum.xda-developers.com/t/modded-gcam.4359015/

Don, that would be really helpful.  (Dying to see how the new PEN F competes as well.)

I'd love to hear others weigh in here -- has anyone else compared footage from before and after the update?  (It remains a unique camera body in other respects; is the video now competitive?)

Ah right.  That makes sense.  Something to be aware of, btw -- not sure whether you've ever covered it here? -- is that Metabones has just added PDAF support for the E-M1 in a firmware update.  This *should* make Canon EF lenses focus as well as Oly's own Four Thirds glass, when shooting stills.  It doesn't work with video, unfortunately:

http://www.metabones.com/article/of/firmware_update_version_1.8

Very useful review.  One question, however -- perhaps I'm being thick, but I can't untangle this bit:  "What Olympus have got resoundingly spot on especially with the E-M5 II is the stills side.  There’s a caveat though. The AF performance is extremely lens dependent, varying rather erratically.  Sadly on the E-M5 II it is just too inaccurate to be fully usable at the moment…  On the E-M1 and GH4 this doesn’t seem to be as much of an issue."

It would seem that you're saying that they haven't got it spot on with the E-M5 II, but have with the E-M1.  Or am I missing something?

(This would be useful for me to know, as I have an E-M1, but have not tried Canon lenses with it.  Should I?)