- Continuing with my not-so-scientific experiment
of the best phones of 2017,
I figured we did the portrait mode one,
we did the speed one, we did the battery one,
let's now do like the actual camera.
Which phone of 2017 has the best camera?
So for this video we have the iPhone X, the Pixel 2 XL,
the Galaxy Note 8, and the Huawei Mate 10 Pro.
Now all of these phones have great cameras.
Period.
It's actually very hard to choose between them
except that we're going to.
But I just wanna make it plain and clear
that they all have really great cameras
before we even get started,
but me being the nerd that I am,
I wanna know which one has the best camera.
So I went out, I took the same photo with
all four of these phones in varying conditions,
put them all side-by-side
and that's what we're gonna look at right now.
So first up, here's a photo I took
in a coffee shop while in San Diego.
Now right off the bat we can see that
they are all great photos,
like I mentioned, all these actually are crisp,
they look like real life for the most part, et cetera.
But the thing is, you'll notice that one of these phones
did a better job than the others,
and that's the Pixel 2 XL.
Now what I'm talking about here,
is if you look in the background where the window is
and the Get Buzzed sign, right?
If you look where the window is on all the other photos,
it is blown out, it is over exposed.
In the Pixel 2 XL it's not.
Now these are all taken at the exact same time of day,
et cetera, what's going on is the crazy HDR mode
that's on the Pixel 2 XL, that's on by default
that takes an HDR photo every time you take a photo,
managed to actually take a photo
of that that was lower exposure,
combining with the proper exposure of the foreground,
and just made kind of a better overall shot, in my opinion.
It's something that you might actually edit the photo with
in Lightroom, et cetera,
but the phone did it all on its own.
So I'm gonna give point to Pixel on this one.
Next up another photo from San Diego while I was there.
This one's outside, very bright obviously,
so I wanted to test that.
Again all good photos.
I think in the Mate 10 Pro photo though,
if you look pretty closely at the tree,
it starts to lose a little detail in there
and a little dynamic range.
As opposed to all of the other ones
kinda did a much better job at that.
The iPhone X compared to the Note 8,
and this is something the iPhones tend to do,
the colors are not as punchy, right?
So if you look at the orange things,
whatever those orange things are in that tree,
you'll notice that they're a lot more subdued
than they are in say the Note 8 where they're a lot poppier.
That's a personal preference.
I would say though, that the iPhone in this case
probably a little more realistic in that sense.
But again I'm really splitting hairs with that.
But up to you.
Now the Pixel 2 XL again with that HDR,
kind of gave a little more detail into the tree
because of the fact that it took a bunch
of different exposures and layered them together to do that.
So again, splitting hairs.
But just by a tad I would say the Pixel 2 XL
'cause I kinda like the way that tree looks.
Whereas the rest of the scene,
I think for most of the shots,
they're all pretty similar.
Then we have this sea lion or seal,
I don't actually know the difference between the two.
Whatever he is, this little creature, also in San Diego,
this is around sunset.
And the interesting thing about that is that
when you look at the Mate 10 Pro and the Pixel 2 XL,
they're much warmer than the Note 8 and the iPhone X.
In fact the iPhone X almost cooled it down entirely,
and in a way it white balanced the crap out of that photo.
But again it's not quite as true to life
as say probably the Note 8, I would have to give it to,
is probably really what it looked like.
It's hard, I think, for the phones to know
that you're trying to shoot at sunset
and want some of that warmth in the shot
to show that it is sunset.
But either way.
If we look closely at all this though,
we're still gonna have a little more detail I think,
in the iPhone X photo compared to the Note 8
and also compared to the Mate 10 Pro.
The Pixel 2 XL, eh.
I would say it's super close to the iPhone X,
and again that HDR stuff is helping.
And also the other thing that the Pixel device does
is it does sharpen photos really well.
Almost to the point where
I feel like if it sharpened them any more
it would be too sharp and look processed.
But it does a good job of just kinda doing it
right to that point.
But in this one I would actually say that the iPhone X
sharpness wise, took a better photo.
Color wise, I mean if you wanted it to be
perfectly white balanced, that's probably right.
But to me it wasn't really true to life.
There was a bit of an orange hue because of the sunset.
But yeah without it knowing that,
it's still between probably the iPhone X and the Pixel 2 XL.
And then we have this lovely sunset,
also I was in San Diego.
Clearly I was here for an event
and wandered around with these phones for a long time.
But at this photo the first thing I would notice off the bat
is that the Huawei Mate 10 Pro added
kind of like a pink hue.
It's very subtle, but it's across the entire photo.
When you look at it in the ocean itself
and also in the sky.
So I would probably wanna adjust that
but if you like a pink hue in your photo, that's cool.
But it's not quite, again, true to life,
which is what I'm kind of judging,
how true to life can we get with
just auto-settings on all of these phones.
The Note 8, the iPhone X, the Pixel 2 XL
I think all just did a great job.
And again the Mate 10 Pro did a good job
if it weren't for that hue.
But in the iPhone X photo,
you'll notice that the clouds actually
are a bit whiter.
It's almost like it did that same cool thing
it did with those seal pup whatever lion thing.
It color-corrected the crap out of it.
But I think that still looks good in this photo,
I don't mean necessarily, like the opposite of that
is the pink hue that the Mate 10 did.
So I still like that.
I'm totally okay with that in this photo for sure,
so (grunts) it's pretty tough.
I'm gonna say it's pretty much a three-way tie for me,
maybe the Pixel 2 XL because when I'm looking at the clouds,
again I'm looking real close at these things,
it has a little bit more dynamic range to it
and again that's from the HDR
that this Pixel 2 is really, really good at.
But yeah those three win this one,
and they're very close.
Next we have the Pink Panther.
So this was kind of like my bad lighting situation.
There's only a few lights on in this room.
Again all of them did a pretty good job,
even considering that were weren't any
real lights on in this room.
And that there's a backlight which just
makes it harder for these phones to do this
on any camera, really.
So first up we look at the Mate 10 Pro again.
If there's a lot of noise in the photo,
it just didn't do as good of a job of sharpening.
Again it's a good photo, but compared to the other ones
it not as good of a job.
You'll see the auras in the lights in the back,
the lens flare
which all of the other ones seem to eliminate just fine.
When we look at the Note 8,
I would say that's probably a step above
but still maybe just a hair below the iPhone X.
It did a good job of say
blurring the background a little bit,
naturally it wasn't on any type of blur modes,
but I'd say the sharpness in such a dark environment
still comes through in the iPhone X.
And again we have the same thing
that we always have with the iPhone,
which is the colors are a little more subdued
as opposed to the Note 8
that punched them out a little bit more.
And then we have the Pixel 2 XL
which I hate to keep saying it guys,
but that HDR.
I mean the Pink Panther himself is a little bit brighter,
the background's a little bit brighter
because again it took multiple photos,
it combined the different exposures and fixed that problem.
And he's pretty sharp.
So yeah, we're going with Pixel 2 XL again.
Just squeezing by.
Back here in New York City,
I took a couple photos outside.
This one at night, obviously,
I mean the Mate 10 Pro we can kind of just get rid of.
I mean if you look at just the top of the buildings,
it's lost all of the exposure.
Again not a horrible photo,
but compared to the other ones it's not the same.
The Note 8 did a great job,
although it did have some noise in the building.
You can see it's kind of a weird exposure going on there.
The iPhone X I think looks great.
There's a lot of sharpness in the castle
compared to say the Note 8 and even the Mate 10 Pro a bit.
Yeah I would say yeah,
it's definitely a lot sharper than the other two at the top,
the same thing goes for the building.
And again it's got that kind of like,
that neutral muted tones.
Which actually I don't mind in this photo.
And then we have the Pixel 2 XL which is a lot warmer,
I would say, than the iPhone.
So meh, I would actually lose points for that in my mind,
because I don't think it looked that way in real life.
It was a little more like the iPhone was.
It was a little more subdued.
It's late at night, whatever.
But it did do a good job of the building,
again a little warmer,
but you can even see, see that's the Rockefeller Center
actually top of the rock behind it,
you'll notice that it's not over exposed
like it is in all of the other photos, right?
So you see how it's blown out in the iPhone X,
the Note and the 10.
The Pixel 2 XL, it's perfectly exposed
as if I was aiming for that.
Again the HDR man, it's just nice.
And here's my face.
Testing out the font-facing camera real quick
on all of them to kinda close this out.
We have the Mate 10 Pro,
which over exposed the image so that's not great.
The Note 8 did a good job, I think.
And you can also see again, the iPhone X
is a little more subdued, color wise,
it's a little more subdued.
And I'll even say maybe potentially the Note 8
did a little bit sharper of a job on my hair.
Yeah I would say just a bit.
And then if we go to the Pixel 2 XL,
I mean the front camera on that just kind of,
I mean look at my hair, it's sharp.
It's sharper than it is in any of the other photos,
again it has that software that over sharpens things.
Not over sharpens, let me take the back.
Sharpens the crap out of things to the point
where it's like if it was any sharper
it would look processed.
So I think the software does a great job there.
I mean also look at the sweater in the background
on the chair compared to all of the other photos.
Everything in the background for that matter.
Again that HDR is still working, even on the front camera.
So yeah.
I think we've got some good data here.
And that data says that data and software
does a really good job when it comes to photos.
I think it's pretty clear in my opinion at least,
and you know you guys feel free to disagree
in the nice way, let me know what you think.
Happy to hear from you, just be nice.
But I think the Pixel 2 kinda just wins.
Again all of these phones took a really great photo, right?
Like all of these I probably could have edited
and got them all looking the same.
Just taking the shot, snapping it real quick,
not adjusting any settings, not editing anything,
I think the Pixel 2, it just kinda wins.
Just by this much, and even more than this much
in certain photos where it gets the HDR perfectly right
and you just get a much,
it looks like it was edited in the best way.
Yeah, so there we go.
Let me know what you guys think in the comments below
of this video, of the results,
and let me know other videos you might like to see me do.
Whether it's comparing different phones,
whether it's tips and tricks,
'cause I'm doing those every Tuesday now.
Trying to do something like this every Saturday at least,
so yeah would love to hear some topics from you guys
and I'll try and see if I can get them done.
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thanks for watching.
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