I cleaned up Annalisa‘s photography closet and gathered all the old lenses and camera bodies she doesn’t use anymore. I then pulled out my cell phone to answer a phone call and started wondering – just how good have smart phone cameras gotten? How does a new phone’s camera compare to old SLRs?
I know on the last phone I had, it wouldn’t be close. But this new phone takes REALLY good pics.
So for kicks and giggles, I chose two locations and I took all pics using a wide angle lens on the camera bodies to try to match the fixed wide angle lens on the Samsung phone.
I’ll admit, it wasn’t a very controlled experiment, focus with the SLRs was probably off a bit, I didn’t really pay attention to aperture, plus on the 1d, I should have zoomed in a bit more. But, the point is, modern phones are pretty awesome, even if it’s against old SLRs. The photo that shows it best is the photo with the flowers – the color reproduction is SO nuanced. The macro on the phone is pretty amazing. The phone does over-sharpen detailed areas and can make things look too busy. But I was blown away overall after looking at the comparisons.
The Achilles heel for the phone is photographing people and it’s because of its fixed wide angle lens. You shouldn’t use a wide angle lens to photograph people and the Samsung is very wide on both front and rear cameras.
If manufactures threw a zoom on the phone’s camera, you could easily toss all the point-and-shoots and it could even give SLRs a run for the money for most people.
