Am I the only one unimpressed with the S7 camera?

[tnt4]

OP, can you post comparisons of the iPhone and S7 photos?

Yes - give me a bit, though. I wish I was comfortable sharing kid pics but I'm not, so I'll see what I can get.

Edit: Random sidenote - my time stamps are all off on the posts. I've triple checked and have the right time zone checked in my Passport profile. Not sure what's up with that.

 

[Tim1954]

I rarely ever take low light pics, most of mine are in daylight in the great outdoors! I'm not impressed with this move in the backward direction. My S6 does better pictures including low light ones as it turns out.. not happy samsung!

 

[tnt4]

OP, can you post comparisons of the iPhone and S7 photos?

Here you go. Three phones here. I've removed most of the metadata but you might still be able to figure out which is which based on specs, so try not to look at the Info the first time. They're all in the same order, so see which you like the best, A, B, or C. On the photos of the dog, unfortunately he moved each time I got to the phone for C, so I only have A and B photos for each of them. All were taken in auto mode.

Edit: evidently I deleted the album somehow since I first posted this... will try and upload again later

Honestly the S7 did really well in almost all of these. I didn't have any focus issues. I was extremely careful at not moving my hand when shooting, though. I think the S7 might be more sensitive to small movements than you would think, despite having OIS. I did get a new S7 today due to a screen issue on the other one. Coincidence? Maybe. Need to get some daylight comps now as well.

 

[SophiaPetrillo]

I'm guessing A is the iPhone, B is the S7, and C is the Nexus. In terms of cropping, B and C were clearer/sharper on most occasions. B had a yellowish tint in the couch photos, but were otherwise fine. The differences are marginal and I agree, the S7 did very well.

 

[monicakm]

Please tell me that steak is med-rare Looks yummy!

I'm totally pleased with the S7 camera, but, I'm also realistic and didn't expect it to do what a dSLR does.
It's SO much more than I ever thought I'd see a cell phone be capable of and so much better than my S5.
It doesn't have the 50x optical zoom of my Canon SX50 IS but I didn't expect that. It's lived up to it's hype as
far as I'm concerned. Granted I haven't printed anything yet and printing is important to me. I don't do FB, Instagram
and all those social media outlets.

 

[DizWhiz]

Well considering I'm coming from an M8 the camera is amazing
I will say that it's good, not amazing but still better than almost anything else on the market that I've seen. I have dedicated dSLR gear for anything I really care about so having something on me at all times is nice. Plus if I really want to capture something I shoot in pro mode and have RAW + JPG turned on so i can edit later at home.

If camera manufacturers would just allow users to turn on some development mode so we can create our own custom settings for auto-iso, sharpening, and noise reduction I'd probably be happy shooting straight jpg.

 

[anon(79257)]

Well considering I'm coming from an M8 the camera is amazing
I will say that it's good, not amazing but still better than almost anything else on the market that I've seen. I have dedicated dSLR gear for anything I really care about so having something on me at all times is nice. Plus if I really want to capture something I shoot in pro mode and have RAW + JPG turned on so i can edit later at home.

If camera manufacturers would just allow users to turn on some development mode so we can create our own custom settings for auto-iso, sharpening, and noise reduction I'd probably be happy shooting straight jpg.

The only thing I really dislike about it is the lack of editing options. I mainly use it for selfies for the girlfriend. So shooting RAW, and editing later, is not really convenient and to me detracts from the convenience altogether. The in-camera jpeg processing definitely leaves a bit to desire. I come out looking like I'm wearing make up. Not sure if they have an aggressive AA filter or what.

I have $8K worth of camera gear for photography. Fortunately, I don't buy cell phones for the camera.

 

[anon(79257)]

Edit: Random sidenote - my time stamps are all off on the posts. I've triple checked and have the right time zone checked in my Passport profile. Not sure what's up with that.

I had to change my time zone to something random and then back again to get posts to show the correct time, earlier today.

 

[DJCBS]

Not really.
I don't think the S7 camera is amazing BUT I can't say I am disappointed because I knew, from the first moment that the rumours about the downgrade to a 12mp sensor came out, that it wouldn't be amazing, despite what Alex tried to sell on the article.

However, that doesn't mean that the S7 camera isn't probably the best (though I think the G5's is slightly better due basically to the extra pixels) on Android.
Unfortunately for the G5, the camera is pretty much all the phone has going for it. And that's why the S7 is the better phone.

And honestly? Having been utterly disappointed by Xperia cameras, I've already learned to downplay my expectations of cameras on Android phones. Clearly no Android OEM is Nokia so the moment I stopped expecting Nokia-imaging quality on other OEM phones, I became more relaxed on what to expect from Android cameras. Once Nokia returns though...then that will most likely change. But until then, the S7 does a good enough job.

 

[anon(79257)]

Not really.
I don't think the S7 camera is amazing BUT I can't say I am disappointed because I knew, from the first moment that the rumours about the downgrade to a 12mp sensor came out, that it wouldn't be amazing, despite what Alex tried to sell on the article.

However, that doesn't mean that the S7 camera isn't probably the best (though I think the G5's is slightly better due basically to the extra pixels) on Android.

The only thing megapickles really bring to the table is crop-ability, these days. 12 should be fine for a point and shoot, given the small sensor size.

 

[slopiijoe]

I will have to agree I'm not as impressed with the 12 mp as I was the S6 18mp camera. The downsize really took away some of those special details that made the S6 pictures stunning. These photos do at least have more vivid colors though. I would still say better than most smartphone cameras though

 

[SophiaPetrillo]

I will have to agree I'm not as impressed with the 12 mp as I was the S6 18mp camera. The downsize really took away some of those special details that made the S6 pictures stunning. These photos do at least have more vivid colors though. I would still say better than most smartphone cameras though

The S6 has 16 megapixels, but I get what you mean. Do you have both phones, and is there a discernible difference between the photos they take?

 

[anon(79257)]

I will have to agree I'm not as impressed with the 12 mp as I was the S6 18mp camera. The downsize really took away some of those special details that made the S6 pictures stunning. These photos do at least have more vivid colors though. I would still say better than most smartphone cameras though

The S6 has 16 megapixels, but I get what you mean. Do you have both phones, and is there a discernible difference between the photos they take?

The problem both of you are seeing has nothing to do with MP difference. Realize that all companies use different algorithms for auto editing. MP is a marketing ploy. And if you would research it, you would not be asking these questions. MP has very little to do with the camera. Sorry.

 

[SophiaPetrillo]

The problem both of you are seeing has nothing to do with MP difference. Realize that all companies use different algorithms for auto editing. MP is a marketing ploy. And if you would research it, you would not be asking these questions. MP has very little to do with the camera. Sorry.

I know megapixels have nothing to do with quality; I'm just wondering whether or not there is any difference to the actual images.

 

[anon(79257)]

I know megapixels have nothing to do with quality; I'm just wondering whether or not there is any difference to the actual images.

That will have more to do with the sensor and the built in post processing. Neither of which you or I have control over....

 

[tnt4]

The S6 had sharper photos in good light. The S7 tries to post-process to add sharpness to compensate, but it's not the same and fails more often than not. That doesn't mean the S6 was always better - but strictly from a sharpness perspective it had the advantage.

 

[slopiijoe]

The S6 has 16 megapixels, but I get what you mean. Do you have both phones, and is there a discernible difference between the photos they take?

I do have both phones. There is a noticable difference but it's very slight. It's mainly noticeable with taking close up pictures. I might post pictures later tomorrow if I can manage.

 

[slopiijoe]

The problem both of you are seeing has nothing to do with MP difference. Realize that all companies use different algorithms for auto editing. MP is a marketing ploy. And if you would research it, you would not be asking these questions. MP has very little to do with the camera. Sorry.

MP has alot to do with details. Although you are right tthat MP has been used as a marketing ploy. The sensor does have to have the capicity to meet up to the MP you are taking a picture in, if not all you are doing is taking a picture and blowing it up to the size of a 16mp picture even though it may be a 12mp picture... it doesn't really work. Another way of looking at it is upscaling a DVD to HD format. Although upscaling will make it look smoother individual pixels are noticable, it doesn't mean that your content is in true HD (reason why people buy BluRays/HD content, to get the true resolution)

More MPs will allow a picture to have more details but only if the sensor can capture the ammount advertised. So with the S6 I do feel more details were captured with the sensor when shooting in 16MP (16MP may not be the actual resolution) vs the S7. The sensor on the S7 does do better in low light. But I do feel the "double pixel" technology does cause some suffering to the details.

 

[anon(79257)]

MP has alot to do with details. Although you are right tthat MP has been used as a marketing ploy. The sensor does have to have the capicity to meet up to the MP you are taking a picture in, if not all you are doing is taking a picture and blowing it up to the size of a 16mp picture even though it may be a 12mp picture... it doesn't really work. Another way of looking at it is upscaling a DVD to HD format. Although upscaling will make it look smoother individual pixels are noticable, it doesn't mean that your content is in true HD (reason why people buy BluRays/HD content, to get the true resolution)

More MPs will allow a picture to have more details but only if the sensor can capture the ammount advertised. So with the S6 I do feel more details were captured with the sensor when shooting in 16MP (16MP may not be the actual resolution) vs the S7. The sensor on the S7 does do better in low light. But I do feel the "double pixel" technology does cause some suffering to the details.

And, really, 12MP is more than this tiny sensor can handle. I'm fairly certain that if this sensor was worth a damn that the phone would not cost $675. Want a camera? Buy one. Don't expect quality in a disposable piece of consumer electronics. Reducing the number of megapixels was actually one of the smartest things they did. Too many on a crappy sensor actually starts to hurt detail.

This is how most (and I'm pretty sure, most) photographers feel about megapixels... The people posting in this thread are mostly pro's...

http://photography-on-the.net/forum/showthread.php?t=1418224

 

[mayconvert]

I think the camera is amazing. My photos are very color accurate when viewed on a 5k iMac with calibrated display.