The Google Pixel 2 and Pixel 2 XL are released this month with the brand promising that it will have ‘the best smartphone camera, again.’ This announcement repeats their promise last year with the release of the Pixel and Pixel XL. But, if early reviews are anything to go by, the global corporation just might live up to their promise.
Image quality rating company DxOMark gave the new camera an overall score of 98, which is the highest it has given to any smartphone camera. The high rating has got a lot of people excited but will the smartphone live up to this and can it pose a serious challenge to the iPhone 8, 8 Plus and X? This video feature from Google employee Nat, of YouTube channel Nat and Friends, takes you through what’s going on with the camera.
What are the specifications?
The specifications show that while the rear camera remains at 12 megapixels, it will have a wider f/1.8 aperture to compensate for smaller pixels at 1.4μm. The front in comparison will have eight megapixels and a f/2.4 aperture.
The Pixel 2 will also allow video recording at 4K at 30fps and 1080p at 30fps, 60fps and 120fps. A lot of work has been done to improve footage quality as well, with promised image stabilisation to eliminate shaky footage
Credit: Google
One of the interesting features of the camera revealed in the short video is that it contains six shaped lenses layered to help with image distortion. Computational photography team lead Marc Levoy explained: “They have very strange shapes, they’ve got weird ‘w’s in them and so on because you’re trying to correct for what are called aberrations, which distort the image in a very small amount of space.”
Depth-of-field
The Google team have also introduced a feature called portrait mode, which recreates depth-of-field by identifying the focus of the camera and blurring the rest of the picture. This is similar to the new iPhone portrait feature but without using dual cameras to achieve it.
The company also claims that the Pixel 2 will allow HDR+ photos as well as improving camera capabilities in low light performance.
After a summer of big announcements from Apple, only time will tell if the Google Pixel 2 will outshine its rival in the camera department.
