Gadgetory

we're looking at the next stage of camera improvements for huawei partnered with Leica in producing dual sensor cameras for phones the p10 plus follows on the heels of the mate 9 with similar sensors software and specs these are some of our favorite shooters especially for creating photographic stool images so should the P in p10 stand for progress buckle up folks we have a lot of ground to cover and I'm going to move pretty quick the p10 plus represents evolution bringing mate features to the more fashionable line of Huawei phones specifically for the camera the plus shares the same sensors same megapixels and mostly the same feature set the single Hardware improvement over the mate and smaller p10 camera are wider apertures now opens to F 1.8 up from F 2.2 which we've seen since the p9 starting off with exposure in saturation Huawei is subtly but noticeably pushing into more i pleasing territory over the mate nine similar setups deliver a bit more saturation this is gorgeous for greens blues and earth tones but can sometimes be an issue with warmer colors most phones have issues with reds for example and the plus is no exception pushing brightness and color to a point where these flowers start to sizzle the built-in tools to reduce saturation or somewhat severe instead dialing back the exposure a half stop does more to preserve detail and arrive at a more accurate color with wider apertures metering becomes a bit more important letting the phone decide produces more clipped highlights than we would prefer but tapping on the center of this flower to engage the spot metering balances the brightness out better in delivering more eye candy the plus airs warmer with white balance than previous Huawei's in warm California light we can expect a bit more of a glow in afternoon shots and shaded shots avoid the trap of arriving too blue like the increase in saturation it's not always the most accurate but it's not overly aggressive or destructive happily these cameras still deliver terrific dynamic range purposely over exposing a shot by two stops and taking the raw file we can easily walk that back to recover not only all the texture in the walls but also most of the detail in the clouds shooting raw is an excellent safety net and the p10 plus delivers top-tier performance here looking at JPEGs this dual sensor approach has a lot of Merit instead of two separate cameras every single photo these sensors work in tandem to capture more light and paint in more detail like as design here produces still images unlike any other phone we've reviewed and even in high contrast situations detail and clarity are wonderfully captured it's a shame most people share photos through heavily compressed services like Instagram as the full resolution shots can be stunning taking a quick tour around the app layout is very similar to the main nine the main composition window is well featured and gestures slide to the left for various modes like panoramas slow-motion in HDR sliding to the right lands you in menus and settings this is a phenomenal attempt at turning a phone into a rangefinder camera and users have tremendous control over photo output video settings are a bit lacking compared to the current champ LGV 20 and the p10 + looses the directional microphones found on the may 9 but the biggest issue facing consumers is navigating this app there's a lot of stuff to control so there's a bit of muscle memory to train in remembering where all of these settings live and we still run into a few control frustrations like disabling the zoom when shooting raw maybe instead this pop-up should alert the user that raw is disabled when zooming but still allow the user to perform the action they wanted - just a thought but I digress and speaking of that zoom the plus employs the same over sampling trick to create a full resolution photo from a crop on the image sensor it works well enough getting you closer to your subject but users should still expect some image degradation huawei's dual sensor solution isn't like apple or LG's with different focal length lenses so we don't see any advantages when changing the field of view close focusing distances on par with other flagships we get a really pretty bouquet when working at macro distances when looking at the difference in aperture size the plus produces slightly softer backgrounds but the differences between the plus and the mate 9 or the smaller P 10 will be difficult to distinguish even when really digging into some pixel peeping especially when considering the very good software blur mode bouquet on the plus isn't a significant advantage when discussing image sensors this for folks who want more info we produced a separate video last year where we compared the p9 with F 2.2 apertures against the galaxy s7 with an F 1.7 aperture for a more in-depth look at smartphone aperture and vogue a blur which is linked down below this video now a happy improvement over the mate 9ro focus performance is noticeably improved there's still a pulse as the lens shifts but the focus lock arrives faster even when shooting video it's not a pretty slide into focus so you shouldn't expect a rack focus effect but it's snappy and it's accurate Huawei also takes another step towards improving HDR content most androids treat HDR like a shadow brightening mode and all too often this kills highlights but we see some improvements here over previous phones in not overly boosting bright sections of your frame for a phone which already excels at producing contrast II images these HDR improvements can help balance out some high contrast situations but panorama performance is still just upper mid pack carefully scanning the street scene we see a number of stitching errors in the power lines depending on how busy your shot is exercising more care and rotating your phone can help but we're all just going to own 360 degree cameras anyway right no just me okay now I hate taking selfies but the shooter on the p10 is better than average a lot better than average now also branded as a Leica camera output is solid and the beauty mode filtering has been enhanced to include bouquet filtering and better odo mode skin blurring a video from this front shooter is also more than adequate for sending a fun message or doing some light vlogging all in all a very nice effort from Huawei for my least-favorite phone photography feature now moving to low-light the increased aperture size did not drastically change background blur and my prediction was we'd only see modest improvements to low-light performance and that's where I was wrong the wider iris for the lens lets in enough light for us to see lower ISO settings and faster shutter speeds for similar exposures the plus is easily capable of producing brighter images with less noise per exposure than the smaller p10 night shots are colorful lively and really showcase light cos Street and candid photography heritage as a point of discussion many people have criticized the output from Huawei phones as being too grainy which is actually a feature and not a bug like engineers have consistently pointed to a little grain as one of their methods for making phone output feel more like film it's not always the prettiest when pixel peeping but you shouldn't be doing that anyway shame on you look at the whole composition this is purely a subjective assessment but personally I feel this texture helps create an organic sense of action or movement that this moment was alive frozen in an instant in this image the practical side of this discussion not allowing the little extra grain to remain means we aren't hitting photos too hard with noise reduction tools that can blur out detail or create watercolor like splotchy photos the plaza also features a dedicated monochrome mode using that secondary sensor that you can see the perspective switch from the RGB to the black-and-white camera monochrome is a captivating way to see the world in capture images so including a dedicated sensor just to capture these shots fits right in with like as imaging history if phones are going to replace standalone cameras for most consumers always going to make sure you're well prepared for nearly any photography situation shifting over to moving images the Mait 9 in Ultra HD video for huawei the p10 continues that though it's difficult to see any significant improvements over last year's phone this camera produces a very high quality video though when handheld it's a busy image where we can easily see hand movements on the whole video exposure and saturation will closely resemble still photo performance but only the RGB sensor is used so video won't have the same textural quality of still photos it should be reiterated that this system shoots UHD video using H at 265 compression this means we arrive at final sizes nearly 30 percent smaller than the UHD video produced by an iPhone 7 but Google does not currently support this video codec because of licensing issues h.265 is a boon for file sizes and bandwidth but it's frustrating that google photos won't alert you that your videos are not being backed up again google's oversight here so h.265 is a bitch here to work with but every format shift comes with some kind of teething pain we have a separate video also linked below this review for folks interested in how they can edit or upload these videos and now we can move on in video we can also take a better look at stabilization it's terrific for still photos but video looks busier than many competing devices taking down to HD video we can also employ software stabilization but the combination of lens warping hardware and software scanning produces an unsettling pulse to video output which is more destructive in my opinion than just dealing with the slightly shaky er Hardware only stabilization plus once you get used to UHD video this 1080p output just feels dull and lifeless the p10 does not inherit the directional microphone array from the may 9 but these mics are still terrific performers handling wind and traffic noise above our freeway test well enough falling behind HTC and LG Huawei has a performer easily capable of running with Samsung's and iPhones lastly looking at slow motion Huawei captures a respectable 120 frames per second video but converting it to slow motion in the phone we lose a ton of data reducing overall quality substantially it's a shame we go from a 40 megabit per second video to 5 megabit per second video if you can edit the raw video directly say from a computer you'll end up with a nicer image so let's wrap this up where does that leave us with the cameras on the fall way p10 plus in our review of the phone we offered the prediction that there wouldn't be a significant difference in overall performance between the p10 and the p10 plus on the whole we were correct these sensors are too small to see a tremendous difference in bulk ik but we were pleasantly surprised to see a more significant change to low-light performance the mate 9 wasn't a low-light slouch but the P 10 plus is now a top-tier night performer Huawei remains one of our top recommendations for still photographers this is exceptional performance with incredible controls moving beyond just trying to impress consumers with Auto processing flashy saturation or increasingly juicy HDR settings this is now a worthy platform for composition and near professional results if we can't get phones with larger image sensors Huawei's dual sensor approach is the next best thing where there's room for improvement is on video performance where this phone becomes an upper mid pack performer great video quality at smaller file sizes but we'd appreciate more manual controls a return to the directional microphone array and smoother stabilization folks this is an easy recommendation and it's an early frontrunner to make our end of your best camera list likely its toughest competition will come from whatever Huawei releases in the next mate as always thanks so much for watching be sure to subscribe to the channel for our full p10 cover including reviews in comparisons of both phones and help us out with some sharing on your favorite social networks for pocket now I'm Juan Carlos bag now author of take better photos smartphone photography for noobs aka some gadget guy on Twitter and Instagram and I will catch you all on the next review