I’ve been using Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra for nearly a year — 5 camera upgrades the Galaxy S24 Ultra needs

[admin]

After using the Galaxy S23 Ultra since it came out, our phones editor has found five ways Samsung could make the cameras on nexy year's Galaxy S24 Ultra even better. And hardware is just part of the equation.

I’ve been using Samsung Galaxy S23 Ultra for nearly a year — 5 camera upgrades the Galaxy S24 Ultra needs : Read more

 

[mhartman.art]

I completely agree on the LOG profile. When Samsung released its own cameras, like the NX line, (since discontinued) it offered users to essentially dial in a flatter LOG-type profile, but it never offered a dedicated Samsung LOG profile that could be recognized in editing software like Vlog, Slog, Clog, etc.

What this tells me is that while Samsung is capable of and already understands the use of flat profiles and how some users definitely do desire that in their workflow, it historically has never been a focus point for the imaging sector of their company, even when they produced pro-level DSLMs, that at the time were a force to reckon with. Then again, this was some years back, 2013-16, and since the reigns of the division have new blood at the helm. And obviously the technology and demand evolves over time. So who knows?

One thing I have noticed is that if you bring in your S23U HDR-10 footage into DaVinci Resolve, it does in fact come in with a "flat" profile, reminding me of the Gen 4 film curve from BMD cams. So the videos you're watching on your S23U that you shot on your S23U in HDR10 are getting a viewable Rec709 (or Rec2020) conversion LUT automatically applied to them so you're not viewing the natively flat version, but it appears to be baked with a flat profile of sorts.

I also shoot pro video. I've been impressed with Samsung's native "Pro Mode" photo and video features. The app gives you a ton of manual control, a histogram, focus peaking, composition guides and a level. That's impressive for a native camera app.

I do agree Samsung needs to take the next logical step and offer a dedicated LOG profile to compete with iPhone's prores/LOG via the new BMD's camera app and obviously Filmic Pro. The color bit depth is there. Just develop and enable it. It's a little nerve racking. Samsung has the goods and smarts to compete here, I'm just not sure they have the will, especially judging from past indicators. This is not a mainstream feature many people would even know to want. General users would see the flat profile image and think their camera is "broken".

 

[sonopil]

While I agree with your article, I would prefer some more QoL upgrades for the Samsung cameras. One thing that I've seen Apple do really well is switching inbetween cameras while recording video. I have noticed that on my S23U, once I start recording in 1x zoom in the native camera app, I am basically locked into using that sensor without the phone being able to switch between them (e.g. going from 1x to 0.6x).
While it is entirely possible that there is a option for this buried somewhere in the settings, I would prefer that it could do it innately, with an option to disable this.
Interestingly enough, Snapchat and such media apps have this feature integrated, where I can record a video and visibly see the image shift as it goes from the 1x sensor to the 3x and subsequently the 10x while zooming.