S24 Ultra after Feb 2024 update: I am considering returning it

[Slavvd]

Just got the February 2024 update on my S24 Ultra.

This update promised a lot of improvements in the cameras department. 

I have to admit updating it improved the camera quality a little (emphasis on little). 

However, I also happen to own an iPhone 15 (cheapest one), currently used as a work device. 

After comparing the two phone's cameras I can honestly say: There is no competition, iPhone wins hands down. 

I took the same pictures with the phones side by side and using default camera camera apps settings. Then compared them on the same device (iPhone) to avoid display bias. I can summarise it as:

- Colors are better after the update but still not quite to the iPhone level

- IPhone takes 24MP shots by default, resulting in much more detail than the default 12MP Galaxy shots

- Switching to the Expert Raw mode on galaxy and taking 24MP shots (otherwise default settings) results in severely oversharpened and overall way worse photos than the standard 12MP ones.

- Switching the iPhone to take 12MP shots makes makes them about even in the details department but not colors. 

- The IPhone is much better in preserving details when a photo has both very lit and very dim areas. (think a light bulb in a dim room that **bleep** one side of your face and casts a shadow on the other) 

I just can't stand the fact that a £650 device can just blow a £1300 device to pieces when it comes to camera. 

For this reason I am seriously considering returning my S24U and using the iPhone full time. What's the point of spending £1300 extra and having to live with 2 phones when I can't even take a decent picture with the S24U?

I love android but this phone is a disappointment. 

[DrMips]

Image looking out of window, original unedited images. If you click the link and then touch the image, the S24U image will show in HDR.

iPhone 15
https://photos.app.goo.gl/Pt3qU5DiAXAnvM3z6

S24 Ultra
https://photos.app.goo.gl/G7auvK1MSPm1zM8R9

[Slavvd]

I haven't seen the room in real life so I will have to take your word regarding the over/under exposure and colors.

However, In my testing the iPhone usually does better to represent what I see with my own eyes (even when shooting at 12MP).

But I would agree that the two phones are close to each other.

I start to think more and more that the galaxy just needs to cut down on the post processing a bit. It tries to make the picture look better than what it is, which while understandable, is not what I always want. I prefer to capture exactly what I see with my own eyes. If needed I can edit it later. While currently you have to guess what the galaxy did and try to edit picture back to what it was.

[Notamech]

Yes return it and keep the iPhone if pictures are your priority. I think as far as cameras go the galaxy devices while good arent the best. IPhone nails it most of the time and if you do videos theres no contest. 1 year down the line after several optimisations this camera will be good but by then the s25 u will come out

[DrMips]

I've noticed that when there is yellow in the scene it tries brightening it up to much.

The images improved when I turned on HDR in the camera assistant and prioritize focus over speed. I also turned scene optimiser off.

[DrMips]

But when the S25U releases it will be buggy like the S24 is now and take another year to fix 😂

Photography isn't my priority for a phone anymore. If it was, i'd probably get the new Xiaomi 14 Ultra as I much prefer Android to iOS.

[Slavvd]

Exactly what I'm seeing. Videos are even worse than pictures.

Honestly it's such a hard choice to make as I love the freedom of Android.

While I've mostly gotten used to iOS by this point, this unfortunately includes accepting there are things you cannot do there. You just have to accept its not and will never be Android. It has its own rules.

Making a choice is even tougher in my situation, because I can technically keep both since one is a work device. But I'm just so irritated that the cheapest current gen iPhone beats the S24U when it comes to camera. It makes me feel cheated for spending so much money on the S24U.

Do you really think the cameras will get further improved with future updates?

Honesty I would really like the see 24MP photos in the default photo mode and maybe an ability to toggle the post processing on/off or at least a way to choose what it does (currently makes everything look either too pale or too vivid for me and it's never how it looks in real life).

[Slavvd]

Do you mean turning on HDR in the gallery app? I don't see such an option in the camera app.

Also what setting do you have your "intelligent optimization" set to? In my experience "minimal" makes the photo too blurry, "maximum" too oversharpened, so I keep it on "medium". I think you can only enable the scene optimization when it's set to "maximum" so that's off for me too.

[RELKady]

I think everything can be solved by updates, I just noticed that the 50 mb sensor in raw mode also is disaster when the Pic is post processed, the yellow destroy the image when in low light or warm light inside and the 24 mp is way better in raw mode but I don't know  why Pic taken in 24 mb appear as 12 mb in the info

[RELKady]

Regarding the camera assistant I don't know why can't find the option and can't find it In  both stores  and good lock

[Notamech]

In my experience samsung does optimise the camera eventually. But all their new phones aren't great. Like right now the camera of the older phones such as the s22u or s23u have a better performance than the s24u. Whether it's better than iphone or not is debatable but at least it's good enough. Today I was testing the camera of the s24u after the software update and it's pretty bad. Eg when taking a portrait shot for some reason the dumb AI chooses to focus on the background and blurs the subject. I had to fix it in post using ai in the editor. It doesn't make any sense. It should be obvious what is the subject and background. Older phones didn't do this.