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hey what's up mkbhd here so this is the
back of the iphone 8. one camera then
this is the back of the iphone 10. two
cameras this is the iphone 13 pro three
cameras this is the back of the galaxy
s22 ultra four cameras and you better
believe there are some phones out now
with five cameras we've just gotten very
used to the idea of smartphones having
lots of cameras on the back it's even
become a little bit of a status thing
like when you see that phone with
several cameras on the back you kind of
know that that's one of the more premium
ones
so this sony phone
may look like a bunch of the other ones
that we've talked about
and
kind of just like a lot of other sony
phones and it has all the sony stuff
that we've come to expect over the years
but it has one really key feature up its
sleeve that makes it very different see
there's other types of phones when they
have three cameras for example they have
three native focal lengths typically
it's an ultra wide a standard and a
telephoto so that's awesome if you just
hit the 0.5 x button for an ultra wide
or just hit the 3x button for that
telephoto shot those are basically
native optical zoom but everything in
between is just going to be digitally
zooming between them so if you zoom into
3.5x that's basically the same as you
cropping in slightly to a photo from the
3x camera after you take it if you zoom
in to 2.5x that's just zooming way into
the 1x lens with digital zoom you're not
getting more detail the photo won't
necessarily look better it's just purely
for convenience so that's why you notice
that little snap that happens when you
get to the 3x and it switches to the
next camera that's how you can tell your
photo will be better but this sony
xperia 1 mark 4 brings back the
legendary continuous optical zoom
through this telephoto camera so last
time we saw this was in this the asus
zenfone zoom back in 2015
which was a much worse camera and that
kind of fell on its face so the tech has
come a long way since then so there's
still a 1x camera yes there's still a
0.7 x for your ultra wide shots but the
telephoto camera is now behaving kind of
like a full-size zoom lens with a focal
length range of 85 millimeters to 125
millimeters so now lets you smoothly
zoom between 3.5 x and 5.2 x with real
optical zoom and yes that means there
are moving parts inside the phone to
make this happen so sony's been working
on this for a little while you might
remember the xperia 1 mark iii that i
also reviewed which is this one
which also had a pretty wild telephoto
camera set up this one with magnets
snapped between 70 and 105 millimeters
so that was technically variable optical
zoom which is still super cool
it's like having two cameras in one in
that telephoto camera this one
with continuous zoom is like having
dozens of different focal lengths and
dozens of cameras in one just in that
telephoto now any focal length between
85 and 125 millimeters will be perfectly
native optical zoom but again it's more
like having a real continuous zoom built
into the back of a phone now in practice
you can see here the zoom range is
relatively small 3.5 x to 5.2 x is not a
huge zoom but it does actually achieve
its goal this was the xperia one mark
iii at 70 millimeters
then snapped to 105 millimeters both of
these are optical then this was when it
was right in between so just digital
zoom
now this is the xperia 1 mark iv first
at 85 millimeters
then all the way in at 125 millimeters
and then here it is right in between
it's subtle but it maintains better
sharpness throughout this whole range
while behaving just like a regular
camera and that is why i think this is
or at least logically should be
the future of smartphone cameras we've
been trying to get good
variables different focal lengths on the
back of smartphone cameras for a while
now like i said we've just accepted a
bunch of different cameras on the back
so galaxy s 22 ultra right now what does
that have that has a regular camera an
ultra wide a 3x telephoto
and a 10x telephoto so that it can
balance between a variety of different
focal lengths of course 3x will be
perfectly optical and then 10x will
sharpen again
but again it's still going to be a
little bit blurry in between
that's why this is ideal this is literal
perfect optical zoom throughout the
whole range you just can't beat physics
now of course the tech
has a lot to improve on probably the
most obvious piece being it's got to
cover a wider and wider focal range as
it gets better like i said 3.5 x to 5.2
x turns out isn't a whole lot of zoom
right now but imagine a version that
goes all the way from
2x to 8x and then maybe something does
all the way from 1x to 10x you know
suddenly you don't need a separate
primary and telephoto camera anymore and
so i was just kind of logically
extrapolating it seems like it would be
such a cool idea if we went from one
camera on the back to two to three
and then as the tech gets better and
better we go from three
back to two
and then back to one but but the more i
think about it i don't actually think
that we can expect to reduce all of the
cameras on the back of the phones now
all down to one just because the physics
problem
is incredibly hard like if you look at a
mirrorless camera you have one sensor
but you still need to change lenses to
go from ultra wide to a normal field of
view to a telephoto even if they all can
zoom you really don't see often some
casual lens that can do everything like
an 18 to 400 millimeter lens actually i
take that back i just looked it up
there there are some
that exist i just found on b h there is
an 8 to 800 millimeter lens
but it's the size of like a microwave
it's 53 pounds and costs
165 000
and that is the point here this is a
physics problem basically and all of the
pain points of trying to solve that
problem get magnified when you shrink it
all down into like a tiny smartphone
camera like this with these little itty
bitty sensors that don't gather that
much light and where there's not a lot
of room for high quality optics but high
quality optics really is the key here so
that zenfone zoom that we talked about
earlier that phone had a single camera
that did 28 to 84 millimeters so it's
about 1x to 3x zoom
and i never owned that camera or that
phone but from all the reviews i read
they all killed it for having really
poor quality optics and really bad
images as a result
and so that means the technology has
definitely gotten significantly better
since then and hopefully that trend can
continue so i love that sony is working
on this they stay really clever with it
obviously starting with turning
everything sideways within the phone for
the periscope zoom and then using
magnets to move around the optical
elements inside in a super precise way
that is very impressive what they've
achieved so far so file this down as yet
another sony phone with a super
impressive technically well executed
enthusiast feature
and then the rest of the phone built
around it is exactly what you'd expect
from sony it's an upgrade from the
xperia one mark iii that i reviewed less
than a year ago it's the same tall
matte black shape and design you can
barely tell the difference from the
outside between the phones but they do
have some year-over-year upgrades thrown
in they've still got their incredibly
overkill six and a half inch 4k 120
hertz oled display
but this one's even brighter up to a
thousand nits so it's more visible
outdoors and even more of a battery hog
uh the battery though is also bigger
it's up to 5000 milliamp hours now and
they've bumped it up to a snapdragon 8
gen 1 chip with 12 gigs of ram half a
terabyte of storage
there's updated loudspeakers and a new
12 megapixel selfie camera all three
cameras on the back can shoot 4k 120
frames per second videos and 20 photos
per second in bursts with sony's awesome
eye tracking autofocus and hey i gotta
hand it to sony i was gonna say i think
they're the only smartphone brand that's
never had a notch in any of their phones
but i did look it up there was actually
once a sony phone that had a notch and
it was pretty brutal but they've been
remarkably consistent with this design
they're also one of the only ones
keeping a headphone jack around despite
being one of the companies selling tons
of wireless earbuds too so they've added
a bunch of new software features around
this phone centered around gaming and
live streaming but at the same time with
all those pluses there are definitely
also still some classic sony downsides
first starting with the fact that it's
being unveiled now but isn't coming to
the u.s till september so you can sort
of map out the hype curve dropping
between now and then and they very much
still lean into the enthusiasts sony
alpha camera-like shooting experience
which is an upside for some people but
that also means there is no simple
point-and-shoot portrait mode or night
mode and you do have to dive straight
into sony's camera app which obviously
isn't for everybody also fun fact the
box it comes in
uh just has a phone
yeah just the phone no charging brick
also no usbc cable no paperwork just
the phone that's it and it's going to
retail when it does land in the u.s for
1
599
so yeah
not for everybody but hey i got to give
sony props because this this is one of
those things like i really enjoy using
these sony phones the software
experience on them has kind of quietly
become one of my favorite near stock
android experiences on any android phone
they get their updates they're smooth
all the time
and they consistently deliver
some innovative new stuff in every new
phone they drop and they refuse to be
notched or headphone jack dropping like
kind of the rest of the phones out so
i'm glad it exists
all right that's been it thanks for
watching
catch you guys in the next one
peace
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