(If more than one face is detected in the scene, the field of view is automatically expanded, resulting in a 10 MP output file for group selfies.) About DXOMARK Selfie tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone front camera reviews, DXOMARK engineers capture and evaluate over 1500 test images and more than 2 hours of video both in controlled lab environments and in natural indoor and outdoor scenes, using the camera’s default settings. With a DXOMARK Selfie score of 100, the Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) lands just a few slots below our top-scoring phone. The Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) generally captures properly exposed selfies, even in low-light situations.
Exposure is consistent, though our testers noted occasional underexposure at the 120 cm (selfie-stick) subject test distance. The S21 Ultra’s front camera has accurate and consistent autofocus so there’s no need to compromise between optimal focus for close-up shots and selfie-stick use, as in fixed-focus designs.
The downside is that since depth of field is fairly narrow, faces farther behind the closest subject to the camera may be out of focus. Detail levels are impressive, with the S21 Ultra (Exynos) earning a top-five score in this category as of this writing. Testers also noted that in very low light, a chroma noise artifact can cause reddish areas to appear in the shadows on faces. The S21 Ultra’s display doubles as a flash in low light, but the results are not up to the output of most high-end phones we’ve tested, with haloing around the face, heavy vignetting, and high noise in the background.
Faces are nicely detailed but noise is not evenly distributed as you’d expect it to be in an image with organic background blur. Video performance in particular takes a small step backwards compared to the best 20-series phones we’ve measured, and even comes in below the standard S21 (Exynos).
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) Selfie review: Excellent texture and autofocus
Processor aside, other hardware specs are identical with the Exynos version that’s on sale in the rest of the world, including a 6.8-inch Dynamic AMOLED display with 3200 x 1440 resolution and flexible frame rates up to 120 Hz. Both versions offer S-Pen stylus support and a rear camera with wide, ultra-wide and two tele-lens modules. The front-facing selfie camera isn’t quite as sophisticated, but it still has a few neat tricks up its sleeve. The single 40 MP Quad Bayer sensor pixel bins down to a 10 MP output when multiple faces are detected, but the device will automatically zoom in on single-person selfies to ensure they fill the frame. This digital zoom solution results in a lower resolution 6.5 MP final output. The f/2.2-aperture 80˚ field of view lens offers Phase Detection Autofocus (PDAF), which still isn’t very common on selfie cameras, and can help ensure faces at different distances retain good detail.
Read on to see how the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) performs under the DXOMARK Selfie test protocol. About DXOMARK Selfie tests: For scoring and analysis in our smartphone front camera reviews, DXOMARK engineers capture and evaluate over 1500 test images and more than 2 hours of video both in controlled lab environments and in natural indoor and outdoor scenes, using the camera’s default settings.
While data and products remain fully comparable, you might encounter mentions and references to the previous scores. Pros Accurate and stable white balance in most photos and videos Pleasant skin tone rendering in most photos and videos Well-preserved detail in indoor and outdoor photos and videos
With a DXOMARK Selfie overall score of 99, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) just makes the top ten in our selfie camera rankings, a point behind last year’s Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra 5G (Exynos) on 100. A Photo sub score of 104 for the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) also matches the result achieved by all variants of the S20 and Note20 Ultra, and is only a few points behind our current top device for selfies – the Huawei Mate 40 Pro on 110. The S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) drops down the rankings a little for front camera video however. Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) selfie images capture accurate white balance with pleasant skin tone rendering, fairly extended dynamic range on HDR scenes, and wide depth of field ensures faces at different distances from the camera retain good detail. In our analysis, photos from the front camera produce accurate white balance with natural-looking skin tones in most cases, and dynamic range is fairly wide in high contrast scenes. Texture rendering is also excellent, with fine facial details very well preserved, although at the expense of some luminance noise, which is visible in all images. Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), outdoor scene Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon), crop; excellent detail with some noise Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), outdoor scene Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos), crop; good detail with some noise Apple iPhone 12 Pro, outdoor scene Apple iPhone 12 Pro, crop; slightly lower detail with some noise There are some other minor drawbacks with perhaps the most obvious being the slightly low target exposures in some conditions.
You can see in the example below, that while the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) retains good highlight detail in the clouds and sky on this backlit selfie, the subject’s face is exposed better on the Apple iPhone 12 Pro and S21 Ultra 5G (Exynos) examples. Micro contrast is often better on the Snapdragon version, however, which renders slightly more natural-looking results in HDR scenes compared to the Exynos equivalent.
Accurate and reliable autofocus ensures the target face is always in sharp focus, and we observed no serious failures during our analysis. Particularly in outdoor and indoor selfies, the level of fine detail in faces is high and similar to results from the Exynos version.
As mentioned, depth of field is also fairly extended generally, but when single faces are very close to the camera at around 30cm, the level of background detail isn’t quite as good as devices like the iPhone 12 Pro. Other areas for improvement include luminance noise, which is visible in all S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) selfies, and more ringing artifacts are noticeable on the Snapdragon version compared with the Exynos. Flash results are comparable to the Exynos version, however, and both devices provide accurate exposure on faces towards the center of the frame, with nice skin tone rendering, to ensure the subject is well represented. In portrait mode, bokeh shots from the front camera are very comparable between the Snapdragon and Exynos versions.
Very slight improvements to depth estimation were noted by our testers, but the same abrupt changes in the gradient between the sharp and blurred areas remain evident. Slight depth estimation artifacts are visible, however, and the blur gradient transition is a little more abrupt than we see on the best front cameras for bokeh.
Tested at 4K/30 frames per second, front camera video on the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) displays similar strengths and weaknesses to its stills performance. Video exposure is good, with generally wide dynamic range doing a good job of preserving highlight detail, although low target exposures on faces in bright conditions remain evident and slight exposure instabilities do occur.
Details are well preserved in most videos too, and although things get a little softer in low light conditions you won’t have too many complaints.
Under indoor and low light conditions a little temporal noise is evident, but its fine grain structure ensures is far from offensive and outdoor videos are rendered fairly clean.
The accurate white balance and pleasant skin tones we noted with stills continues, with particularly good color rendering on outdoor and indoor videos from the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon). It’s not quite as good in indoor or low light conditions; where occasional instabilities and out-of-focus movies were observed, and depth of field in videos isn’t quite as extended as we saw in the S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon)’s stills.
Artifacts such as color quantization, flare and anamorphosis are sometimes visible too, and some jello and residual motion effects persist in video captured while walking. Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) outdoor video
Boasting an automatic digital zoom for single-person selfies with a wider field of view for group shots, as well as an autofocus lens, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon) offers the kind of well spec’d front camera you would expect from a top-end flagship.
Results for both photos and video are good, and for the most part the device delivers wide dynamic range, nice color, high detail and accurate autofocus across front camera stills and videos.
There’s no noticeable improvement over the S20 models, while the results between the Exynos version, as well as key competitors including Apple and Google flagships, are comparable. Despite some minor drawbacks, including low-face exposures in bright backlit conditions, visible noise, and abrupt blur transitions in bokeh shots, most users will be content with selfies from the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G (Snapdragon).
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G
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Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra, S21 Plus camera details revealed
As per a video shared by tipster Sakitech on YouTube, the Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra will come with a quad-rear camera setup that is placed inside a vertically stacked rectangular setup. It is expected to be powered by the Qualcomm Snapdragon 875 chipset that is coupled with 12GB of RAM and 128GB of storage space.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra Specs
Specifications are top-notch including Snapdragon 888 chipset, 5G capability, up to 16gigs of RAM, and 512GB of storage.
Samsung Galaxy S21 Ultra 5G — CONNECT-TESTLAB.com
But the image quality is significantly lower, the pictures show less fine detail across all light levels. Apparently, the Nonacell sensor structure with its large blocks of nine makes it difficult to zoom digitally. Samsung installs two telephoto cameras with focal lengths of 70 and 240 millimeters (full-frame values). This is very clever because all zoom levels up to 240 mm would have to be generated digitally by the main camera if only the very long telephoto was available. Although both telephoto modules work with 10-megapixel sensors, you get JPEGs with 12 megapixels – so the data is moderately upsampled. A 240 mm telephoto (full-frame value) in a smartphone is impressive, but shows its pitfalls in practice.
This in turn leads to more camera shake or forces a higher ISO sensitivity, which causes more noise and swallows up details. In the lab, the telephoto with 4.9/31 mm shows a lower detail resolution than the other cameras even in high light. The module does not adequately reproduce many structures at the level of a 10 MP sensor, even under favorable conditions.
The camera does not reach the quality level of Huawei’s Mate 40 Pro, but it can completely convince overall.
When the light decreases, the signal processing still ensures sharp edges, but the image becomes less clear and the noise reduction algorithms destroy fine structures.
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