The resolved detail is on par with other flagship 12MP cameras, but how the detail is presented is what distinguishes Sony from the rest. Sony's processing has been one of the most potent we've seen lately because it produces some incredibly natural photos. Their quality is similar to those of the last few Xperia flagships and we are glad. The daylight photos we took with the main camera using F/2.0 aperture are class-leading. Sony, however, assured us that the unit is running commercial firmware and the output by the main camera is 100% representative of what the final retail units will be capable of in terms of image quality. Before you move on, you should know we have a pre-production unit of the Xperia Pro-I where some video features and the 2x zoom camera are not working yet. The selfie shooter is an ancient 8MP Samsung snapper.Īnd now, let's finally see some samples. Note this camera was not operational on our early review unit because Sony is still fine-tuning it. The telephoto camera packs a Sony IMX486 12MP 1/2.9" sensor with 1.25µm pixels and uses stabilized 50mm f/2.4 lens. It sits behind a 16mm f/2.2 lens and supports PDAF, meaning it can do macro shots, too. The ultrawide camera uses a Sony IMX363 12MP 1/2.55" sensor with 1.4µm pixels. There is no Night Mode as on other phones, but the Xperia Pro-I makes automatic decisions based on the scenes how many frames it will snap and then blend them together to achieve a photo with low noise and good dynamic range.
Sony is also using the power of image stacking, HDR, and various software improvements, which have become standard features in most phones and are often referred to as computational photography. Of course, in any situation when there is not enough light, any sharpness advantage from stopping down the aperture to the darker f/4.0 is quickly outdone by the increased noise and noise reduction smearing. Interestingly, unlike Samsung's implementation, the aperture on the Sony Xperia Pro-I has no automatic solution - you need to manually switch to the desired f/2.0 or f/4.0 even when in the Basic (full Auto) camera mode.įrom a creative standpoint, when there is plenty of available light, having the choice of two aperture levels allows the photographer control over whether they'd like more focus depth and better sharpness (f/4.0) or better background defocusing in closeups (f/2.0). This solution is extremely rare and so far only Samsung has had a few such smartphone cameras, but the Korean maker eventually abandoned this path. Sony has equipped this sensor with a 24mm stabilized lens and variable aperture with fixed f/2.0 and f/4.0 steps. And while impressive, it's not unheard of, and it's definitely not the largest in the smartphone industry. While Sony is technically correct by saying it is using a 1"-Type sensor inside the phone, the sensor area that is effectively used is smaller - even if the pixel pitch remains at 2.4µm like on a 1" sensor.Īfter running some calculations of our own, we're fairly convinced the effectively used sensor area is equivalent to a 1/1.33" sensor or in the thereabouts. That is because Sony is not utilizing the entire sensor, but just its 12MP center. You've probably caught the resolution discrepancy - a 20MP sensor shooting 12MP photos. It is the same sensor behind the Sony RX100 camera - a 20.1MP 1" Exmor RS BSI CMOS with 2.4µm pitch. The highlight of the Sony Xperia Pro-I is the 1"-Type sensor used for the main camera. There is also a ToF camera, a color spectrum sensor, and a LED flash. The Sony Xperia Pro-I features three 12MP cameras on its back - one for the standard wide-angle photos, one for ultrawide-angle, and the last one is a telephoto with 2x optical zoom.