So, which phone would I rather use for its camera?
Both phones have their ups and downs, and they both take great photos. Overall, though, I'd prefer to take the Pixel 2 XL with me. The Pixel seems to know when to saturate colors and when not to, as shown with the flower photo. And the iPhone simply adds too much yellow tint to its photos compared to the Pixel for my taste.
Portrait Modes on either phone are a mixed bag, as the Pixel did better in one example and the iPhone did better in another. Portrait Modes on smartphones are still in their early stages, and there's certainly room for improvement on both cameras to produce more consistent results.
Both cameras have similar sharpness except when it comes to zooming, where the iPhone wins hands-down. But remember, it's up to you. If you like the iPhone's warmer photo style, then the iPhone is the better camera. If you'd rather have more accurate, less warm photos, the Pixel is the way to go.
How about in a low-light situation?
In this low-light situation, both phones did about as well as each other in terms of taking a photo in the dark, expect for the iPhone's camera adding a warmer yellow tint that made the bananas look riper than they actually are.
In a different setting, though, the iPhone's Portrait Mode wins.
The Pixel won the last Portrait Mode round, but the iPhone wins this one. My face in the Pixel's photo has far too much contrast and makes for a less appealing portrait shot compared to the iPhone photo.
Now let's check out the Portrait Mode on both phones.
The iPhone makes for a brighter Portrait Mode shot, but it slightly overblows the brighter areas on my left cheek. The Pixel photo's lighting is more uniform and makes for a better portrait.
Also, notice how my sweater is more in focus in the Pixel photo, whereas it's blurry on the iPhone photo. Keeping clothing in focus makes for a better-looking portrait shot, and the Pixel wins the portrait wars.
The Pixel focuses faster than the iPhone, and it did a lot better in this photo.
Here, the iPhone overblew the white bottle caps completely and removed pretty much all of their detail compared to the Pixel's photo. I'd absolutely go for the Pixel in this case.
The Pixel 2 XL's camera makes the iPhone 8 Plus' camera seem flawed
In an indoor situation, the iPhone's photo did the reverse of the previous outdoor flower photo. The iPhone's colors are more saturated than the Pixel's. Yet, the iPhone's photo is also darker than the Pixel's more vibrant scene.
Technically, the colors in the iPhone's photo are more accurate, but I'd still pick the Pixel's photo.
Having seen the flowers in real life, I can say with some surprise that the iPhone's colors in this photo are more accurate than the Pixel's more saturated colors. With that said, the Pixel's photo is more appealing. The Pixel also handled the bright background a lot better than the iPhone.
Now let's look at how each phone handles a mixture of dark and bright lighting.
The iPhone again made colors far warmer than they should be, and the warmer colors on the building facades almost looks fake. It also added a hazy look compared to the clearer Pixel photo, which is more apparent as you look down the street.
At the same time, the iPhone kept more details in darker areas than the Pixel, especially around the scaffolding on the left of the photo. Still, I'd rather show the Pixel's photo to friends and family rather than the iPhone photo for its deeper contrast between light and dark.
This photo is zoomed in all the way on both phones.
Here, both phones are using "digital" zoom rather than optical zoom. Digital zoom isn't as good as optical zoom because it's simply enlarging the pixels to zoom in, which robs a photo of fine detail. The iPhone does a definitively better job when you want to zoom in to objects far away, mostly because it's zooming digitally off of its second 2x optical zoom lens. Details are far sharper on the iPhone photo. The Pixel is zooming digitally from its only lens, which makes for a photo that's void of detail. Still, you can clearly see how the iPhone's camera adds warmer, yellow-ish tones to colors.
Then there's the iPhone's secondary "telephoto" lens, which has a 2x optical zoom. The Pixel phone doesn't have a secondary lens.
The iPhone has a 2x optical zoom, which the Pixel doesn't have, so we can't compare photos in this instance.
Here's another similar shot, but the iPhone's warmer tones went too far.
On its own, the iPhone's photo looks fine. But once you compare it with the Pixel's photo, it's clear that the iPhone tends to make photos far warmer than they should be. It's a clear sign that Apple's philosophy is to make photos warmer than the original scene, and this is where I'd consider the iPhone camera is flawed. It's especially noticeable in the trees, which look almost yellow in the iPhone photo instead of green in the Pixel photo, and it's not a great look. Skin tones on people's faces also look orange on the iPhone's photo rather than their more accurate skin tones in the Pixel photo.
Google's philosophy is to let a scene and its colors speak for itself rather than adjusting the color temperature.
In this shot, both the Pixel and iPhone took great photos.
They only really differ in the overall color "temperature," where the iPhone tends to make photos appear warmer than they actually are by adding yellow-ish tint to most of the building facades. The colors in the Pixel are more accurate.
Overall, the iPhone's photo looks generally better, as colors on the Pixel photo appear more monotone compared to the iPhone's photo.
Source: Business Insider India