Even with today’s amazing mobile cameras, smartphone photography keeps evolving. One may argue that the quality of daylight pictures has seemingly stalled, but as hardware and software evolve beyond the megapixel race of yesteryear, we see continuous improvements in new, key areas. Of course, it is often the vanguard of expensive flagships pushing the envelope of computational photography, with “night mode” ultra low-light pictures being a new key talking point. With the Honor 20 Pro’s excellent combination of hardware and software, you can get the impressive results in a premium but affordable package.
The Honor 20 Pro has received glowing reviews for its camera capabilities: XDA’s camera expert Daniel Marchena found that the phone has “camera tuning down to an art”, delivering stunning shots that have amazing detail and, most importantly, a natural feel to them. Other camera reviewers, like DxOmark, praised the phone’s excellent exposure, achieving the joint top score for this category at the time their review was published.
This isn’t too surprising given that the device packs an extremely complete quad-camera setup, offering a Sony IMX586 48 MP main camera lens coupled with AI-powered software and hardware, allowing users to shoot pictures with excellent clarity even in dimly-lit environments. Low-light performance also benefits from the inclusion of Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) and Artificial Image Stabilization (AIS), but the phone also offers AIS Super Night Mode, which can be activated by setting the camera mode to “Night.” This mode is excellent for city skylines at night, or dimly-lit back streets, yet it’s not where the phone’s ultra low-light photography capabilities stop. We’ve found the phone to have excellent exposure in low light even in auto mode. So how does Honor achieve such well-exposed pictures, and how does it stack up to competitors?
Exposure on digital cameras is controlled by the f/stop, the shutter speed, and the ISO setting. The Honor 20 Pro has no shortcomings in either regard, with a wide-aperture f/1.4 lens on the powerful main camera — the aforementioned 48MP 1/2″ Quad-Bayer camera sensor by Sony. Beyond that, though, the Honor 20 Pro features what Honor calls “Auto Ultra-High ISO.” In this particular regard, the 20 Pro stands head and shoulders above some of the top competitors in the mobile space.
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In digital photography, an ISO number indicates how sensitive a camera is to light, which is dependent on the signal gain of the camera’ sensor. A higher value indicates greater sensitivity, and in turn, better low light captures. On the Honor 20 Pro, you can adjust the ISO manually when using the versatile and powerful Pro mode, but their automatic ISO tuning for regular shots is still capable of achieving extremely high ISO numbers, making for tremendous low-light shots. The Honor 20 Pro’s ISO of 204800 dwarfs that of the Galaxy S10+, which cannot surpass 6400. This upgrade over the Honor 20’s 102400 ISO even puts the Pro’s ISO number ahead of that of SLR cameras like the Canon 5D Mark IV.
See sample photos here
The 20 Pro will adjust the ISO automatically whenever you are shooting in auto, so in practice, you do not need to think about the ISO number and how to tune it to the particular scene. The Auto Ultra-High ISO algorithm automatically kicks in under 1 lux of brightness, at the point where most detail can’t be perceived by the naked eye. As expected from modern low-light mobile photography, this mode can bring out hidden detail and color. While turning up the ISO usually comes at the expense of additional noise, the 20 Pro can also keep noise within acceptable ranges, with DxOMark noting that some results offered by the Honor 20 Pro’s noise control in low-light scenes are “comparable to those of the best performers.”
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With a more compact smartphone body, fitting complex components for image stabilization is almost impossible. One the other hand, carrying a tripod on the go would be unrealistic as it is bulky and cumbersome. It is no surprise then that image stabilization is a thorny issue to get right in smartphone photography.
Typically, there are three categories of smartphone stabilization technologies: Electronic Image Stabilization (EIS), Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) and AI Image Stabilization (AIS).
EIS (Electronic Image Stabilization) is generally used in videos. Due to handheld shakes or movements, videos can come out blurry. EIS technology counteracts these jitters/movements through real-time calculations of the movement and rotation of the camera. Hence, the video would appear steady.
OIS (Optical Image Stabilization) refers to actual lens adjustments to counteract hand jitters. Compared to EIS, OIS does not crop the image and power consumption is kept to a minimum. However, the range for OIS is narrow and can usually cancel out 1~2° of jitter.
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AIS (AI Image Stabilization) is a perfect blend of EIS and OIS. By identifying jitters with an AI algorithm, a series of images are aligned before being merged into one single unit to achieve stabilization.
The recently-unveiled HONOR 20 PRO is one of the few flagships smartphones available that supports EIS, OIS and AIS altogether. Furthermore, the quad camera system allows for basically any conceivable shooting scenario, including telephotography, macro and night photography, as well as videography. The HONOR 20 PRO scored 111 on DxO’s comprehensive camera test, the 2nd highest score for any smartphone camera. We will explore several scenarios to explain image stabilization on the HONOR 20 PRO.
1. Handheld Camera Shake
OIS works best in cancelling slight tremors that blurs photos. The in-built gyroscope detects jitters and generates adjacent movements in the opposite direction. This cancels out the jitter and generates clear and precise photos despite tremors in the photographer’s hand.
The following figure serves as an example. ‘A’ depicts the camera when it is kept stationary, but when light emitted from objects shift, the camera senses the jitter and the image becomes blurry. OIS, however, detects even the slightest movement and adjusts the lens real-time to ensure that the light hits at the correct position nevertheless.
Both the 48MP main camera and 8MP telephoto camera on the HONOR 20 PRO supports OIS, offering users a superior photography experience by balancing hand jitters.
2. Motion Blur
By definition, motion blur occurs when the subject moves during photography or videography. Just imagine taking a photo of a moving car, it is highly likely that your picture will come out blurry.
The solution would be to increase the shutter speed, which is to get a quick snapshot rather than prolonging exposure. However, increasing the shutter speed leads to decrease in image brightness, making it impossible to take clear pictures of fast moving objects in low-light conditions.
The HONOR 20 PRO features an F/1.4 aperture, the largest ever on a smartphone. It guarantees an average of an additional 50 % light reception, when compared with the standard F/1.8 aperture commonly seen on the market. HONOR applies an unique algorithm to achieve an ultra-high ISO value of 204,800, effectively minimizing noise that typically comes with high ISO. The HONOR 20 PRO’s outstanding photosensitivity further boosts the shutter speed, reducing the distortion brought about by motion blur.
3. Blurriness Caused by Image Synthesis
Night mode on smartphones has become commonplace. In principal, a series of photos taken within seconds apart are merged seamlessly into an integral unit. Through manipulating exposure time, the AI ensures that brighter areas are not overexposed, while darker regions are kept bright. However, since the user’s hand will inevitably shake within that few seconds, visual elements will “move” across the images, resulting in blurriness in the synthesized image.
The HONOR 20 PRO’s AIS image stabilization technology is the answer to this issue. By locating the pixels on each image, the AI algorithm detects and corrects discrepancies by the pixels, producing a sharp synthesized image
The following are sample photos taken by the HONOR 20 PRO.
Capturing distant objects and people have always been a challenge for smartphone cameras. For instance, if you are seated far away from the stage at a concert, you’d have a hard time trying to take a picture of your favourite celebrity. Likewise, it would be difficult to get a good landscape photo or a close-up of animals when you go on holiday without a professional DSLR camera.
The telephoto lens on the HONOR 20 PRO aims to resolve this issue once and for all. Capable of 3X lossless optical zoom, 5X hybrid zoom and 30X digital zoom, simply enlarge the photo with the lens to get a closer look of distant scenery and animals.
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Now let us deep-dive into the telephoto lens!
1. Optical Zoom
Optical zoom involves actual lens adjustments to manipulate light, scaling up and scaling down an object without compromising details – hence the term lossless optical zoom. Most mobile phone cameras on the market are restricted to a maximum of 2X optical zoom, such as the Samsung S10+ and iPhone Xs Max. HONOR, however, went the extra mile to include a telephoto lens capable of 3X lossless optical zoom on the HONOR 20 PRO. Its powerful optical zoom capabilities allow users to get up-close to far-away objects without degrading image quality
2. Digital Zoom
Digital zoom, on the other hand, magnifies each pixel of the image using the processor to create an enlarged effect.
In fact, the range of digital zoom is highly dependent on optical zoom: the former scales up every pixel based on the ability of the latter. The 3X lossless optical zoom enables up to 30X digital zoom, outshining the industry-standard 10X digital zoom. Also worth noting is that the HONOR 20 PRO's telephoto lens supports Optical Image Stabilization, which identifies jitters with an in-built gyroscope. In response, the lens is moved in the opposite direction accordingly to counteract ghosting.
Prepare to be amazed by the amount of detail the HONOR 20 PRO can capture. Forget about your external lenses; at 30X digital zoom, simply dial down the exposure and you can even get a close-up of the moon.
Most flagship smartphones on the market do not support Night Mode when zoom is activated. This seriously undermines the results of photos taken at night or in dimly lit environment. However, with the HONOR 20 PRO, its AIS (AI Image Stabilization) Super Night Mode works in tandem with digital zoom, allowing users to capture far away objects at night. Whether it be 10X or 30X zoom, the AIS Super Night Mode merges a series of images seamlessly into a single photo, delivering unparalleled camera performance under low-light environments.
HONOR 20 PRO: AIS Super Night - Mode in conjunction with digital zoom
Other flagships: Unable to support zoom and night mode simultaneously
3. Hybrid Zoom
Hybrid zoom can be explained as another form of digital zoom. Specifically, images captured by the main lens and telephoto lens are merged to compensate for the diminished image quality. The result of optical zoom is superior to hybrid zoom, though the latter is a better option than digital zoom in general.
HONOR 20 PRO can achieve up to 5X hybrid zoom. This may not sound as impressive as the 30X digital zoom, but the exceptional image quality translates to practicality for users.
Aside from its remarkable ability to zoom into pictures, the HONOR 20 PRO features the world’s widest F/1.4 aperture for a smartphone camera, an ultra-high ISO of 204,800 and a 4 cm macro lens. These qualities account for basically any conceivable shooting scenario. There is no surprise that the HONOR 20 PRO performed tremendously on DXO’s comprehensive camera test, its score of 111 was the 2nd highest for any smartphone camera.
The recently unveiled HONOR 20 PRO seamlessly integrates four rear sensors that allows for basically any conceivable shooting scenario including night photography, ultra-wide angle, telephotography and macro photography. It was also accorded 111 points by DxOMark, the 2nd highest score attained by any smartphone, the gold standard benchmark for camera quality in the industry. Above all is the HONOR 20 PRO’s exceptional night photography capabilities, which is demonstrated below simply by comparing the same image taken under different lighting.
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As you can see, the differences are staggering. HONOR 20 PRO continues to outperform its competitors under low-light conditions, capturing images in ultra clarity. Let us delve into the shooting process and look into detailed analyses to understand HONOR’s superior night photography.
1. Analyzing the Photo-taking Process
To conduct the test, we first identified our shooting location. We made sure it was as dark as night, so it was virtually impossible to see with a naked eye. This is a sample photo of the results you’d achieve with our counterparts’ flagship smartphones.
With the HONOR 20 PRO, all we did was aim at the object and tap the shutter, choosing the default mode without any professional AI processing. Despite the poor lighting, the HONOR 20 PRO captured the object perfectly.
The HONOR 20 PRO is no doubt your most trust-worthy partner. All you need to do is tap on the shutter and know that you will get a perfect photo even in low-light environments. You do not even need bulky gadgets such as a tripod, which is often used to stabilize the camera for long-exposure photography.
2. Analyzing Photo Specifications
We did a comprehensive analysis of HONOR 20 PRO’s images. Uncover HONOR’s two secrets to night photography with us through its exceptional specifications!
The HONOR 20 PRO features an F/1.4 aperture, the largest ever on a smartphone. It guarantees an average of an additional 50 % light reception, when compared with the standard F/1.8 aperture commonly seen on the market – the more light a lens can receive, the better the image resolution and quality.
The ultra-high ISO of 102,400 is also worth highlighting, since the ISO of images taken on other smartphones merely reach 1250.
A higher ISO value can effectively increase the brightness of the picture, but it has a down side: prominent noise. Therefore, most smartphones limit the ISO value within 10,000. The HONOR 20 PRO, however, has a maximum ISO value of 204, 800, which is more than 20 times higher than other smartphones on the market.
More importantly, there is limited noise in pictures taken by the HONOR 20 PRO. Despite its ultra-high ISO, the image is kept crisp and precise. HONOR confirmed that it applies a unique algorithm to achieve such an ultra-high ISO value, only supported on Huawei and HONOR smartphones.
Some may question why flashlight photography isn’t used instead. In fact, flash itself can be problematic when lighting is uneven or when the object is too up-close. There are many limitations to flashlight photography. For instance, you won’t be able to use flash to capture an infant’s smile when he is asleep. Likewise, it may not be appropriate if you are at a museum trying to get a close-up of an exhibit.
HONOR 20 PRO manages to deliver fine-quality photos under extreme testing conditions, demonstrating its efforts in camera hardware and algorithm development. As seen below, results under normal night light also prove to be phenomenal.
Hello All,
Dharma Chandru, One of The Oppo Global Product Ambassadors, I Have Received Matt Black Version of The OPPO Find X5, I Have been Using it for a Month and ill sum up my thoughts and review from a Photographers POV.
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Build Quality & Design ::
OPPO Find X5 Truly caters the Word Flagship and it Uses Super Premium Materials and it feels great to hold it on hands and its almost the right size. Not so big,not so small. The Size and the choice is screen size is very much apt for Personal Movie Experience
Performance & Screen ::
Im never into Gaming so Let me give you a glimpse on the Performance from my personal experience while i was using it for a short while.
Oppo Find X5, phone is powered by the Snapdragon 888 processor, paired with Practical 8GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, App Launch including Photoshop,Lightroom and Snapseed are Super Fast and theres no Lag in Import,Processing and Export too. Handles Large files with Ease.
Oppo Finx X5 has an 6.55 Inch Amoled Screen with HDR 10+ and Supports 120 Hz. The 120 Hz is a Bliss while reading but it consumes more battery than the regular 60 Hz Mode. i Preferred to use 60 Hz as Default. It has a resolution of FHD at 2400x1080 and is bright enough to be used comfortably outdoors with 500 nits, it can be boosted to 800 nits, i tried using it under direct sunlight and i could manage to use it without any problem.
Battery ::
The Battery has 4800 Mah which is like very practical, with the Supported 80W SuperVOOC Charger the charging time is Super Fast and i could attain 3% to 100% in about 40 Mins. Put up on a charger head for the shower and when you are back you should get a days charge up and running if u are a casual user.
Speakers ::
The Stereo Speakers are quite impressive, the sound through ringtones and song ringtones are rather clean than loud. I Personally prefer this rather than loud jarring speakers from the ones i used earlier.
Color OS ::
Color OS is quite New to me and Its close to Stock OS. Thats one of the Favorite thing for me. The main Settings menu features Oppo's colorful icons for easier navigation. Android 12's new privacy features are implemented. You get a summary of all the apps that use your data, location, camera, microphone, etc., all in one place. It's called Privacy Dashboard and is something like Digital Wellbeing but privacy-focused. Most of the UI elements on ColorOS can be customized. We are talking deep customization of app icons, accent colors, quick toggles and their shape, font, fingerprint reader animation, Edge lighting for incoming notifications0, of course, the Always-on display.
Camera ::
Lets Begin Talking about the Most Important and The Favorite Part From OPPO X5. i.e The Camera
Selfie Camera ::
A 32 MP Selfie Camera With F2.4 Aperture. This should be very much okay for most users as it can convincingly make good portraits with Decent bokeh effect. The Skin Tones are quite real and theres no artificial bleaching.
The Main Cameras ::
Find X5 relies on Two 50M Sony IMX766, 1/1.56", 1.0µm sensors for its Main and Ultra-wide cameras. Both sensors support multi-directional PDAF, of course. Their lenses are what sets them apart. They use uses a 13MP, 1/3.4" sensor paired with f/2.4 aperture for Telephoto. Thanks to the Hasselblad Tuning and MariSilicon Neural Processing Unit. The Results are outstanding. The Videos Has Pro Mode & 5 Axis Stabilization which almost reduces the Use of the Gimbal and we do have HDR Log Mode to Record video for Greater Post production Compatibility.
I Have been using this Camera From 5AM in the Morning to 1 AM in Midnight and the best part i like about the Camera is Super Fast and Accurate Focus in most Conditions. I Have used it under Various conditions From Harsh Sunrise to Blazing Light Trails
Some Studio Portrait Samples ::
Some Architecture Samples ::
Twilight Samples ::
Long Exposure Samples ::
These Were Mounted on a Tripod.
Some Night Scape Samples ::
Conclusion ::
Overall Im Very Happy with the Phone as My Primary use is Photos,Videos and Social Media and Sometimes Photo Processing and The Phone Does the Job in a Fantastic Manner. If you are Someone who wants a Daily No Nonsense Phone which can Shoot some Wonderful Photos, Then you should Consider Oppo Find X5 or Oppo Find X5 Pro
Regards
Dharma Chandru
Photographer & Tech Entrepreneur Who Represents Around 14 Brands.
Intro Building on the successful of the OPPO Find X3 Pro, OPPO released the new flagship smartphone OPPO Find X5 Pro, it has 2 colors, Ceramic White and Glaze black, I received the White model for the review.
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Build Quality/ DesignOnce glance at it, OPPO Find X5 Pro's back design looks very characteristic, you can easily recognize it from another smartphones. It is one of the most beautiful designed smartphones I have seen, its streamline design feels very natural, compare with glass, the new OPPO Find X5 Pro rear is made of ceramic material which is more gentle, warmer and reliable.
Here is my OPPO Find X5 Pro unboxing video:
Performance/GamingFor today’s mobile phone products, the screen display become more important. OPPO Find X5 Pro’s screen is a 6.7-inch AMOLED panel, very high resolution 1440 x 3216, with this display we can have a good contrast and nice color. And up to 120Hz dynamic refresh rate, this higher refresh rate display makes moving content looks smoother, also makes a big difference when it coming to gaming. when I am playing League of Legends: Wild Rift and Brawl Stars, it can handle very well, and also you hardly to find the rear is hot it because of ceramic material that can maintain effective cooling under game pressure.
League of Legends: Wild Rift
Brawl StarsBest ColorOS FeaturesOPPO Find X5 Pro has a huge range of customization options, I particularly like the Always-On Display function, Adaptive Sleep function and Air Gestures function. For example, I use Air Gestures function to switch the channel when I play TikTok, no need to touch the panel.
Camera ReviewOPPO Find X5 Pro camera system equipped with MariSilicon X chip and co-developed with Hasselblad, as a photographer I will be more expecting the camera performance. The coolest thing is to check out the flagship sensor on triple cameras, wide and ultra-wide with 50 megapixels cameras, telephoto with 13 megapixels camera, so we can have a pretty decent improvement in low light performance and significantly 4k ultra night video.
I've spent two weeks to test the OPPO Find X5 Pro camera performance mainly in 3 situations.
1. To test camera performance in difference period, such as to capture in the daytime, sunset & night.
2. To test camera performance in difference environment, such as to capture in outdoor or indoor.
3. To test camera performance in difference subject, such as landscape, nature and food.
Here are OPPO Find X5 Pro two sample videos took in Singapore,
1. 4K 2160P 60fps Merlion Park day walk:
2. 4K 2160P 60fps Marina Bay night walk:
When you open the camera, you can easily to see a Hasselblad orange shutter button and when you press the shooting button, a Hasselblad shutter sound will be heard.
SLR-Level-5-Axis Image Stabilization
This time OPPO Find X5 Pro comes with a real 5-axis optical image stabilization, this new stabilization technology can occur on 5 different levels and let it reach DSLR-level. If you are using DSLR cameras, you probably know how useful and powerful the 5-axis stabilization is to taking picture or doing videography in low light environment.
It can improve stability, sharpness and color performance, to produces a perfect night photos and videos, even though at the image corners, it also can provide a good quality.
OFF
ONUltra HDR Photography
Usually I will on HDR AUTO setting that phone will detect the environment and use HDR automatically, when I shoot in HDR mode, the camera takes several pictures in quick succession, each having a different exposure value. The phone inside software then merges the images into a single photo.
Compare with non-HDR photo, HDR photo provides sharper details from the darkest and brightest areas.
OFF
ON>> Part 2