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Help Camera (and motion video) talk - the Ultrapixel and more (tips/discussion)

Yes, that's right, some people prefer the enhanced versions, and from reading about elsewhere, when people complain about the One images looking washed out etc compared to other phones it's usually because the other phones automatically apply auto enhance when the photo is taken, where as the One takes the image as it is and you can then apply the auto enhance if preferred.
 
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Yes, that's right, some people prefer the enhanced versions, and from reading about elsewhere, when people complain about the One images looking washed out etc compared to other phones it's usually because the other phones automatically apply auto enhance when the photo is taken, where as the One takes the image as it is and you can then apply the auto enhance if preferred.

If that's a problem for some, then perhaps cranking up Saturation by a notch will do.

That setting is remembered and if that's more pleasing for some, there you go.
 
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Exactly, altering the settings will achieve that, adjusting either exposure/contrast/saturation by a notch will give some users more pleasing results and stay saved, it has also been noted that the sharpness setting of 0 on the One's settings is too aggressive and a more pleasing result can be achieved by lowering it to -1 or even -2.
 
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OK, here are a couple of pictures from each taken in my garden. I'm using standard settings on the iPhone 5 and HTC One barring both have HDR enabled. I've made sure that both of the pictures were taken from the same distance away from the subject too.

On each of these first two pics, the focal point is the flower at centre middle of the frame.

iPhone 5

photo2.jpg


HTC One

IMAG0008.jpg


The focal point of these next two pictures is the closest knotted right angle branch.

iPhone 5

photo-1.jpg


HTC One

IMAG0009.jpg


I honestly prefer the HTC one pictures. The colours might not be so bright but I feel they are more natural given that I know what the original scene looks like with my naked eye. I'm afraid you'll have to take my word for that, sorry.

Anyway, in comparison, I really do think the HTC One has the better camera.

Based solely on the pics taken above i think you'd have to be blind if you think HTC One took the better pics. iPhone 5 clearly has the better camera. Imo only!
 
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Based solely on the pics taken above i think you'd have to be blind if you think HTC One took the better pics. iPhone 5 clearly has the better camera. Imo only!

Or well-informed with over 40 years of photography experience.

If you believe that dry trees have green bark, do not regularly exhibit white mold and that the fence in the background likely had a green tinge to it, as displayed on a calibrated monitor, and that edge distortion on the background trunks is correct, then your opinion is correct and I must be blind. :D
 
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Apparently several of us here are blind. Has anyone seen my walking stick? I can't find it. :D

Someone mentioned pictures looking washed out and frankly based on the evidence given with only those pictures i have to agree, that's just my gut feeling on the matter. But hey everyone's different.

I did like your reply, it was very funny! Touche! :D
 
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Someone mentioned pictures looking washed out and frankly based on the evidence given with only those pictures i have to agree, that's just my gut feeling on the matter. But hey everyone's different.

I did like your reply, it was very funny! Touche! :D

The pictures from the HTC One are actually the closest to the real thing. It was incredibly overcast and grey yesterday and had been snowing briefly earlier so the clouds were heavy. Whilst the iPhone pictures do look warmer, they are not a true reflection of the actual scene seen with the naked eye.
 
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The pictures from the HTC One are actually the closest to the real thing. It was incredibly overcast and grey yesterday and had been snowing briefly earlier so the clouds were heavy. Whilst the iPhone pictures do look warmer, they are not a true reflection of the actual scene seen with the naked eye.

I really wish more people could grasp that concept.
 
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I think the pictures from the iPhone are so much better than the One. I understand that the one is closer to reality but as I only have those pictures to go by I find the warmer tone of the iPhone's pictures much more pleasing on the eye.

I'm no expert on camera's but I am not impressed with my new phones camera at all, it'll do for snapping the odd picture to be uploaded to facebook or twitter but that's about it. Put up against even my partners 5mp ipod 5G camera it fails miserably and is very difficult to just pull out and snap a decent shot like it was on the One X.. I only hope this doesn't detract from what is otherwise an amazing phone.
 
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I think the pictures from the iPhone are so much better than the One. I understand that the one is closer to reality but as I only have those pictures to go by I find the warmer tone of the iPhone's pictures much more pleasing on the eye.

I'm no expert on camera's but I am not impressed with my new phones camera at all, it'll do for snapping the odd picture to be uploaded to facebook or twitter but that's about it. Put up against even my partners 5mp ipod 5G camera it fails miserably and is very difficult to just pull out and snap a decent shot like it was on the One X.. I only hope this doesn't detract from what is otherwise an amazing phone.

Turn up the saturation under settings, perhaps play a bit with higher contrast.

You may be able to get the default views that you want.
 
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Turn up the saturation under settings, perhaps play a bit with higher contrast.

You may be able to get the default views that you want.

You've hit the nail on the head of why I'm not keen on this camera. With my One X camera I never had to change settings, just point and click the way a phone should be. With this camera it takes really decent photos indoors but then when you go outside you have to change settings, then change them when you are somewhere else, then again when back indoors.

All I want to do is take a decent pic and with 2 kids sometimes I need to take that picture straight away without messing about with it.

It's not a bad camera, what they've managed to do with it is pretty good but it's not as good as the One X, not as good as an iPhone and sadly wont even come close to the S4
 
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You've hit the nail on the head of why I'm not keen on this camera. With my One X camera I never had to change settings, just point and click the way a phone should be. With this camera it takes really decent photos indoors but then when you go outside you have to change settings, then change them when you are somewhere else, then again when back indoors.

All I want to do is take a decent pic and with 2 kids sometimes I need to take that picture straight away without messing about with it.

It's not a bad camera, what they've managed to do with it is pretty good but it's not as good as the One X, not as good as an iPhone and sadly wont even come close to the S4

In that case, if I were in your shoes, I'd take it down to the shop and compare mine with theirs, some snaps of the rep inside and outside the shop.

There's more light being gathered per pixel but that's per pixel.

Your One X was F/2.0 to a 1/3.2" sensor, your One is F/2.0 to a 1/3" sensor - light metering, and therefore overall exposure, ought to be fairly close. (edited, note to novox - The One gathers about twice the light per pixel with about half as many pixels as the One X. Noise should be reduced, but the total light integration should not be pixel dependent but rather sensor dependent.)

Sorry for hassle-ful advice on comparing but I think that it might be a good idea to find out if yours is behaving properly while it's still new.

I could be all wrong on this. I'll see if I can't get novox to give you a better opinion, but something sounds quite off to me to here.
 
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Using the picture comparisons posted earlier, I made the following:

onevsiphone.jpg


The top is the original HTC One shot, and the bottom is the original iPhone 5 shot. In the middle is my manual post processing of the HTC One photo via photoshop.

What I want to note here is that image quality, as far as the physical camera specs are producing, are very comparable between the high-end smartphones. What most people are debating here is really the software/firmware treatment of the image AFTER the camera has done its work.

For most people, they don't want to deal with having to run through their photos through photoshop; they want the camera to just give them a pic they like. And as we've already seen, some people prefer the iPhone's rendering and some people prefer the HTC One's offering.

My image is simply to illustrate that with post processing, I can easily make the HTC One photo look like the iPhone's, and had I chose to do so, I can easily make the iPhone photo look like the HTC One's. And the reason I can do this is because from an image quality perspective (resolution, contrast, color, et. al), the two raw images are practically identical.

I think using the camera's physical specs to justify why a photo SHOULD be better only goes so far. I stand by my previous post that most people judge photos based on the firmware's ability to post-process the raw image to the user's liking.

The iPhone does not take perfect photos every time. My wife has one and we've seen shitty photos come out of it. And sometimes I'll run her photos through photoshop before we post it on FB. Likewise with my Evo LTE. But as far as raw image quality is concerned, the difference is small, as hopefully I've shown in my image by normalizing contrast, saturation, and color temperature.

As for personal preference, in this comparison, I prefer the post processing of the iPhone, even if it's not quite as realistic. Take a look at postcards and tell me if the colors you see there are realistic. We don't always want realism in a photo. Sometimes, photography is the glorification of light, not simply the reproduction of it.
 
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The issue that Wilkas has raised is inconsistent behavior between indoor and outdoor pictures comparing his One with his One X (as one example).

Do you agree with the advice I offered?

Well I certainly see no harm in making sure the problem isn't a one-off issue. That said, in my personal experience with cell phone cameras, I see so much fluctuation in performance from any one camera that I wouldn't make any blanket conclusions about the hardware. I tend to blame environmental variables before blaming the hardware.

My Evo LTE takes amazing photos. I believe it's the same camera as on the One X. Yet on occasion, I get photos that look way worse than the average pic from the predecessor, the Evo 3D. And the 3D was known for erratic camera behavior. So, I'm not convinced that there's enough evidence to say that the One is inferior to the One X. There are multiple variables to eliminate, including the possibility that it's a defective unit. The order in which you eliminate the variables doesn't matter.

Also, I'm still unclear what exactly the issue is. Are the picture blurrier? grainier? green tint? What exactly does it not do as well as the One X?

Wilkas, since you have our attention, how about shooting the exact same subject with the same framing and lighting conditions, with both your OneX and One and posting your results?
 
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I don't have the One X anymore Novox, I cracked the screen so got it repaired and sold on. After the football I can post a couple of examples of why I think it's a better camera if you want? I have all the pics I took with the One X on my laptop.

The quality of the One X was just better, clearer in all light conditions although yeah, sometimes it would take a poor photo like all cameras. I am no camera enthusiast and tbh I don't know much about the inner workings.. I just liked how I could point it at something or someone and 9 times out of 10 I'd get a great picture.

Up to now that has not been the case with the One camera.. it could be I need to experiment with it a bit more
 
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I don't have the One X anymore Novox, I cracked the screen so got it repaired and sold on. After the football I can post a couple of examples of why I think it's a better camera if you want? I have all the pics I took with the One X on my laptop.

The quality of the One X was just better, clearer in all light conditions although yeah, sometimes it would take a poor photo like all cameras. I am no camera enthusiast and tbh I don't know much about the inner workings.. I just liked how I could point it at something or someone and 9 times out of 10 I'd get a great picture.

Up to now that has not been the case with the One camera.. it could be I need to experiment with it a bit more


I do think you need to give it more time. It could be all in your head too. The One X camera was leaps better than anything HTC (or Sammy) had offered in the past. It was universally praised as being a huge leap in quality. So I think we all have very good mental impressions of that camera. I kinda see the HTC One's camera as "doing more with less," so the pictures may be comparable to the One X, but it's not way better. And if you expect way better, you might be disappointed.

When I upgraded my dSLR from my 2003 Canon Digital Rebel to the 5D Mark II, for a long time I felt like my entry level camera from last decade performed better. I think in the end, I had gotten very comfortable with that camera, the controls, lenses, the feel, weight, even the mechanical noises it made during shots. It took some time before I felt like I had a good handle with the new 5D.
 
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