Mobile photography reaches new heights, actual test of Huawei Mate 20 Pro camera

With the strong performance of the P20 Pro in the first half of the year, how high the Huawei Mate 20 Pro’s photography can reach should be the question that everyone is most concerned about.

From a hardware perspective, Huawei Mate 20 Pro basically continues the configuration of the P20 Pro, which is still a combination of three cameras arranged in a matrix. This design pays homage to Porsche's classic four-eye headlights. More importantly, this layout will better reduce the viewing angle difference between each lens, and is more friendly to zoom and ISP processing.

Going back to the specific parameters of the camera, the main camera of Huawei Mate 20 Pro is a 40-megapixel camera with a large f/1.8 aperture, using a 1/1.7-inch Sony IMX600 sensor, and an equivalent focal length of 27mm; The telephoto secondary camera also retains the same 8-megapixel camera as before, with f/2.4 aperture, equivalent focal length of 80mm, and supports OIS.

As for the 20-megapixel black-and-white camera on the P20 Pro, the Mate 20 Pro has been replaced with a 20-megapixel color ultra-wide-angle camera, f/2.2 aperture, and 16mm equivalent focal length.

Starting from Huawei P9, black and white cameras have been standard equipment of Huawei’s flagship series, used to capture more light, dark and detailed information and assist in main camera imaging. However, with the addition of outsole photosensitive elements and the introduction of AI algorithms, the role of this black and white camera has been significantly weakened. In comparison, consumers expect more focal lengths to adapt to more shooting scenes, so the Mate 20 Pro changed the original 20-megapixel black and white camera to the current 20-megapixel color ultra-wide-angle camera.

And this camera is called super wide-angle, but its actual function is far more than shooting a wide angle.

Equivalent to a 16mm lens, wide-angle and macro can be grasped with one hand

Ultra-wide-angle lenses have precedents in the field of mobile phone photography, but most of them use the principle of "hyperfocal distance", which will The focus is locked at infinity, so that the scenery behind a certain distance can be imaged relatively clearly, thus eliminating the need for an autofocus module (point-and-shoot cameras take pictures directly without focusing, and this principle is also used). After all, in the perception of ordinary users, the role of a wide-angle lens is to "photograph distant scenery." The hyperfocal length solution cleverly caters to this need and is low-cost.

But Huawei obviously thinks more. It has added an autofocus module to this 16mm equivalent lens. It recently supports 2.5cm focus and developed a super macro function based on the original ultra-wide angle. .

From the actual effect, the 16mm equivalent lens can express a relatively wide scene in a narrow space, with extremely strong picture tension, and is suitable for shooting large scenes such as landscapes and buildings.

Super macro is a function that subverts the existing cognition. Under this lens, details that are far beyond what can be observed with the naked eye are presented one by one, such as the pattern of insect wings and the traces of delicate The stamens are astonishingly detailed. You will definitely fall in love with it when you use it for the first time. You can even take photos of a common RMB for half a day because the details are so rich.

Leica triple camera, the strongest lossless zoom

Based on three cameras with different specifications, Huawei Mate 20 Pro supports 3x optical zoom and 5x hybrid zoom, of which optical zoom It is based on the 8-megapixel telephoto lens, while the hybrid zoom is based on high-pixel cropping and algorithm support. Both can provide rich details and give creators richer choices in composition. .

Since the telephoto lens is more sensitive to shake, the Mate 20 Pro is equipped with OIS optical image stabilization on the 3x telephoto lens to ensure image quality. As for the 5x hybrid change, the user is required to maintain the hand posture for a short period of time to improve the details of the picture.

In this set of sample photos, Mate 20 Pro still has fine picture quality under 5x hybrid zoom, and the text on the brand is clearly visible, far exceeding the digital zoom quality of ordinary mobile phones.

Optimize Super Night Scene, with more harmonious color details

Super Night Scene is the most amazing feature on P20 Pro. Its essence is to continuously take multiple photos with different exposure parameters, and then use AI to The algorithm identifies and aligns the objects in it to offset the image shift caused by jitter during the shooting process, and then stacks and synthesizes a clear, clean, and high dynamic range night scene photo.

On the Mate 20 Pro, this feature has been further optimized and is supported by all three cameras. Compared with the early problems of the P20 Pro, which caused the picture to be dry and distorted due to over-sharpening, it has been improved. And due to the advantage of the main camera IMX600 itself being “one level larger”, the Mate 20 Pro’s night photography is definitely at the top level in terms of color, detail and tolerance.

AI support makes shooting artistic blockbusters easier

Huawei Mate 20 Pro supports AI scene recognition, which can instantly identify the subject of the picture and make targeted styles and parameters during imaging settings to improve the final film effect.

For example, when shooting a blue sky, the camera will adjust the saturation of the blue to reflect a sense of comfort; when shooting food, the camera will adjust the color to be more saturated and rich to reflect the deliciousness of the food; when shooting a night scene, the camera will turn on the super night scene mode. Brightening and noise reduction.

It can be said that with the help of AI, Mate 20 Pro has further lowered the threshold for the public to shoot blockbusters, such as the following samples.

At the same time, based on the improvement in computing power of the dual-core NPU, Mate 20 Pro can realize the leap from static recognition to dynamic recognition, and can recognize dynamic human bodies in real time. It is precisely for this reason that Mate 20 Pro has added an AI portrait color retention function, which can recognize portraits in real time when shooting videos, and only retains the color of the portrait in the video, while the background is uniformly rendered in black and white, creating a very stylish video.

At the same time, Mate 20 Pro also supports AI video editing function. Users can intelligently search for the protagonist in the film they have shot, perform intelligent editing, and generate a new protagonist story video, customized for the people they follow. Blockbusters are definitely a tool for collecting likes in social circles.

To sum up, the imaging of Mate 20 Pro has been further improved on the basis of P20 Pro. The focal length coverage is wider, and it can handle multiple scenes easily. The performance in macro is amazing, and it represents the best performance at present. Strong mobile phone camera capabilities.