I recently got a Google Pixel 7 pro because my previous phone was glitching out and it was a headache. I didn't buy the phone for the camera, I have a mirrorless that I use when I want to take a picture, I got it for the battery life and to not have Samsung bloatware.
But still every once in a while I want to take a quick pic and send it on signal or Snapchat or something, and every time it comes out way too saturated and way too sharpened. All the ads I saw for this phone was for camera features like the magic eraser thing and the night vision, but they're all just covering for what is the worst camera sensor that they could possibly find. You can't control the exposure, you can't get the raw image, It is a horrible experience to take a picture with this phone every single time.
If you want a smartphone to be able to take good pictures. First of all, don't. Get a camera. Second of all, steer clear of the pixel phones.
I just bought a Pixel 6 and I'm astounded by how much better it is than my OnePlus 5 when it comes to taking pictures. The fuck happened in one year?
Yeah for most people that are posting pics on social media it's fine for that, since most that do don't care that much for color accuracy and postprocessing.
But if you want to have control and possibly even use it in a professional setting then no. It's not all that great, you are at the mercy of Google's color science and algorithmic photo/video postprocessing. Really Google was shooting for the iPhone "
set itand forget it" philosophy.And I could live with that if it didn't look like ass. I'm not needing professional pictures here, just the bare minimum.
For OpSec I won't post an image, but the sharpening makes my dog look like he hasn't gotten a bath in years. It's so bad.
My pixel 5 has a shit camera too but it would have been considered good 7 years ago. Unfortunately the pixel 5 came out 3 years ago!!
Xiaomi Redmi note pros or older OnePlus flagships for 300 bucks all have incredible cameras
Pixels completely leans on machine learning bullshit for photos
That's the thing, I don't want an incredible camera, I just want a reasonable one. The big thing that sold me on this phone was the battery life
My last 2 Chinese phones had ~5k mAh and lasted far longer than my pixel 6
chinese phones are the best: although the hong kongian brand that i am using now has higer features/price ratio: for 200$, infinix offers a lot of features compared to other phone brands like xiaomi. some of xiaomi 1000$ phones are absurd. also chinese phones are now stuck in 6nm process nodes, since the semiconductor embargo..idk how this would fare in the future..
https://9to5google.com/2022/11/08/take-raw-pictures-google-pixel/
https://ai.googleblog.com/2020/08/live-hdr-and-dual-exposure-controls-on.html
I have an older model Sony mirrorless that I use for "sherryush" photography. And I really enjoy my Samsung camera I think the phone is as an a22 (is that even a Samsung model idk?) I have several older mf lenses on adapters that I use on my Sony though, including an old contax lens that was built at the end of WW2....
Same, I have a Sony a6000 that I got an adapter for so I could use some lenses from my mom's old film camera
I got an S22 on super-duper sale and I'm pretty happy with it. Unlocked so no carrier bloat. Hid most of the samsung stuff and locked other apps. My only real complaint is I can't make the UI scale smaller.
I looked at pixels and between that godawful camera bar and the smaller device being made of cheap plastic, I just accepted my samsung fate. The S22 is a fairly "small" flagship, decent weight in the hand, and a giga camera that has so many pixels its honestly annoying how much space the pictures take up.