Category
đŸ¤–
TechTranscript
00:00In this video we invade Fred the cat's personal space, I look like I've seen and
00:04actually maybe I'm a ghost and I walk around in the rain at night holding two
00:08phones side-by-side while definitely not looking creepy at all.
00:13Hey guys I'm Tom the Tech Jap and I've got the new Galaxy S21 Ultra with me here
00:17along with the iPhone 12 Pro Max and I want to figure out which phone has the
00:22best camera. So I've got my laptop with me here I'm just gonna walk through and
00:26give you my analysis of the photos I've taken but I also want to hear what you
00:30guys think. Do you agree with me? Do you think I've completely missed the mark
00:33and I could be more blind? Either way let me know in the comments below and also
00:37if you haven't subscribed yet and you check below I'm like right on that 1
00:41million mark. It could be you actually that tips me over. Hit that subscribe
00:45button it'd be hugely appreciated and hopefully we can hit that 1 million.
00:48And as you can see I want to start with a blind test. Can you tell the difference?
00:53Do you know which is which and also do you have a preference? Let me know in the
00:56comments. To be honest I reckon you guys have probably got this right but I can
01:00tell you that on the left photo A is the S21 Ultra with the iPhone 12 Pro Max on
01:05the right. So let's go through the different lenses and if we start with
01:09the ultra-wide then switching to the main lens so now we're at 1x
01:12essentially. Now let's move up to 3x zoom and on the iPhone we actually get
01:16a 2.5x optical so this is going to its maximum optical zoom and then
01:22cropping in a little bit to the 3x but then this is where things get
01:24interesting moving up to 10x so now this is taking full advantage of the
01:29S21 Ultra's new periscope zoom and what a difference I mean even in the
01:33foreground actually look at the bushes the trees there's a significant
01:36difference in quality. Moving up to 30x zoom so this is actually the 12.5x
01:42max digital zoom of the iPhone cropped in further to 30x. What a
01:46difference. You can even see the people on the S21's shot which just don't
01:51appear at all on the iPhone. I took these the exact same time side-by-side
01:54and then finally at a hundred times well they're both kind of bad actually but
01:59one is a lot worse than the other. Okay this time back in my kitchen let's go
02:04through the zooms one more time and again we are getting that quite
02:07significant difference in contrast between the two. Samsung say that they've
02:11increased the contrast by 50% with the S21 Ultra which is a bit vague I mean
02:15from what what the numbers there but clearly you can see the iPhone's got a
02:19flatter look. Up to 10x and the S21's doing a fantastic job. The clarity of
02:24this blue microphone is well significantly better than the iPhone and
02:28even at 30x there's bits of noise and artifacting it doesn't look as clean but
02:32yeah side-by-side no competition really and finally 100x this is actually
02:38probably only five meters from me or so so this is very zoomed in at a hundred
02:41times but yeah I think the difference speaks for itself. So there's no question
02:45really when it comes to zooming in the S21 Ultra is the clear winner. But let's
02:50talk a little bit more about image quality generally. No edits or filters
02:53I've not adjusted any of these photos it's fresh out of the camera but look at
02:57the difference in the colors particularly the grass and again I would
03:00say the S21 is closer to reality so it's a question of whether you want accuracy
03:05or vibrancy. It's interesting because with this flower photo and if I just
03:09quickly jump ahead to this close-up of the petal is that we call it the flower
03:14petal the flower itself that difference of contrast does give you a well a very
03:18different look for a start but the advantage on the iPhone is that you do
03:21have more information more detail in those darker areas so if you look say at
03:25the top of the vase you are seeing a fair bit more on the iPhone so if you
03:28are going to edit this afterwards you may have sort of more information to
03:31work with again quite a difference in color and contrast. This is a tricky one
03:36because straight off the bat I'm kind of leaning towards preferring the S21 it
03:41just feels like a more realistic photo again we've got that much brighter look
03:45on the iPhone but actually if we, Sarah's gonna hate me for this, but if we zoom in
03:49on her face the iPhone is a fair bit sharper. This isn't portrait mode it's
03:52just a regular photo but we saw that with that initial blind test portrait
03:57mode where again Sarah's features the facial features were just a little bit
04:01clearer but then switching it to a portrait mode photo same distance away
04:05but there's this clear pattern emerging of iPhone is brighter and flatter versus
04:09a more shadowy contrast a slightly cooler look on the S21 Ultra but
04:14looking at these and also if we just move on to a picture of me which one do
04:18you prefer because a lot of this is going to come down to your subjective
04:21preference aesthetics do you prefer in a bright and airy Instagram ready or do
04:26you want a more sort of darker realistic contrasting look? I'd generally love to
04:30hear your thoughts so do let me know along the way what you think in the
04:33comments. I think if this video has taught me nothing else it's that I
04:37really could do with a tan although sadly it's not very likely in the middle
04:41of winter here in England
04:51so we established the S21 Ultra is the king of the zoom but it's also the best
04:57when it comes to close-up macro shots just look at this photo these are taken
05:01side-by-side exactly the same distance away from the top of my Yeti blue
05:06microphone so you can get idea of what this is and it's such a difference if I
05:10just put my hand in front of the lens you can see automatically switching
05:14between them so now we can get much closer more macro shots now you can turn
05:20that off you can just tap a little yellow focus enhancer if you don't want
05:23it to keep switching when you're close up to a subject to be honest with you
05:26I'm not sure how often I would actually use the macro myself but it's a nice
05:30option to have and I think paired with the incredibly impressive zoom with this
05:33guy I reckon the S21 Ultra is the most versatile camera okay let's switch gears
05:38a little bit and look at some low-light nighttime shots and on the face of it
05:42there's not a massive difference between the two photos the colors on the iPhone
05:46are a little bit warmer if you look at the walls in the background or indeed
05:49the floor under my desk but I think what really stands out is if you look at my
05:53light strip behind the desk and also my monitor itself the S21 is doing a much
05:58better job with a dynamic range reducing the highlights and the blown out areas
06:02on the screen and behind the desk they're both pretty good though but
06:05actually another little minor thing I've noticed is that the S21 Ultra has a
06:08slightly wider field of view if you go from the back of my chair on the far
06:12right to the left hand side of those shelves you can see we're getting more
06:15in the frame with the S21
06:26oh man I hate this photo so much but it is a good demonstration of how different
06:32these can be straight away I am drawn to the iPhone which is much brighter versus
06:37the more contrasty darker and cooler look of the S21 but if I was gonna pick
06:41my favorite and maybe even post one straight away onto my social media I
06:45would probably go with the iPhone here this is actually another good example of
06:49how well the S21 deals with a dynamic range I'm not even sure what you call
06:53those things in the middle of the road they're sort of median things but you
06:57can see on the S21 again it's done a much better job at reducing that really
07:01overexposed highlight whereas on the iPhone the left one in particular is
07:05just well completely blown out
07:13okay let's switch things around and look at the front selfie camera I must admit
07:18while the iPhone looks slightly more appealing because again it's much
07:20brighter it's raised all those shadows I kind of like the more shadowy realistic
07:25look of the S21 Ultra I think a lot of this is going to come down to your
07:29personal preference and which kind of aesthetic you prefer now this one's
07:33really interesting because I actually took this selfie in direct sunlight so
07:37it was really really bright on my face you can't see the background in the
07:40iPhone shot that it's much brighter and everything is better exposed but then my
07:44face is completely washed out and lacking in detail okay this is the last
07:48photo I promise before we look at some video and I think there's a definite
07:52pattern here with the photography the iPhone goes for a slightly brighter
07:55flatter warmer and arguably more pleasing look whereas the S21 Ultra is
08:00consistently a little bit more contrasty more shadows and also a cooler color
08:04temperature let's talk about video and this is being shot at 4k 30 on both
08:10side-by-side and this is Fred the cat here who is a very kindly letting me
08:14film him although he usually hates the camera being thrown in his face and it's
08:18interesting to see the stabilization between the two because the iPhone 12
08:21max specifically does stand out thanks to its sensor shift stabilization so we
08:26should be looking for a slightly smoother video on the iPhone but in this
08:30good light I can't tell a massive difference
08:40however at night things are a little bit different and you can see while neither
08:45are flawless the iPhone does a much better job at reducing those horrible
08:50vibrations that you get with my footsteps and surprisingly a bit of a
08:56reverse of what we saw with the photos the iPhone seems to be handling the very
08:59bright streetlights and again those weird median road things much better
09:03than the galaxy so for this test Sarah is very kindly modeling for me but I
09:14kind of want to see how they compare when it comes to focusing one of the new
09:18features of the iPhone 12 pro max is the LiDAR which should in theory
09:24especially in low-light help with focusing so hopefully that gives you an
09:27idea how they compare when it comes to focusing in tricky lighting thank you
09:32Sarah well what about front-facing video and also microphone quality so this is
09:38actually being shot with the front cameras at 4k 30 I'm also jumping
09:42between the mics you can still speaker icon on screen and as I pan around we
09:47change the lighting this is actually behind the scenes of where I've been
09:50filming this video hopefully it'll give you an idea of how the cameras compare
09:55so if I just keep rabbiting on for a little bit longer I'm about to hit a
09:59million subscribers actually so if you guys haven't subscribed yet you may be
10:02the one that tips me over the edge so one hit a little subscribe button down
10:06below it would be very much appreciated but I also need to figure out what I'm
10:09gonna do to celebrate 1 million subscribers that's pretty insane but
10:13yeah let me know which one you think has the better camera and the better mic in
10:17the comments below so that's the main stuff but each one has a couple of
10:20little extras for example on the Samsung we get 8k video still at 24 FPS but if
10:26you want that super super duper high resolution you can and one of the
10:30benefits of that is you can then pull out 33 megapixel screenshots so you
10:35could just record yourself for a while and then take a screen grab and you've
10:38got a nice high quality picture so that is quite nice extra also on the iPhone
10:42with this for the first time on the 12 series including the Pro Max here we can
10:46shoot in Dolby Vision HDR which is quite nice and actually watching it back
10:50on the screen is beautiful although make sure if you're gonna share it with
10:53anyone else that they also have a compatible screen or TV or laptop that
10:57supports Dolby Vision another advantage of the LiDAR aside from helping with
11:02low-light focusing is you get better augmented reality and 3d measuring now
11:07I'm not sure how often people will actually use this but if you are using
11:10one of these 3d mapping apps then you can get some pretty cool results that
11:16was a lot to take in and also I think my voice is getting a bit horsey but my
11:19conclusion from that I think the S21 Ultra is the most flexible camera and I
11:24think I would also call it a tie when it comes to photography they're just
11:27different and I don't think one is really always better than the other they
11:31trade blows they're both excellent you can't go wrong with either if I had to
11:34pick one for photos I would probably go with the Samsung just because I kind of
11:38like the more true-to-life accurate even if it's less flattering look of the
11:43images but when it comes to video I think I probably go with the iPhone but
11:47most importantly which one do you think it came out on top and why let me know
11:51in the comments below and if you did enjoy this video and want to see more
11:54from me and also help me get over that 1 million subscriber mark don't forget to
11:57hit that sub button below give me a thumbs up if you liked it and I'll see
12:00you next time right here on the tech channel