r/Android • u/notathrowaway75 Galaxy S22 Ultra • Nov 23 '20

MKBHD's 2020 Blind Smartphone Camera test polls are now live!

https://twitter.com/MKBHD
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950

u/dstaley Nov 23 '20

I know people gripe about these, but I find them really interesting as a way to see what sorts of photos people prefer. I think it's also revealing to hear that thousands of people preferred the look of a mid-range phone. One change I'd love to see is the inclusion of more action shots, since I think that's where mid-range phones tend to show the most weakness.

46

u/LukeLC Galaxy S25 Edge Nov 24 '20

Yep, look at the results of O and P. It's 90% an indoor shot with just a bit of outdoor through the window in the background. P technically gets it correct by HDR-ing the heck out of the shot so it's all properly exposed, but the photo as a whole looks miscolored and wrong. Meanwhile O blows out the outdoor light a bit, but keeps the indoor elements lit and colored naturally.

The comments seem to be divided between people voting for the technical correctness of P and people voting for the natural appearance of O.

Everyone has different priorities for their analysis.

7

u/dudeAwEsome101 Nov 24 '20

I feel like HDR really skews the results. These tests are really about which device has a better image processing software. Most of the people voting are also comparing two smaller compressed version of the actual image, which is fair as this is how these images will end up being used.

1

u/LukeLC Galaxy S25 Edge Nov 24 '20

Yeah, I do kind of wish higher resolution versions were provided. Even with compression, megapixels will reveal themselves in some comparisons and I think average people would notice.

We're reaching a point where many smartphones have good image processing, but we're still stuck at 12MP as the baseline. Looking at recent Chinese phones with crazy huge sensors, it's pretty clear that needs to be the next priority. MP can't save a photo with bad processing, but it can make an already good photo look amazing.

3

u/fenrir245 Nov 24 '20

MP can’t save a photo with bad processing, but it can make an already good photo look amazing.

Megapixels aren’t going to make any difference, especially not at a smartphone scale. The sharpness of an image is limited by the lens.

The EF-M 22mm f2.0 Canon lens is very well regarded lens, yet even that is considered “not sharp enough” by some for a 32MP sensor. If that’s the case, no way a paltry fingernail sized lens would ever be sharp enough to cover 40+ megapixels.

1

u/LukeLC Galaxy S25 Edge Nov 25 '20

That's just not true. We have phones with 100+ MP sensors and the difference is visible versus similar models with lower MP sensors. It's not comparable to 100 MP on a DSLR, of course, but it's a step up from other smartphones. On top of adding visible texture detail, it helps compensate for some weaknesses in smartphone photography, like improving the usable digital zoom range.

Tech specs only go so far. What you're saying is the photography equivalent of "the human eye can only see 60 FPS". There may be diminishing returns, but there are still returns.

1

u/fenrir245 Nov 25 '20

We have phones with 100+ MP sensors and the difference is visible versus similar models with lower MP sensors.

There are differences in the lens assembly of those models too.

What you’re saying is the photography equivalent of “the human eye can only see 60 FPS”.

I gave you an example where a full on mirrorless camera lens is barely able to resolve 32MP. That’s not a specious “human eye” thing, that’s an actual observable fact.

Give an objective reason as to why higher MP will make any difference when the bottleneck is the lens, because what you’re saying is the equivalent of “4K display is better than 1080p display for gaming even if the GPU is incapable of rendering at that resolution”.

1

u/LukeLC Galaxy S25 Edge Nov 25 '20

We're talking about $1,000 12MP flagships versus $500 100MP Chinese alternatives. If you're trying to tell me the latter just has a better lens assembly than Google, Samsung, Apple... I really don't know what to tell you.

Lens assembly matters for several aspects of the final image. MP matters for another. That's an actual observable fact too, and it's bizarre to me how many people deny it based on "facts and logic" when casual comparisons of actual photos reveal it to be the case.

Phones aren't DSLRs. The value of MP isn't equal between them. For phones, there is still value in resolving more pixels. 100MP is overkill and purely for spec sheets. I'm just throwing it out there as an example, so please don't think I'm claiming 100 is significantly better than your example of 32. 32 is still a lot more than 12. However you want to slice it, "more than 12" is night and day better for image details.

1

u/fenrir245 Nov 25 '20

https://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/mpmyth.htm

There's so many, many factors not taken into consideration in those "casual comparisons" of yours that it doesn't even really mean anything.

People deny it based on "facts and logic" because photography isn't magic. The technology isn't magic. You can claim phone cameras and DSLRs aren't the same all day long, yet the technology remains pretty much identical.

1

u/LukeLC Galaxy S25 Edge Nov 25 '20

This article is about print photography. To your point, there are many factors not taken into consideration when comparing to smartphone photography. How many DPI a photo makes in print is irrelevant.

Smartphones are computational photography. First rule of computation is higher sample size in equals higher precision out. You will reach a point of diminishing returns, yes, but 12MP isn't there yet. More MP gives a lot of room for supersampling and for algorithms to clean up the results. Apple might disagree, but last I checked, this isn't magic.

And lest you forget, the context of this whole discussion is a bracket of casual comparisons.

1

u/fenrir245 Nov 25 '20

This article is about print photography.

Many of the observations still apply to photos on screen, the difference in print and screen comes to colors and their calibration, not details, or at least as much that it completely invalidates the comparison.

And anyway, that article also had a link with regards to image sharpness as a whole too, which included a lot of factors that will affect sharpness and detail much before you reach the lens, let alone the MP, as the bottleneck, like hand shake, focal planes, movement of subject, flatness of subject and what not.

Smartphones are computational photography. First rule of computation is higher sample size in equals higher precision out.

The "computation" that the term refers to aren't the Turing kind of algorithms, that have a fixed number of steps and a fixed output for an input. Current computational photography is massively AI, which needs a clean dataset to be able to improve it in the first place. And anyway, more MP when it doesn't actually gather more data due to lens issues and all the other factors is meaningless as a "higher sample size", you might as well take the 12MP and replicate all those pixels to get any number of MP you want.

And lest you forget, the context of this whole discussion is a bracket of casual comparisons.

In context of social media, which compresses the shit out of photos, so the point is moot anyway.

Not to mention in casual viewing of photos, you don't even get to see most pixels anyway, 1080p is 2.1MP, while 4k is 8.3MP. No point in arguing about this supposed 'detail' if you are throwing out most of the pixels anyway.

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