Samsung Galaxy S7 vs. Samsung Galaxy S5 Camera

I recently upgraded to a Samsung S7 phone from a Samsung S5 phone.  My S5 was getting a little long in the tooth - falling apart, I changed the body once, the screen twice, and the camera lens cover, the back battery cover several times and the accelerometer died on it recently as well so taking landscape photos I would have to manually rotate them.  It was time.
There has been high praise for the S7 camera, most people saying that it is one of the bast, if not the best cameras on a cell phone as of today, and this was really the major contributor in me wanting to get a new phone.  I really wanted the S7 active and not a regular S7, since it has 33% larger battery, some built in protection for dropping, but for some reason Samsung decided to make it not only a carrier specific phone (AT&T, but a country specific phone, meaning it it not available in Canada.  This wouldn't be a big deal - I could buy one off of ebay and unlock it, but the cost is prohibitive.  A new one is about 700-800 dollars due to the CAD horrible exchange rate for a new-ish phoine, and because of Ebays lame Global Shipping program, it meant I'd pay another 150 dollars or more for duty, shipping, etc.
I found a barely used S7 on Kijiji for 450 dollars and jumped at the chance.

The camera simply blows me away.  It is eons beyond my two and a half year old Samsung Galaxy S5.  Gone are the days of grainy out of focus photos almost all cell phones were plagued with 5 years ago, even in good light.  In good light all cell phone cameras take good photos, but low light has always been a challenge.

 Low Light Performance
The Samsung S5 is a decent performing camera in bright light,   Low light left something to be desired.   Even in moderately lit situations such as a pub, the photos are grainy and the camera need to be held completely still.  With the dual pixel camera, and F1.7 lens in the S7 just amazes me in low light. The live view of the camera can actually see brighter than my eyes can - it's always been the other way around.  Compare these two photos and the difference is obvious.

















S7                                                                                                                                                        S5

Autofocus
Autofocus is slow on the S5 and it has a hard time with macro focus, not being able to focus on some things that are a foot or two away.  The S7 does not have any problems.  The autofocus is lightning fast on the S7 compared to the S5. 

Pro Mode

This is my first cell phone, and also one of the first available that you can manually control the ISO, shutter speed and focus if you wish to do so in Pro Mode.  It also shows you the autofocus points in the frame.  And, as well, it has the option to save as a RAW file!  Photographers know that RAW mode gives you more control in post editing, especially when it comes to white balance adjustment. 

Wider Angle
I sometimes struggle to get subjects in view with the S5, especially tight indoor scenes and landscapes, but the S7 has a much wider view. See above photos for comparison.

Ease of Access to Camera
Another plus on the S7 camera is the speed it takes to get to the camera taking mode.  Just a double tap on the home key brings up the camera.  I've missed many good opportunities with my S5 in the time it takes to access the camera, even with the swipe to open camera option on it.

Fast Charging
This phone charges ridiculously fast..  another great plus.  Many times I was just about to run out of the house with my S5 but found the battery wasn't charged, and the charging on this phone takes significantly longer than the S7.  Just plug the S7 into a fast charger for a quick top up in a few minutes and it is good to go.


Other Things and some Negatives
The processor speed is very noticeable quicker on the S7 which is great.
There are a few other funky features that I have yet to play with such as motion photo which captures video before you take a photo, slow mo, hyperlapse that the S5 does not have.

 But, everything isn't all roses with the S7.. there are some negative things I don't like about it.
I do not really like the glass back cover on this thing - it's just looking to get broken.  This is an overreaction by Samsung to the whiners complaining of the plastic on the S5, so they went overboard on trying to make the phone feel like a premium phone.  I don't really like putting my phone in a case to make it more bulky and collect dust - typically I only put a glass screen protector on it to save the real screen from scratches.
The S7 is also horrible for repairability compared to the S5.  I changed a screen and the body myself on the S5 and I don't think I'll be trying that on the S7 - to do repair anything, you have to heat the back cover up to soften the adhesive and pull the back off with a suction cup and use guitar picks to pry it off.   It would be nice to be able to change the battery, since 2 years from now, the battery capacity will have degraded enough to be noticeable, as all batteries do.  On the S5, I simply swapped the battery.

Summary
Some great upgrades with just the camera itself make this phone a must-have upgrade in my books if you like photography, along with the speed of the new processor and memory, but be careful with it!

Photography Challenge - Shooting Boxing Match

I had the opportunity to shoot a Muay Thai boxing match my friend Jon organized last weekend.  It was a great opportunity and challenge any photographer would benefit from.  It really is hard to think of more challenging circumstances to shoot in – very low light, very fast action and no flash.  The standard for boxing match is no flash as it is likely to distract the boxers, although many audience members don’t have the forethought or etiquette to follow this. 

It was my second time photographing a boxing match and I learned a great deal, which I can share here, hopefully for others’ enlightenment. I borrowed my friend’s D600 body and brought my own, with one lens on each.  For up close and personal shots, I was primarily using my 50mm F/1.4 G lens, and for wide angle I had my 14-24mm F/2.8 lens.  Both work brilliantly as they can in these circumstances. 

The 50mm is almost perfect focal length for most close shots in the ring.  I debated dropping 3 grand on a 24-80 f/2.8 lens but decided better of it before and didn’t miss the zoom at all.  The F/1.4 is obviously to get as much light as possible, and even then it was still pushing it quite a bit.  I set my camera on AF-C continuous autofocus, shutter priority, not focus priority so the camera fires regardless of whether I had obtained autofocus or not when I pressed the shutter. I set the AF pattern to d9, nine point focus.  I also set it to shutter priority at 1/400 of a second to have crisp enough shots for the elusive glove-in-the-face shot, and also capped the ISO at 3200.  Even at 3200 I don’t like the low light noise on my D600, and find it unbearable above 3200.  But this combo worked well for all close shots.  Mind you I was ringside, standing up beside one of the corner posts for the most part.  I also set the drive to continuous high to capture bursts of action.

The 14-24 lens produced some surprisingly great photos of the action going on outside the ring, the judges, announcer, referee, and crowds.  I set this camera similar to the other one, except I set shutter priority at 1/125 to get a little more light with the F/2.8  instead of 1/400^th.  I set it at ISO 3200 and continuous low drive as well.

I was lucky to not have no one behind me.  I didn’t move around all that much, but it can be easy to get in spectators views while shooting.

I captured around 1200 photos from 9 matches.  Many photos were not in focus (or at least not focusing on what I wanted it to - between the low light, the super shallow F/1.4 aperture and the camera being set on shutter priority for the AF mode.  But I did capture some good ones.  You have to expect this, in these conditions.  The great photos are a lot of luck…  you just have to basically time when to hit the shutter as the opponents come together and hope for the best.

With these settings, the camera stayed at ISO3200 the majority of the time, sometimes dipping down to ISO2500.  Regardless, there is a considerable amount of noise in the photos, so I post-processed some of them in Topaz Denoise 3.0, which does help out quite a bit in reducing noise and tried to recover some detail.  The end photos are satisfactory, but I do wish the venue had much brighter lights to capture better photos.

Topaz Denoise