What's the best smartphone camera for pictures of my kid?

[MoreDef]

She's 2, and always moving. I've been doing a lot of reading on what may affect motion blur in photos, but long story short, my S20 Ultra is not cutting it. I'm talking indoor light, always-moving baby type situations, and every single time, this camera gives me blurry faces and limbs. It's disappointing, and I need a smartphone that is up to the task. I don't care if it sucks in every other situation, or sucks as a phone in every other way, as long as it can take pictures of my daughter without making her look like Samara's next victim in The Ring, then I'm all ears. I also don't care if it's a phone that was 1, 2 or even 3 years old, as long as it gets that one job done right. I read that the Pixel 3 is better than the 4 when it comes to this one specific situation, but that overall, the Pixel line is my best bet at snapping non-blurry photos. Any suggestions, ideas, input?

 

[ManiacJoe]

It is not the phone, the problem is most likely the mode that the camera is in. You need a "sports" mode, or something that is not "generic auto" mode. The low-level indoor light is causing the "auto" camera to use a slow shutter speed because it does not want to push the ISO setting through the roof causing digital noise in the photo.

If you camera has a manual exposure mode, this will get you exactly where you want to be.
Set the shutter speed to something like 1/125 or faster, then crank up the ISO to get a good exposure.
If need be, turn on more lights in the room.

If you get lots of noise that bothers you, you can post process (edit) your pictures to reduce the noise levels.
If the noise levels are really bad, you can help hide the noise by converting the color pictures to black & white.

 

[mustang7757]

Either one the pixel 3 or 4 will do the job.

 

[MoreDef]

It is not the phone, the problem is most likely the mode that the camera is in. You need a "sports" mode, or something that is not "generic auto" mode. The low-level indoor light is causing the "auto" camera to use a slow shutter speed because it does not want to push the ISO setting through the roof causing digital noise in the photo.

If you camera has a manual exposure mode, this will get you exactly where you want to be.
Set the shutter speed to something like 1/125 or faster, then crank up the ISO to get a good exposure.
If need be, turn on more lights in the room.

If you get lots of noise that bothers you, you can post process (edit) your pictures to reduce the noise levels.
If the noise levels are really bad, you can help hide the noise by converting the color pictures to black & white.

Yeah...I just want a point and shoot, no blur, picture. I mean, the S20 Ultra is everything else I want in a phone, but this one thing is bugging the hell out of me.

Here's the same room, same kid, the different attempts at a shot with the different methods.

The first one is the GCam app, and it's way too dark. I get a non-blurry shot 70% of the time, but that's still a horrible clip.

The second is the stock camera, and trust me when I say I took 20 shots consecutively and ALL of them are like this. Out of focus, blurry and basically terrible.

The last is pro mode, with the shutter speed set to 125 and iso around 600. I forget the exact settings, but I wanted to see if faster shutter speed would reduce blur. It did...but pro mode is also really grainy.

 

[MoreDef]

Either one the pixel 3 or 4 will do the job.

Yes, but which one will do the better job? And is the 3 better or worse than the 3a? I guess I'll wait for the 4a to see if that is better, but I guess what I'm realizing is that with all these reviews of camera phones, absolutely no one thinks that the category of indior pictures of moving subjects is worth covering.

 

[dfplaya]

GCAM.

 

[MoreDef]

GCAM.

The first picture IS gcam...and as you can see, it's terrible on the S20 Ultra. Do you have settings that I can apply?

 

[mustang7757]

Yes, but which one will do the better job? And is the 3 better or worse than the 3a? I guess I'll wait for the 4a to see if that is better, but I guess what I'm realizing is that with all these reviews of camera phones, absolutely no one thinks that the category of indior pictures of moving subjects is worth covering.

I had the 3a ,3xl and now 4xl ...you cant go wrong with any of them they seem the same to me , some people experience on 3a slower process for picture but that was not my experience. If price is a concern go the cheapest if not the 3xl or pix 4xl can get at good price now .

 

[MoreDef]

I had the 3a ,3xl and now 4xl ...you cant go wrong with any of them they seem the same to me , some people experience on 3a slower process for picture but that was not my experience. If price is a concern go the cheapest if not the 3xl or pix 4xl can get at good price now .

Always great advice and help, Mustang, thank you. Is there a difference between the 4 and the 4xl? I mean, performance wise. I don't care about battery or anything else, just pictures. Does the 4xl process faster, take slightly better pictures than the 4, or is the only difference between them side?

 

[mustang7757]

Another thing I like to mention :
I have the pixel 4xl,Note 10+,S10+,1+7P,iphone 11 pro ...this camera phones will get get blur in low light moving kids, the pix 4xl and iphone 11 pro do a better job .

 

[mustang7757]

Always great advice and help, Mustang, thank you. Is there a difference between the 4 and the 4xl? I mean, performance wise. I don't care about battery or anything else, just pictures. Does the 4xl process faster, take slightly better pictures than the 4, or is the only difference between them side?

I never had the 4 but 4xl for battery wise , picture be same on both versions

 

[MoreDef]

Another thing I like to mention :
I have the pixel 4xl,Note 10+,S10+,1+7P,iphone 11 pro ...this camera phones will get get blur in low light moving kids, the pix 4xl and iphone 11 pro do a better job .

Thanks! I was also considering the S10 because it's $400 on Amazon right now, but if I'm honestly looking for the best stolen moment indoor pictures, then side from an actual camera, the Pixel 4 is the way to go. Thanks again.

My wife had the 11Pro, and she was always jealous of my Note 9 Gcam pics, which always seemed to snap the fastest and least blurry pictures. Too bad I traded it for this Ultra =/

 

[Mike Dee]

Thanks! I was also considering the S10 because it's $400 on Amazon right now, but if I'm honestly looking for the best stolen moment indoor pictures, then side from an actual camera, the Pixel 4 is the way to go. Thanks again.

My wife had the 11Pro, and she was always jealous of my Note 9 Gcam pics, which always seemed to snap the fastest and least blurry pictures. Too bad I traded it for this Ultra =/

The S10 won't do it for you. Have you tried the single take mode which will take a variety of picture, video and animation shots?

 

[mustang7757]

Thanks! I was also considering the S10 because it's $400 on Amazon right now, but if I'm honestly looking for the best stolen moment indoor pictures, then side from an actual camera, the Pixel 4 is the way to go. Thanks again.

My wife had the 11Pro, and she was always jealous of my Note 9 Gcam pics, which always seemed to snap the fastest and least blurry pictures. Too bad I traded it for this Ultra =/

The ultra is a fantastic device , so dont be disappointed completely about your purchase because it shines in many other areas of the camera and video plus what it offers, but if you need that picture of moving things I would say pixel 3,4 or iPhone 11 pro.

 

[MoreDef]

The S10 won't do it for you. Have you tried the single take mode which will take a variety of picture, video and animation shots?

I've tried single take too =(. It's really a crapshoot in terms of getting the shot I want. Technically, I could always just shoot 8K and cherry pick the best stills, but that's just too much work to get what should be convenient snapshots when and where at the press of a button.

 

[MoreDef]

The ultra is a fantastic device , so dont be disappointed completely about your purchase because it shines in many other areas of the camera and video plus what it offers, but if you need that picture of moving things I would say pixel 3,4 or iPhone 11 pro.

Yeah. I absolutely don't regret the Ultra in every other way, as my 16g of RAM and 512g storage meansit's basically future proof for the next 2-4 years. I know it will get better with some Samsung help and a lot of community development. I acknowledge that with so many things going for it, I shouldn't be disappointed it can't do one thing right, and that if I really wanted that one thing, I should have gone with the Pixel from the start...but having a perfect gcam app on my Note 9 let me to believe I could replicate the same experience on the Ultra. I was wrong.

 

[Mooncatt]

Yeah...I just want a point and shoot, no blur, picture. I mean, the S20 Ultra is everything else I want in a phone, but this one thing is bugging the hell out of me.

Here's the same room, same kid, the different attempts at a shot with the different methods.

The first one is the GCam app, and it's way too dark. I get a non-blurry shot 70% of the time, but that's still a horrible clip.

The second is the stock camera, and trust me when I say I took 20 shots consecutively and ALL of them are like this. Out of focus, blurry and basically terrible.

The last is pro mode, with the shutter speed set to 125 and iso around 600. I forget the exact settings, but I wanted to see if faster shutter speed would reduce blur. It did...but pro mode is also really grainy.

Two things stick out to me here.

The first is lighting. You have a somewhat dark subject, but very bright back lighting (the ceiling light). In auto mode, the camera doesn't take the photo you want it to take. It takes the photo some random programmer thinks it should take based on how the scene is metered. In general, auto modes attempt to make everything balanced. When you have a high contrast scene like this, you wind up with slightly brighter shadows, dimmer highlights, and a lackluster overall image. Your best bet here would be to try shooting in HDR mode. It will take multiple shots at different exposures, then attempt to piece the best parts of each photo into a single properly exposed image. Even those are questionable if you have a moving subject.

The other issue is simply the limitations of the phone. These sensors are tiny, which means they don't collect a lot of light. Well exposed low light photos of a moving kid is the Holy Grail of smartphone photos, but that rarely happens. As you saw, the only way to stop the blurring is by decreasing shutter speed, but then you have to compensate by raising your ISO. Increasing ISO necessarily means increased noise (you can think of it like distortion in a speaker when you try to turn the volume up past a certain point). Without getting into the physics of it, I'll just say that the smaller the sensor, and more dense the pixels, the more ISO related noise pops up. You see what happened at ISO 600. For comparison sake, a full frame DSLR could shoot ISO 1200 and have almost no noise because the pixels are not as densely packed. So not only is the lighting in your examples hurting you, but so is the limitations of the hardware.

I think you will need to dial back your expectations some. Yes, phones can take some fantastic low light photos. What the ads don't show you is how the photo was setup. The phone was likely on a tripod and using manual mode to keep the ISO low and noise free, the shutter time increased to get the right exposure, and the subject isn't moving. They also likely saved as RAW files and then edited them to look better You won't get the type of photos you see in the marketing unless you're willing to put more effort into it than simply point and shoot.

Of the 3 photos you posted, I would say the first one is the best. You could take it and do some light editing to it to get your son to show up better.

 

[Mike Dee]

I've tried single take too =(. It's really a crapshoot in terms of getting the shot I want. Technically, I could always just shoot 8K and cherry pick the best stills, but that's just too much work to get what should be convenient snapshots when and where at the press of a button.

The Pixel is a better choice for someone that needs an autoshooter. As good as the Pixels were for me, I just can't go with a device that doesn't support manual settings.
I'm different when it comes to photography because I'm willing to shoot manual. That's how I learned photography. I know all the reasons people would rather turn on the camera, point and click but I usually have enough time to pre set the camera. I can't argue against the convenience of an autoshooter.

 

[MoreDef]

Thank you for the insightful comments and advice. Yeah, being a tech enthusiast puts me in a weird place where I like using it but sometimes aren't really concerned about the how (like being a car enthusiast that can't drive manual). You're right, maybe my expectations need to be dialed down, but my real question at the end of the day is what cameras can get me better results than the pictures of my daughter than I've posted (she's taking forever to grow her hair out, but I don't mind, it keeps her looking like a baby longer, haha!)

 

[MoreDef]

Yeah... It's real hard to take premeditated stolen moments, but if I could, I would. Thank you. It looks like some iteration of the Pixel is going to be my secondary phone.