[BigMackCam]

The Xiaomis have ridiculously good spec sheets - my family has several generations of the Redmi Note*
...
*Not the Pro, but it's not a huge difference I think?.

There's actually a lot of difference between the non-Pro and Pro models... I was surprised by just how much. Processor, memory, camera sensors, screen, battery and more are quite different. On the plus side, the non-Pro version doesn't need a flat-bed trailer to carry it around

Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 vs Note 9 Pro

[timb64]

Just remind me... how much is LR subscription per month?

I only use the free app on my iPhone 6s which cost me £240 over two years,(and the battery is now failing)

[BigMackCam]

I only use the free app on my iPhone 6s which cost me £240 over two years,(and the battery is now failing)

There's a LR free app? Wow... I wonder if it's available on Android?

As for failing batteries, it's another reason I'm reticent to buy an expensive phone I know third parties can replace them (there's an absolute wizard of a guy in my local shopping mall), but still...

[normhead]

I think it's 12 bit RAW and 8 Bit for the JPEG./HEIC files. Not as good as the 14 bit we get on most DSLR/Mirrorless.

Any raw file scenes you'd like to play around with Norm? I'm heading up north tomorrow to upper Michigan to see family. (3 covid tests later and total isolation this month!). It'll be interesting to see how it does with the bright highlights and shadows with some snow.

Despite my location being Alabama I'm from far up in the Northeast, so most of your pictures remind me of where I grew up. And half my families Canadian around the Ottawa area (they all grew up in Quebec) and wayout west in Saskatchewan. Needless to say I do miss the snow a bit.

I once did see comparisons using my K-x or one o my 12 bit cameras. Despite the nay sayers calling me names etc. no one ever showed a head on comparison where a 12 bit file was better than a 14 bit file. I used shadow detail, almost black shadows, everything I could think of. As far as I can tell there was no discernible difference. Much the same as trying to prove the difference between my K-5 and K-1.

[LeeRunge]

RAW files are already accessible on camera phones via LR.

The ProRaw files are totally different then the the output in Lightroom we’ve had for a while. Much higher quality file, also very large in size 25-40 mb per image. It’s a new feature that came out with 14.3 for the 12 pros last week.

---------- Post added 12-22-2020 at 08:01 PM ----------

We certainly don't get deals like that, I think... plus, of course, you need that older, half-decent device to trade in. The iPhone 12 Pro 128GB version is GBP £999 here (£1,099 for the 256GB, £1,299 for 512GB), with up to £280 trade-in depending on the device. Even with the best possible trade-in, that's GBP £719. Welcome to the UK

I'm a cheapskate when it comes to mobile phones... my current one is last was (strike-out explanation to follow ) a Blu Vivo 5R for which I paid GBP £109 in mid 2017. It has been a good phone with a basic, adequate daytime JPEG-only, single focal length camera. I dropped it onto a kerb, then gravel, in the first few weeks of ownership, leaving a big chip out of one corner of the screen and case. At £109, I didn't care... but if I'd paid four, five, six... maybe ten times that, I'd have been incandescent

All this talk of the iPhone has had me thinking, though, that I really could use something much better than my less-than-modest Blu Vivo 5R... so I just ordered a new phone, heavily discounted on Amazon UK Cheapskate-mode still enabled, I've ordered a Xiaomi Redmi Note 9 Pro 6GB / 128GB at a whopping (wait for it, wait for it)... GBP £189 The specs are quite amazing for such an inexpensive device, the reviews generally excellent, and the camera seems to do an awfully good job (considering the price) with 64MP Samsung G2 (?) main sensor (16MP with 4x pixel binning for better DR), plus ultra-wide / macro / "selfie" lenses and sensors - and native raw capture Night mode isn't spectacular, apparently, but "OK" (not bad at the price-point)... sufficient for my needs, that's for sure. Oh, and it has a huge 5,020mAh battery... which I guess is some payback for its gargantuan dimensions

I couldn't trade in my 3.5 year old cheap Blu phone, of course (LOL ), but I'll put a new pay-as-you-go SIM in it and chuck it in my car's glove box for emergencies...

I don't expect this Xiaomi will come even close to the iPhone 12 Pro, but that's not the point... It'll scratch my itch for a "best camera is the one you have with you" phone cam... and if when I drop it, I won't be too concerned

You share some responsibility here for me wanting a new phone, Lee, so it better be half-decent...

https://youtu.be/PgTWi7xRubk




Just remind me... how much is LR subscription per month?

Ha, see what I’ve done! I think the xiomi will be a great phone. Lots of bang for the buck. I usually check out gsmarena.com for specs on all the various phones. The reason I have an iPhone in the first place is because of my wife’s addiction to Apple phones. We got a two for one deal on iPhone 8’s three years ago and now I’m stuck in the promotion cycle for iPhones lol. In the USA it’s a game of getting the promotion to switch carriers, open multiple new lines, I’m my case I threw in a veterans discount, the. Add the old phone trade into that bargain stew. I agree new iPhones are ludicrous in price.

As for the guys here having battery troubles after a while, they can be replaced. I’ve taken apart and done it myself as I’m pretty handy with taking electronics apart. But you can also have it done at various service locations.

And do checkout Lightroom mobile for the phone. I primarily use that on an IPad but it works pretty well on a phone too with an SD card reader. They want a subscription for editing RAW for 4.99 a month though. JPEG is free. I find the iPad fun to edit with (12.9 inch iPad with pencil). And it’s quite fast as well.

I also just discovered painting with iPad and pencil, sort of YouTube meets Bob Ross.

---------- Post added 12-22-2020 at 08:03 PM ----------

I once did see comparisons using my K-x or one o my 12 bit cameras. Despite the nay sayers calling me names etc. no one ever showed a head on comparison where a 12 bit file was better than a 14 bit file. I used shadow detail, almost black shadows, everything I could think of. As far as I can tell there was no discernible difference. Much the same as trying to prove the difference between my K-5 and K-1.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen a comparison between 12 and 14 bit RAWs now that you mention it. I still think K-5 outputs great RAW files in 2020. That camera had a great sensor.

[BigMackCam]

Ha, see what I’ve done! I think the xiomi will be a great phone. Lots of bang for the buck. I usually check out gsmarena.com for specs on all the various phones.

Well, as I said, I'm not fooling myself the Xiaomi will be even remotely close to an iPhone Pro in capability, but it's a big step up from my Blu Vivo 5R for casual photo use. The one downside - its size - will likely be an advantage for me, as with my large fingers I found the camera app fiddly on my Vivo. Plus, it'll double as a small tablet for reading books, magazines and the news, the odd bit of web browsing, and the occasional game

The reason I have an iPhone in the first place is because of my wife’s addiction to Apple phones. We got a two for one deal on iPhone 8’s three years ago and now I’m stuck in the promotion cycle for iPhones lol. In the USA it’s a game of getting the promotion to switch carriers, open multiple new lines, I’m my case I threw in a veterans discount, the. Add the old phone trade into that bargain stew. I agree new iPhones are ludicrous in price.

The UK iPhone 12 Pro and Xiaomi prices I mentioned are for the phone only, unlocked to all carriers, which is the only way I'll buy one. I make so few calls, send so few texts, and use so little data on the go that it's just not economical for me to pay a monthly amount for a set allowance (some months, I don't make a single call). Instead, I use a PAYG ("pay as you go") SIM from my chosen carrier and top that up with funds as necessary. I usually top up GBP £20 or £30 at a time, which lasts me around a year

As for the guys here having battery troubles after a while, they can be replaced. I’ve taken apart and done it myself as I’m pretty handy with taking electronics apart. But you can also have it done at various service locations.

Yeah, pretty much all of these smartphone and tablet devices need a battery swap-out eventually. It's a little frustrating, but simply the nature of battery technology as it currently stands (I lament the demise of user-swappable battery packs... I'd happily accept devices being slightly chunkier if the batteries could clip and unclip from the body). Still, I have some "spudgers" and a decent iFixIt screwdriver kit, so I'm reasonably well tooled up for the job I've done a couple of tablets and my Kindle Paperwhite, and they worked out well enough. Finding genuine OEM batteries in the first place is the harder part, as so many of them (like branded camera batteries) are fakes, labelled with inaccurate capacity ratings, unprotected or otherwise poor quality

And do checkout Lightroom mobile for the phone. I primarily use that on an IPad but it works pretty well on a phone too with an SD card reader. They want a subscription for editing RAW for 4.99 a month though. JPEG is free. I find the iPad fun to edit with (12.9 inch iPad with pencil). And it’s quite fast as well.

I'll check out the free Lightroom app for sure. I also hear Google's Snapspeed is good? In any case, I won't want to do more than exposure, contrast, saturation and cropping adjustments in-phone, and even Google's own Photos app does that...

[Rondec]

150 megapixel images that are 250mb in size lol. 4 shots per GB!

Someone needs to copy the live bulb and live composite modes Olympus pioneered. Live composite is awesome for lightning. Live bulb is just cool to watch long exposures come to life in real time, it's like being in a darkroom minus the chemicals. It also makes long exposures stone simple to get right on the first try.

I actually really like the Pentax style of pixel shift -- just four shots and a really high quality image that has the same number of megapixels. As you increase the number of shots, you increase the likelihood that stuff shifts in the scene you are shooting and suddenly that part of the super resolution image isn't useful any more. Even a little breeze is enough to stir grass and leaves around and make it a waste of time.

[LeeRunge]

I figured I drop some of the ProRaw shots in here as it’s been a while. I’ve been using that feature exclusively for my iphone now and mostly using Lightroom mobile to process them. Files are about 30-40 mb in size, much larger than the 3-4mb jpegs the iphone normally produces. Dynamic range I’ve found to be extremely close to my Z5 which is similar to the D750 in range, both are very close to the K-1 as well in base ISO DR so this iphone is hitting in that ballpark for what it captures into the files. It’s still 12 mp so the resolution is limited to what that provides but I’ve found it to be quite good from a phone. Here’s an as shot image through a gun port in a fort in full sunlight outside with the shadows, then the shadow and highlight sliders in lightroom pulled to max each so you can see whats in the file in the shadows and highlights through the window. It’s similar to what I get from the Z5.


First is what’s in there for range, second is as shot.




Here are a few shots processed from lightroom.

From the ultra wide. iPhone 12 Pro Max
Exposure Time 1/2500s
Aperture ƒ/2.4




Regular wide (@26mm)

iPhone 12 Pro Max
Exposure Time 1/140s
Aperture ƒ/2.2

[HuistonPhill]

Let him try to take a picture with his Iphone 12, and then look at the pictures taken in 2010. I'm sure it will turn out that the picture taken in 2010 will look much clearer and of higher quality, since no mobile camera can shoot even as good as a 2005 sample camera. So it is better to use the phone for its intended purpose, which is to make calls. Just recently got myself a VoIP number subscription and I call my relatives in Eastern Europe.