S21 Ultra: colorless, blackish night mode camera

[creatoroftruth]

Hi everyone.

I previously used S20+ and the night mode camera was awesome - detailed and colorful.

Recently I took S21 Ultra and I am disappointed to see comparatively low-color, blackish night mode photos.

I completely fail to understand where S20+ delivered super colors in night mode camera, how come the updated S21 Ultra delivers blackish, colourless-looking night photos. This is completely unexpected and unexplainable as S21 Ultra is updated from S20 series.

Please see two photos for comparing.

Absolutely frustrated.

[GoanGeek]

Samsung has toned down its vivid colours due to a lot of complaints that their processing was too aggressive.
Which is good in a way.

Also is your screen set to normal or vivid in display settings?

[creatoroftruth]

Thanks for your reply.

I am using vivid display mode because the normal display mode looks fade. I used the vivid mode in my old S20+ also.

If Samsung willingly toned down its night mode - it's suicidal. For that, the night mode photos come out all blackish and colorless. The true color of the leaves, building - nothing is there in S20 Ultra photos, which used to come nicely (and correctly) in S20+.

I compared night mode with iPhone 11 & 12 Pro Max, they deliver colorful, nice photos like my old S20+. S21 Ultra night camera is just too colorless and blackish.

I do not complain normal camera colors. Only night camera.

Do you know of any way to go back to "tone-up/high tone colors" in night mode, as in S20 series?

Thanks again.

[GoanGeek]

TBH I haven't tried night mode much.

You could try Pro Mode or use post processing to bring it up to your likeness.

Also play with the different lenses like the 3x especially as it's a higher f-number.
Or even different lighting situations.

[Gavlee2010]

Edit them push up the colour of that's what you like. Easy to fix. Or like the poster says above, use pro mode and turn on raw and that gives you a blank canvas to edit them exactly how you like them.

[5ayf]

I found that if you physically change the mode to night mode for night shots, it makes a huge difference and the colours are bright, vivid and the photo itself is very clear and sharp. Leaving it on auto does a very poor job for night shots.

[creatoroftruth]

Thanks. But editing them manually like brightness, contrast, or color tones (warm, cool, etc.) does not offer the true colour of the night mode camera of previous S20+, where each objects own color (pink, green, and others) would come vivid separately.

[creatoroftruth]

Each time I select the night mode manually, as you pointed out. After selecting so, I change the timing to 'Max' instead of 'Auto' which increases the holding time a bit, like 5 seconds instead of 3 seconds, thus the picture in 'Max' comes better than 'Auto'. Still the above result. I tried everything actually. It can be hard to understand the difference unless you compare it to (or you used) the previous S20 series where it was so naturally colorful, detailed, and nice. My S21 Ultra's night mode now is pretty close to the night mode of a low-budget Samsung phone, A50, which my friend purchased 2 years back. Indeed the photos are close. Disappointing and hard to accept.

[5ayf]

I know what you mean and true, without comparing side by side, probably impossible to see what you mean. I took this last night from my bedroom window using night more and was pretty impressed. It was a 3 second capture.

[creatoroftruth]

Sometimes, I repeat only sometimes, the photos (in night mode) come OK but still not anything like previous S20+. And other times, it is a disaster. Below is another comparison. See the color depth in S21 Ultra is gone. Though it looks more clear and brighter than S20+, but the true colors are not there. Not even a bit of it. The colors from S20+ are good and detailed - the left wall, floor, even the right side green wall, all nice and true. But in S21U, it is either blackish (dark), or whitish (too bright). The S21U night mode does not identify other colors (than black and white) well.