17-03-2020 01:14 PM - last edited 17-03-2020 01:53 PM
Since getting the phone (S20 Ultra) and dealing with some autofocus issues, I've come to appreciate the pro mode. Not for any of the pro features, really (I'm no photographer and don't get how to use all the features properly) but for the fact that it has manual focus. When auto focus fails (which it regularly does on the current firmware) it's great to be able to have a backup option. There are 2 problems with the pro mode, however:
1) You can only use the main camera sensor
2) You can't use 108mp mode on the main sensor
Personally, I think it would be great if Samsung enabled pro mode on the telephoto and wide angle lenses - especially the telephoto lens. While it wouldn't negate the need for better autofocus on the normal mode (which the phone desparately needs) it would at least give people an option when the camera is unable to focus, or in situations where the camera just keeps focusing on the wrong thing (which can happen on the best of autofocus implementations).
17-03-2020 01:34 PM
Cheers @ConcreteLlama!
This one has been pitched at our R&D team. Me or one of the other Mods will let you know what the developers say.
17-03-2020 02:36 PM
I would really like to have a manual focus option for all camers.
I find focusing is difficult in low light conditions.
When I want to take a photo of a distant object I just need the focus to stay on infinity.
Some quick way to force that would be greatly apricated.
18-03-2020 09:09 AM - last edited 18-03-2020 09:10 AM
Just so you know - I had a lot of Huawei phones over the last 2-3 years and what they did have, which I do not have in S20 Ultra - they had the ability to switch between lens in Pro mode. It was just like a zoom switch which switched the lens itself and all of them had full functionality of Pro mode and ability to save as .dng format (RAW). I would like and I really do think you should, all of this be present in S20 Ultra since it is direct competitor and not having that will say to me that it was a mistake to switch to Samsung
19-03-2020 12:32 PM
Hi all,
The developers have replied:
"For now, Pro Mode supports Wide Camera only so Tele Camera can not be used in Pro Mode.
Basically Pro Mode is designed for manual control without automatic settings.
But Wide and Tele Camera have different features like aperture, focus and etc.
Therefore it would be hard to show both ones in the same mode because they are totally different feelings."
In other words, it seems that the different ways the Wide and Tele lenses work means that extending Pro Mode to include both lenses would make the UI very complicated.
I asked them about the possibility of manual focus for the Tele lens, and they've replied that "there's no way to enable manual focus functions on Tele camera for now."
19-03-2020 01:31 PM
Hi @AntS , thanks for the response! I had a feeling that might be the case on the telephoto lens, but thought it was worth asking. I hope they can overcome that and implement manual focus at some point, but I get that may not be possible.
Shame about the other stuff though - personally I don't feel it would clutter the UI, but it would likely require an extra button on the row for "Lens" which would be inconsistent with the look in the Photo page where there are 3 icons. Either way I'm glad this feedback reached the devs.
20-03-2020 07:55 AM
I mean Huawei did it. And it didn't clutter the UI at all. Why can't you?
28-03-2020 06:21 PM
Please, there must be a way to implement it. I basically never need pro mode except for the telephoto because it has so many focus problems. Why not just add the three icons for wide normal and zoom like the main ui? Blocking the lens from pro mode and also from third party uis greatly devalue the product as the zoom lens becomes useless for macro shots. Please please find a way to make this work
30-03-2020 02:43 PM
Hi,
If you are a moderator, can you please look at my post and help me as I am having several issues with my S20 Ultra - link is:
Many thanks !
01-04-2020 12:34 PM
There also appears no way to save the PRO mode, on any of these phones.
I've just got a S10e and the "save settings" feature mentioned in various posts has been removed...