There are many legends in the field of mobile phone photography, and the more famous ones are: "iPhone camera second Android, Android camera is the strongest, Samsung camera is the strongest, domestic camera is the vivo, and mobile phone camera has caught up with card machine/WeChat." But are these legends reliable?

In order to dispel superstition, representatives of various legends came here this time: Apple's most powerful photo taking iPhone 6 Plus, Samsung S6/S6 edge vivo Xshot、 As well as QX100 (1-inch outsole) which is used as the benchmark and used as the card/micro bill representative.

The following is the time to dispel superstition by speaking with proofs. The original sample pictures with detailed EXIF information are placed at the end of the text. Interested users can click the magnifying glass at the lower right corner of the picture to download the original pictures.

Parameter comparison

iPhone6 Plus： Sony backlight 8 million pixel sensor, with unit pixel size of 1.5 μ m, F2, 2 aperture, OIS optical anti shake
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge: Sony IMX240 16 million image sensor, sensor size 1/2.6 inch, unit pixel 1.2 μ m, F1.9 aperture, OIS optical anti shake
vivo Xshot： Sony IMX214 13 million image sensor, sensor size 1/3.06 inch, unit pixel 1.12 μ m, F1.8 aperture, OIS optical anti shake
Sony QX100: 20.2 million backlight sensor, sensor size 1 inch, Zeiss lens, aperture F1.8-F4.9, equivalent focal length 28-100mm, OIS optical anti shake

Sample of indoor lighting

The order of all comparison samples is S6 edge in the upper left corner, Phone6 Plus in the upper right corner, Sony QX100 in the lower left corner, and Xshot in the lower right corner. The focus of all samples is at the center, and they are in automatic mode. The automatic HDR is not turned on, while the QX100 is shot at 28mm focal length.

One of the key points that affect the discrimination is "pixel density per unit scene". The above figure is a comparison of the sample sizes of the four. You can compare the "scene pixel density" of different machines by comparing the size of the exhibition stand in the center of the sample.

If the wide angle is the same, the 20 megapixel proof at 4:3 and the 16 megapixel proof at 16:9 should be the same size, but the S6 edge has a 120 degree wide angle, which results in the smaller size of the scene than the QX100.

However, the booth in the S6 edge demo is still larger than the 13 megapixel Xshot, while the 8 megapixel iPhone 6+booth is a little too small.

Enlarge the center of the exhibition stand

Central magnification of other indoor lighting samples

In terms of metering characteristics, iPhone metering is dark, and Xshot metering is bright, while S6 edge and QX100 metering are relatively accurate. From the perspective of transparency, the best performance of the lens is QX100, followed by S6 edge, 6P, and the worst is Xshot. In addition, the first three samples of Dafa QX100 are all automatic white balance. The first one is relatively accurate, but the latter two are more obvious (Sony: Are you sure you are not blacking me?).

In terms of discrimination, QX100 completely exploded, S6 edge exploded iPhone 6+, and iPhone 6+exploded Xshot.

Even though the ISO of QX100 is several levels higher than that of mobile phones, the picture is still pure, and they are not the same level of equipment at all;
The iPhone has the lowest pixel, but the ISO is also the lowest. The shutter is madly pressed to 1/8 second. However, Apple's noise reduction algorithm is not very effective, and the images under ISO200 are not very clean;
The ISO of S6E is higher than that of IP6+, but it is also very low. In addition, the pixels are high, which makes the other two mobile phone rivals very popular;
However, the Xshot is pasted into a ball after it goes ISO fast, and the color saturation drops seriously.

Outdoor sample

The S6 edge white balance is closest to the real situation. The iPhone 6+is sometimes yellow and sometimes green (the iPhone white balance is accurate, which is really a legend), and the Xshot is obviously yellow.

Even though the ISO is 800, the noise suppression of the QX100 is fierce, and the S6 edge is not bad. Although the ISO of IP6+is distorted to only 125 (the picture brightness is not enough), the noise is still obvious; In order to ensure the brightness of the image, the ISO of Xshot is easily over 1000, and the noise is the most serious.

More proofs

The characteristics of other samples are basically similar, so only special parts are explained, and others are not analyzed. The comparison of all the samples below is more about discrimination and white balance. There are details of the samples in the upper left corner of the picture. Click the magnifying glass in the upper right corner of the picture to view the large picture.

Scenario 1

whole

Central amplification

Zoom in at the lower left corner. The large wide-angle lens of S6 edge has scene distortion at the lens edge, while the QX100 has obvious edge degradation (it is not excluded that the blurring is caused by optical anti shake compensation).

Scenario 2

Overall, the S6 edge in the upper left corner, even though it has a large wide-angle lens, the 16:9 sensor is still a little less vertical than the normal model, but a large section more horizontal.

Enlarge the focus in the middle of the picture

Zoom in at the lower left corner, and only focus on discrimination. Although I also want to black out the white balance of the iPhone (the sample in the upper right corner), there is a color changing light source on the upper edge of the scene, so the white balance cannot be compared here.

At the non focus position in the center of the picture (the focus is the stairs behind), S6 edge is the most blurred. Its out of focus clear range is very small (depth of field is large). Pay attention to focus when taking photos of large depth scenes. Although the ISO of the Xshot has soared to 800 and its brightness is higher than IP6+, the bright details (flowers) outside the focus are the most in the mobile phone camp.

Scenario 3

According to the road color, the white balance of the iPhone 6 Plus drifted again, but this time it was green, while the Xshot was pink.

Scenario 4

The iPhone image is not bright enough, and the flowers in the trees on the right are gone, and the white balance is floating again... Fortunately, the rival S6 edge is also floating, pink. The QX100 in the lower left corner here is the manually adjusted white balance, which can be used as a benchmark for comparison.

Hybrid scene

summary

The result of dispelling superstition is cruel:

First of all, even the most powerful iPhone6+and Samsung S6 edge, their photos are still taken by QX100 seconds at the bottom of an inch. What can save face is that the mobile phone, which is superior in algorithm and computing power, easily abused Dafa in white balance;
Secondly, Apple's strongest iPhone 6 Plus, even in its relatively stronger night photography project, has lost to Samsung with optical anti shake, and the gap is obvious.
The white balance of the strongest apple in the legend is always floating. Rather than being accurate, its "color dye" is very appealing to everyone (the voice dye in the brain tonic headphone industry), but this is certainly not the performance of a camera that is loyal to reality.
What saddened everyone most was that the domestic representatives failed in many projects, such as discrimination, white balance, photometry, lens quality, and so on, and there was still a clear gap between them and international manufacturers. However, their prices are several times lower after all. This comparison is actually unfair to Xshot.

In addition, some imaging features of these models were also found during the test, which can be used to avoid problems.

The night imaging feature of iPhone is to give priority to reducing the shutter speed and ISO to ensure the purity and discrimination of the image. The price is that the brightness of the image in automatic mode is often insufficient, and manual exposure compensation is required; In addition, the suppression of noise by iPhone sensors and algorithms is relatively poor. Even if the ISO is only 200, the noise will be much worse than that of the 13/16 million Sony sensors in the same period, and the performance under ultra weak light photography will be ugly;
S6 edge should be the strongest photo in Android camp for the time being, but its edge distortion is obvious due to 120 degree wide angle and F1.9 aperture. When using the rear camera to take a self/group photo, please try to ensure that the target is in the center of the picture, otherwise you may see that the characters at the edge of the picture have their own Haha effect. In addition, its 1/2.6 inch sensor and F1.9 aperture make its depth of field shallow. Pay attention to focusing when shooting large depth scenes;
In order to improve the shutter speed and picture brightness of Xshot, the algorithm tuning always likes to use ISO, which results in obvious loss of detail and saturation in weak light. If there is a high requirement for taking pictures at night, it is recommended to use its professional mode.

Stakeholders: As a photo disabled Moto X powder, the author's position should be quite neutral (moto: confirm that this is not blacking me?)

The average size of the following original sample is about 5m, which will take a long time to load, so you need to wait patiently

Samsung S6 edge sample

Sample of iPhone 6 Plus

Vivo Xshot sample

Sony QX100 sample