With its 40 megapixel 1/1.7 inch base alone, Huawei P20 Pro is now the flagship mobile phone with the strongest camera hardware, and Huawei has also "sent" a 1/4.4 inch triple variable sub camera with optical anti shake. Although it doesn't have the DxOMark to kill the list, how strong is Huawei P20 Pro in fact, and whether it can defeat the most prestigious camera phones such as iPhone X, Samsung Galaxy S9+, and Pixel 2 XL?
summary
According to the convention, the conclusion is in the front and the detailed analysis is in the rear.
Because Huawei P20 Pro has too many modes, the last four mobile phones have more than 1500 test samples. Finally, this article selects 19 scenarios and 47 groups of samples in the form of 6-7 groups for splicing display:
Among the competitors of the reference system, the iPhone X is the most stable in white balance and photo taking experience (also the mobile phone with the highest rate of weak light film formation), the strongest S9+has the strongest noise reduction and sub photography (the strongest outside P20 Pro), and the Pixel 2 XL has the strongest tolerance/HDR (but noise reduction is difficult and there is no sub photography).
Huawei P20 Pro It is the night vision effect of discrimination, weak light noise reduction and super night view mode The rest of the basic projects, such as white balance and tolerance, did not break the record of the previous generation. They are the normal level of the top flagship, but nothing special.
It is indeed the strongest and most playable camera phone, and its biggest regret is that although The comprehensive performance of different modes is crowned as the king, but it is impossible to crush the existing flagship with any single camera or mode Perhaps, The biggest regret of Huawei P20 Pro is that it will not automatically switch between 1000W and 4000W pixels according to the luminosity 。
There are many camera function modes, including the following five, and the cost is a little high:
The default mode (1000W pixels) is very weak in the daytime, and the weak light is very strong : Here are the most powerful sharpening and smearing we have ever encountered. A large number of image details have been processed by algorithms. The details can't stand to be magnified, the oil painting is obvious, unnatural, and very obvious Artificial "MSG flavor" ”。 Even so, the power of discrimination is still inferior to that of iPhone X and S9+. There is not enough pixels. It has not been so strong for a long time Its advantage lies in the weak light scene. Although the advantage of discrimination is slight, the purity, tolerance and contrast of the picture under the weak light are one position higher than S9+;
4000W pixel mode, rolling from the number of pixels: In the daytime scene, the discrimination is stronger than twice the light change of iPhone X and S9+; In the light scene, the discrimination can also win the main shot of iPhone X and S9+, but it loses to the secondary shot of iPhone X and S9+, and the weaker the light, the more losses; The weak light and extremely weak light scenes are far inferior to the other flagship. The weaker the light, the greater the gap;
3 x/5 x telephoto, ferocious in discrimination but limited in application scenarios: Like Xiaomi MIX 2S, this pair can also be used in weak light. These two modes with different zoom levels are both completed by 8 million pixel sub photography. Theoretically, the two modes have only algorithm differences (at 5 times, smearing and sharpening are more obvious), but they show a certain difference in discrimination.
This is an active mobile phone The strongest sub camera, none of them . Even in the relatively weak lighting scene, it can defeat other competitors and its own other modes Strong to shock. Other mobile phones are used to take pictures of people at the opposite table and on the opposite road. The Huawei P20 Pro, a telephoto sub camera, can take pictures of people on the opposite floor or even across the lake. With telescope effect, don't ask me what it can do
The side effects of zooming larger than the conventional 2x optical zoom are also obvious. The field of vision of the 3x and 5x zoom is too small, and the subject cannot be completely received into the viewfinder in many use scenes. In addition, when the recent focusing distance is more than half a meter, it is unnecessary to think about macro. The depth of field of its ultra long focus is too shallow (it is suitable for taking portraits, with a certain degree of virtualization), which is one of the reasons why it occasionally pulls the bellows when focusing in the daytime, Not suitable for capturing medium and short distance moving objects (equivalent to 5 times of 125mm telephoto, it dares to take 1/17 second, and the film rate is OK, but the film rate of the lighting scene is low due to the focusing of the bellows)
AI scene mode , low availability: It can be understood as It has its own mode of later revision. Although it is suitable for sending friends, it is not suitable for recording life. Although the first impression is very fresh, HDR, smearing and sharpening are excessive, and the taste of MSG is very strong;
The ferocious super night scene synthesis process is still in hand
Super night view mode, shocking effect: The most powerful thing is it It has achieved a long hand-held exposure of 4 or 5 seconds. The unprecedented extremely low light picture brightness (it should be based on one of the first frames, and use the long exposure in the next few seconds to improve the picture brightness), the scene where you can't see your fingers (how weak is the light? Even the Pixel 2 XL, which supports full pixel dual core focusing, is pulling the bellows), can also take pictures with completely OK usability, Call it the "Super Night Vision" mode, it will be more appropriate, and even the flash will be saved. However, after all, it is hand-held and can not completely avoid shaking, so the picture details and contrast will also be slightly reduced. It is suitable for scenes that are extremely dark but inconvenient to turn on flash lights (shooting stars, dark buildings and other scenes that cannot be seen by flash lights).
Finally, the author would like to beep his personal opinion on the noise reduction of the night scene: although the domestic mainstream thinks that the cleaner the noise reduction paint is, the better, Noise reduction like iPhone X and Pixel is enough. Control the noise size well, and preserve the image information together with the noise, which has more space than the later stage of the "strong noise reduction smear" scheme (if you like to smear, the later stage software smears in batches, which is also completely OK);
The S9+and Huawei P20 Pro are powerful night scene noise reduction smears (which lead to the oil painting like image appearance on the latter), The smeared image details cannot be repaired by future algorithms. If there is noise, it can be smeared with post-processing, but it has been smeared straight out, and the picture information will be lost for a long time. Photos are the freeze frames of some special moments, Try to keep the picture information of each sub-pixel, which is the duty of the camera.
Not all photos are created for the circle of friends. The number of pixels and tolerance of precious moments are not enough. If you still think these are unimportant, you are happy. Because when people are old, they will remember the past, just like our Mao counting party, hoping to retain every detail of the past moment.
Hot question and answer
Can 40 megapixels get stuck?
The shooting is a bit off frame, but the speed is OK
The last phone equipped with a 4000W pixel camera was Nokia Lumia 1020 (total sensor pixels 4100W, actual maximum output 38.2 million, 7136 * 5360). The quality of the lens and ISP performance in those years were not good enough to cope with such high pixels, which led to the impression of "extremely slow imaging and blurred extreme magnification" (the pixel density was close to, or even exceeded, the ultimate discrimination of the lens, and it was easy to blur the extreme details if there was any oil stain or if it was used for a long time) of people who had used 1020;
By default, Huawei P20 Pro produces 1000W pixels. The 4000W pixel mode needs to be manually enabled, and the latter does not support digital zoom, and even There is a certain framing loss Problems. But 4000W pixel mode Shutter response and film speed are not big respectively in 1000W mode , like a machine gun, the experience is completely OK.
Another experience slot is that the auxiliary focus of the telephoto has a little fan box, and other experiences are excellent.
Size comparison of three common pixel samples
Size comparison of 4 common pixel samples
Is 1000W pixel enough?
Not really enough
Compared with the common 1200W, 1000W pixels are not much smaller. The decrease is only 25%, which is less than the 33% decrease from 1600W to 1200W that year.
However, it is embarrassing that 1000W pixels are stuck on the threshold of 4K resolution. For 3648 * 2736 samples, the long side cannot even cover the 4K screen (3840 * 2160). That is to say, the photos of P20 Pro in 2018 can not even be displayed point-to-point on the 4K monitor that may be popularized three or four years later and the 4K TV that has been popularized now.
4 cameras, 5 cameras, edge imaging contrast
4 cameras, 5 cameras, edge imaging contrast
What kind of experience is 4000W pixel?
Shocking in the daytime, the light is OK, and the weak light is mediocre
The 4000W pixel proof of Huawei P20 Pro's 7296 * 5472 has two times the actual length and width of the 1000W pixel proof and four times the total number of pixels, which reflects the huge gap in the size of the proof. Even though the photographing experience is no longer a problem, there is still a problem that the lens quality cannot catch up with the pixel density, Color noise and purple edges are indispensable, But it is not as sharp as it was in those days.
With the optical anti shake mechanism, it is more difficult to control the edge degradation. Therefore, the machine without the optical anti shake mechanism has a natural advantage in edge degradation. However, the 1/1.7 inch sensor of Huawei P20 Pro is too large, and it has not become an Oreo like 1020, and has made a choice in terms of lens quality. In the 4000W pixel mode, the edge degradation range of Huawei P20 Pro is close to that of S9+with optical anti shake, but its extreme edge degradation is higher.
Because of its higher number of pixels, it will really give people the illusion that a large area of corners will be pasted. Although it is really a piece of paste, the area proportion of edge degradation is only a little more serious than that of other flagship ships. It is totally acceptable that such a small lens can do this. When the output is 1000W pixels, oversampling+sharpening makes the edge degradation look very small, which is a relatively pleasant setting.
Sample description
In the global comparison, the other three mobile phones are the main camera, and the magnifying part is the secondary camera until the light is weak enough that the secondary camera cannot be triggered (the last two light scenes, iPhone and S9+cannot trigger the secondary camera). In the daytime proof, the 1000W, 4000W, 3x and 5x light variable of Huawei P20 Pro appeared at the same time, and the automatic scene recognition function was turned off uniformly. In the weak light sample, the Huawei P20 Pro was shown in 1000W, 4000W and super night view modes.
In the global comparison, you can see the difference between metering/white balance/wide angle/field of view. Enlarge the proof sheet to contrast the resolution/sharpening/smearing/contrast/saturation at details. scene The highest proportion is the light scene that people usually use most indoors, followed by the weak light/extremely weak light scene that tests sensors and algorithms.
The samples are arranged from near to far, from strong light to weak light. All proofs are in automatic mode, and the focus is in the center. If at Love to play computer games To browse the PC official website, you can click the picture to view the large picture.
Intelligent mode
The AI camera of Huawei P20 Pro will automatically trigger multiple scene modes such as "blue sky, delicious food, sunset". Their common point is that they will increase the contrast, saturation, sharpening and smearing strength of the image. The white balance will also shift to different colors according to the needs of different scenes.
Although most of the special modes are fresh at first sight In the setting sun and other scenes, there will also be a bit fake HDR effect. Overpainting and sharpening will lose a lot of details, resulting in a sense of oil painting. These are the self provided post revision maps. Although they are suitable for sending friends, they are not suitable for recording life, and cannot represent the actual performance of Huawei P20 Pro. Therefore, all the samples below turn off the AI scene function.
The virtualization function of Huawei P20 Pro uses the main camera for the virtualization mode, and unlike Pixel, it does not have the cutting function. There are inherent advantages and disadvantages in the basic focal length. However, the matting effect of Huawei P20 Pro lags behind S9+slightly, and is slightly better than Pixel 2 XL (using a single camera with full pixel dual core focusing to complete the virtualization) and iPhone X, and the performance is OK.
White balance and photometry
In the past year or two, except for some domestic brands that don't pay much attention to cameras, most flagship lightings and white balance have rarely overturned:
The white balance of Huawei P20 Pro is stable, and it tends to be red and warm. The white balance of the 4000W pixel primary and secondary photography and the secondary photography with 3 times light variation are adjusted very closely. However, due to the huge difference in the view field, their photometry is often quite different. In the default mode of 1000W pixels, there will be heavy hand sharpening, smearing and purposely raised contrast, which is different from the 4000W pixel mode in appearance;
Among the four testing machines, the white balance of Pixel 2 XL, which is blue and cold, always seems out of place, and the metering is often dark;
The iPhone X is familiar with its yellow color and warm color, and its white balance accuracy and stability are difficult to match, very close to what the naked eye can see;
S9+photometry is slightly higher than that seen with the naked eye, and its saturation is also higher, which is more pleasing.
Daytime scene
Day Scene 1
Daytime scene 1 central magnification
Day Scene 2
In the daytime, scene 2 is magnified in the center (the scene S9+sub camera overturns, without triggering)
Day Scene 3
Daytime scene 3 central magnification
Daytime scenario 4
Daytime scene 4 central magnification
Daytime Scene 4 Zoom in above the center
Light scene
Light Scene 1
Light Scene 1 Center Enlarged
Light Scene 2
Light Scene 2 Center Enlarged
Light Scene 3
Light Scene 3 Center Enlarged
Light Scene 3
Light Scene 3 Center Enlarged
Light Scene 4
Light scene 4 zooms in at the center (iPhone and S9+can no longer trigger secondary photography)
Light Scene 5
Light scene 5 zooms in at the center (iPhone and S9+can no longer trigger secondary photography)
Light scene 5 zooms in at the right of the center (iPhone and S9+can't trigger the sub camera)
Weak light/extremely weak light scene
Weak light scene 1
Weak light scene 1 central amplification
Enlarge the dark part below the center of weak light scene 1
Weak light scene 2 central amplification
Weak light scene 3
Weak light scene 3 central amplification
Weak light scene 4
Weak light scene 4 central amplification
Enlarge the center right of weak light scene 4
Weak light scene 5
Weak light scene 5 central amplification
Extremely weak light, pure experimental nature, rarely take photos at this level of light in daily use (all are hand shot, and the actual naked eye light is close to the iPhone X sample)
Extremely weak light amplification (all are handheld photography)
Pixel's HDR+still has a good saturation under such luminosity, which is higher than the S9+of "12 open close 1" multi frame synthesis. However, the S9+is better than the S9+in terms of details. The default mode of Huawei P20 Pro performs slightly better than that of iPhone, but 4000W pixels perform poorly. The previous ones were all blasted into dross before the 4-second exposure of Huawei P20 Pro.
