yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
How is this amount of lightcapturing measured? Can't find any info about it in the data sheets. What value should I be looking for? Is the lens the only factor in light capture ability? I'm not very good at these more techie sides of things :)

But you are wrong when you say that the Ones longer exposure is the reason for better low light. The S4 is the camera which has the longer exposure. Sometimes up to 5 times as long even in daylight. This is why reviewers say (even those you refer to) that even if you can get good low light pics with the S4, it usually takes a lot of tries to get them where the One makes it happend more consistently. This is primarely due to the shorter exposure times on the One which it can have thanks to a more light sensitive sensor and bigger aparture (f 2.0 vs f 2.2)

Some reviewers say the S4 has equal or better low light than the One but the majority says the One is better in low light. The problem seems to be that all reviews are made in different conditions. Some with tripods in a lab. Some outside. Lacking in all reviews is the typical use cases of photos of people or kids not beeing completely still etc. Those every day pics and not pics of buildings at night is far more interesting in my opinion (YMMV). Also you often get only the good picture in a review even if it took a couple of tries. How many tries is seldom told but is a major factor for a point and shoot camera.

We can only really wait to see real world pics start to flow or try them both out at the same time ourselves. In forums like these we also tend to only upload the good pics to show the capability of a camera and not say how many tries it took to get that perfect picture or how many crappy ones goes on every good one.
[Galaxy S 4 General] joslicx:
The short answer is yes. As far as capturing light is concerned, its a function of aperture and shutter. Wider aperture (smaller f number ) will capture more light. Similarly slow shutter will help capture more light. As usual there are tradeoffs with everything in life. Wider aperture will result in less depth of field (area in your image that is in focus). Slow shutter can result in motion blur.
[Galaxy S 4 General] hung2900:
Have no idea who are majority here. Only some reviewers from some East European countries and in China have the pre-released S4, so how the "majority" can "say" here.

One thing I have to tell you that capturing more light is not everything. For me, noise is somewhat more important than brightness of the photo. And this is the part that One's sensor is bad (noisy even under sufficient light)
[Galaxy S 4 General] pack21:
Sorry, but can't resist....

What's the point of ONE shooting very well in dark, if gets at night without battery for shooting?.....ehehehe

Sorry folks.:o
[Galaxy S 4 General] i9100g user:
Well there are F-stops (Focal length/aperture diameter) which determine the intensity(or density ) of light falling on a sensor, lower the number more the intensity of light and faster it will adjust ISO and higher the number more the depth of field,HTC one has around 14 (28mm/2.0)and SGS4(31mm/2.2) has around 14.09

Even though htc one has a slightly bigger aperture diameter , S4 compensates with a longer focal length (which results in smaller FOV) though there are many other things which effect , like quality of sensor,reflectivity etc.
[Galaxy S 4 General] gavinfabl:
These snapped today. Cold and overcast. Auto everything on HTC One. On here as comparison shots. Really want to see how these compare vs S4.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
So if they have different aparture values then they will not catch exactly the same amount of light as stated above? Right? Companies all say that "this new sensor is able to catch more light bla bla bla". Is this bull since the lens is the only factor?

---------- Post added at 07:48 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:33 AM ----------

No, you are right, I was thinking low light reviews and not comparisons. My bad. Sorry :(

If the lowest noise is the most important to you then the S4 is probably the better camera for you. For me the ability to catch more light is interesting not to be able to see in the dark but rather that the shutter speed can be increased considerably. Even if I to like as little noise as possible I rather have a clear picture with some noise than a blurry one with less noise. That's why I'm interested in these "real life" shots between these cameras to see if the faster shutter on the One really helps as much as it technically should. Some early comparisons (phoneArena I think) says that the one is better at "getting the shot" right away, but seeing how different every review is I think I'll wait to see some more comparisons in this regard. If they are equally able to get blur free pics most of the time then other factors will have to decide.

I went through a lot of pics comparing the S4 with the S3 and the One with the One X separately. One thing is for sure with both these new phones. Their cameras DESTROY the previous model in their own product line. Either way you go you will be VERY pleased if you had the one x or s3 before :) . This is mostly seen in evening or indoor shots but since thats usually a big part of shots taken in every day use it makes a world of difference.

---------- Post added at 07:54 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:48 AM ----------

If you don't need the Zoe for editing you just save the best pic from the sequence and the rest is deleted. I guess this is the way to go for any mode on any phone that captures many pics in a sequense.

---------- Post added at 08:33 AM ---------- Previous post was at 07:54 AM ----------

Answers in your quoted text in bold :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] GeorgeP:
You are missing the point of capturing more light. The point of capturing more light has nothing to do with making the photo brighter. The whole point is to reduce noise by increasing the signal-to-noise ratio. The signal is the light coming in to the sensor through the lens. The noise is the distortion introduced by the sensor's signal amplification circuits. The more light captured, the higher the signal, and the less amplification required, therefore less noise. Reviews I've read of the HTC One camera (e.g., AnandTech), show pretty low noise with the HTC camera.
[Galaxy S 4 General] gavinfabl:
Well I get my S4 on Saturday and will test the S4 against my HTC One. I already believe I know what to expect but at the end of the day I will keep the phone with the best camera for photography I do the most of.
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
Neat, I didn't know that feature existed.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BarryH_GEG:
It exists on my N2. ;) And whether what Bathyon described (still pics shot one after another) can get stiched together to form a sequence shot outisde of Zoe remains to be seen because it contradicts the manual.
[Galaxy S 4 General] randombirt:
I can confirm that a sequence shot outside of zoe is indeed possible :)

Also you have the always smile and object removal options. This is with the burst mode, ie keep the shutter pressed to take a series of pictures and not with zoe. Although these features are available with zoe too :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] gavinfabl:
Some good points by both of you. It clearly shows the different operation of these two phones.

Whilst my S4 arrives on Saturday, and believe me I am going to compare both phone cameras a lot, does anyone who has the S4 or knows the answer , know if the S4 produces a 30 second highlight, which you can then share eg to YouTube. If you are not sure what I mean, this is one I made on the HTC One http://youtu.be/Om_qTIeaBQc

This is quite a nice feature to design video highlight instantly. Makes crap photos exciting :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] randombirt:
Maybe it's your manual... You should return it for a replacement. :D

Press burst, edit, sequence, it offers you the pictures that have an object in.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
If I remember correctly from the One X the burst mode is saved as a group before you decide what to do with them. If I for instance took 10 pics in burst mode the camera will ask me right away which pics to keep and to discard the rest. If I don't make this decision then and just hit the back button you will see that the pics you just took is represented as one image in the gallery but with an icon that says it's really a group of images from a burst shot. If you click it you will enter the "edit mode" of the bursts and from there select one and discard the rest for example. I would guess that it's from here you can access the options on the One to use these special effects (sequence, best face, remove objects etc).

I'm just guessing here since I didn't even know these effects were accessible from a burst shot. I missunderstood the question above and therefore my answer implied that I knew it was possible to make an action sequence from a burst shot. My bad again, but it seems that it is possible according to others here. Let's await confirmation about it.

In the case with the pitching girl a zoe would work as well instead of burst shot ;). Maybe even better since the phone would use them to do a nice montage of the whole game to share with her afterwards :) (except the zooming of course).

Regarding the lost of low light capabilities in Zoe mode I was thinking it could be because of the short shutter time needed to catch all those images fast. I'm just guessing it should apply to the S4 action mode etc in low light also if they try to keep the framrate high. If it is then software etc can't fix it. It's just physics. Any thoughts or knowledge regarding this?
[Galaxy S 4 General] Hendrickson:
Well if someone releases a tweaked camera App like we have had for the S3, Note II etc. Tweak those jpeg compression settings. Up the video bitrate I'm sure we can improve on this. But the trade off is a larger file size.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Sarcron:
Easier to manage with expandable storage. Although if you're uploading a lot, definitely need a good data plan to compliment.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
S4 vs. One (vs. Lumia 920 vs. SIII vs. Ascend D2, vs. Xperia Z) comparison. The S4 is very natural with the skin colors and has quite a good amount of details indoors (dude has sunburn on his face.

The S4's dynamic range is also impressive in normal mode

Which means the difference between the regular and HDR photos are not big

Detail and color comparisons:
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Impressive color reproduction of the S4 and the dynamic range of the outside pic is also impressive. All but the One seems to take the sky as the exposure value making for example the toolbox very dark and sometimes with no detail at all. The one shows this well but overexposes all brighter areas instead. The S4 has the best combination of the two extremes here managing to both show the sky and more detail of the toolbox than the others if not counting the One.

It would be interesting to know the firmware version of the one since a lot happend in last update regarding overexposure and wash out:

http://abload.de/image.php?img=vergleich_autog0pwg.jpg

Not to be paranoid or picky but I just noticed that the pictures outside is not taken at the same time of day. The One seems to be taken at mid day and the rest in later in the afternoon. Check the shadows of the bushes in the garden and the length and direction of the shadows. Also the gear in front of the toolbox is the same in all but the One pic. I don't know how much of a difference different time of day and objects in the image makes (the table with a white cloth for example).

Anyway.. The S4 is the best in this bunch I think :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
The S4 picture was taken at 10:22:39 yesterday, the One a little over an hour later (11:43:16).

The One samples are sharp, so it has the update firmware, as I'd imagine every device today.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Ok.. sweet thanks. I don't know how much different the light gets in 1.5 hours where you live.

The sharpness thing is between erlier firmwares. The latest adresses over exposure to some extent. Could you check. Is your phone on 1.28 or earlier? The one has had over exposure issues from start so it would be interesting to see if their latest efforts made a difference. Thanks again for the comparison :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] CLARiiON:
^^ What's wrong with HTC One HDR?? That's so bad!
[Galaxy S 4 General] -]Megacharge[-:
I don't think he has an HTC One...
[Galaxy S 4 General] marmarm:
?? What do you mean by that ?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y7fEhMS--Ig
[Galaxy S 4 General] randombirt:
Ok just to confirm sequence shot, always smile and remove object is possible from burst although you are offered only the first 5 burst shots for these three options.
[Galaxy S 4 General] -]Megacharge[-:
I mean exactly what I said, RCFTW. Bathyon responded to BoneXDA as if he is the one who has the HTC One and is doing these comparisons himself. He is not, he is finding the pics and comparing them here in this thread......
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Yeah, my bad again :) Can't seem to get anything right around here. When he posted the times I just assumed to much.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
Once the pictures are in, especially those shot at the same time, same place, same mode, it doesn't matter whether I own the devices or not, I compare the same pictures as the photographer. And one thing I'm noticing in this comparison as well, is the white balance issues of the One, particularly on the sky color, as it often has a purple tinting to it, wonder why.

One thing I also noticed, is that the UltraPixel sensor has minor color bleed, which means colors around a vivid area pick up that area's tone. Say this whole shot is rather redish, look at the deer on the One which is closer to the building's color compared to the S4 where there are a wider range of colors. I've seen this on other shots so I very much look forward to our college's comparison once he gets his S4 to test these areas, both handsets on latest firmware.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Sarcron:
These are both using the same settings, right? It's just so......weird how much different they look. The HTC comes off as darker and as you said, the purple sky.
[Galaxy S 4 General] CLARiiON:
I must admit that [MENTION=4890367]BoneXDA[/MENTION] has amazing googling (is that a word??) skills!

Keep up the good work man..Found the links you mentioned in this thread very useful.

cheers!
[Galaxy S 4 General] ste1164:
If anyone finds a comparison with the HTC One running the new 1.29 software against the S4. Thats meant to improve the white balance :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
The darkness of first pic is an exposure thing. The one has exposure set for the bright sky while the S4 has it on the darker buildings etc. You know when you move the phone slightly and the whole image gets darker or brighter depending on the light meter. If you have more bright areas in the image the camera will use that for exposure. As is visible the pic from the One has more sky and less road in it compared with the S4 which will definetly affect the outcome in such a situation. It is important however that the phone makes the right decision more often than not if you don't know how to set it yourself (touch to focus for example).

The other pics do have a clear color difference. Which one is more correct is hard to say if you weren't there or have a reference camera, but I do like the sky colors of the S4 better. Looks more like I whish the sky would look :). The orange building on the other hand looks very unnatural and over saturated in the S4. Nothing of this feels like deal breakers for me for any of them and I probably wouldn't even notice it if I didn't compare them side by side. Once again it shows both these cameras are really great.

Keep'em comin! :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] shox22:
Some Engadget quotes (thanks hamdir)
[Galaxy S 4 General] ITALIANNYC:
Geez this is confusing lol.

For what I gather, the GS4 takes better pictures than the ONE, but the ONE is better in low light. Also with alot of light, the ONE is not as good. Its funny because I use to think the only thing HTC ever really had over Samsung was its picture quality. Now its the opposite. HTC still has sexier phones though.

I personally think my HTC amaze took better pictures then the ONE. I am buying one of these two and am coming from a GALAXY S2 lol, either will be an upgrade. HTC has way to many bugs for me though.

Is it that impossible for a phone to just get EVERYTHING right?

The ONE and GS4 need to make a baby.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Sarcron:
Heh. Even if we combined an HTC One/Galaxy S4 hybrid beast and it came with stock Android and got updates as fast as the Nexus line, I'm sure someone would still have a complaint about it.
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Yes it's very confusing. So according to Engadget both phones take excellent pics in daylight but the S4 is still better. The One is better at capturing a usable pic when the object is moving (people, pets etc) in both daylight and low light. In low light the One takes a better picture but the S4 has less noise.

Cropping and zooming= S4

Good light and static objects = S4

Good light and moving objects = One

Low light with moving or static objects= One

Camera features= Draw

Vacation photos= S4 Everyday photos= One

I want it all hehe :) The baby thing starts to sound like a great idea ;)
[Galaxy S 4 General] ITALIANNYC:
The brand new HTC GALAXY S ONE
[Galaxy S 4 General] tubular_board:
I would more likely buy a htc galaxy one note 3
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Both anandteck and Gizmodo have posted their reviews of the S4 now and have some comparisons with the One:

Anandtech:http://www.anandtech.com/show/6914/samsung-galaxy-s-4-review/

Gizmodo:http://www.gizmodo.co.uk/2013/04/samsung-galaxy-s4-review-better-but-not-best/

They pretty much say what we already know:

S4 better in daylight but slower

One better in low light but faster

Low light comparison from Gizmodo attached.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
Depends on the low-light situation, which is why I separated that category to 1) darkness: in no light the One certainly comes out on top as it manages to brighten up areas with practically no light of any kind hitting it, and 2) low light with some still spreading, say brighter city lights or at a bar: the S4 does better cause the One tends to overbrighten these.

Now an interesting info from Anandtech: they list the S4 sensor as IMX091PQ which is the Exmor R whereas various Asian sites list it as Exmor RS (IMX135). However the details don't suggest separate sensors, both the Exynos and SD600 versions perform on par with the PureView 808, but I'll be looking out to get a final word on what is the sensor type exactly. Various shots of the US version:
[Galaxy S 4 General] Bathyon:
Those are great pics. I got a little worried when they complained about the camera being slow even in daylight. It seems that with enough light the S4 can hold it's own when it comes to brightness if you hold it very still but that is worth nothing if they tend to get blurry as they claim. I hope they are wrong about this cause the pics you posted look stunning.
[Galaxy S 4 General] epicfailguy2:
BEFORE AFTER

HTC one firmware update

http://www.androidpit.de/htc-one-update-fotos
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
It's about time a reviewer finally took some actual low light pictures with the SGS4, rather than taking night pictures of buildings with massive spotlights on them and calling it low light.

That is far closer to what should be realistic from this hardware.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
And how often do you shoot in complete darkness?

---------- Post added at 06:20 PM ---------- Previous post was at 06:10 PM ----------

Ha! The sample u posted had night mode off. This is with night mode on.

No special lighting either. These are okay.
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
Right, and here is the same photo taken with the HTC One WITHOUT night mode on:
[Galaxy S 4 General] -]Megacharge[-:
Too bad you can't zoom... Shame that they only made it 4mp, it would have been great if it was 8mp.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
Aliveon2legs: Your observation of the One producing brighter shots is not wrong, but does it produce better shots?.

Look at the bottom right with the very bright lights on the cars and tarmac, the burnt out lights everywhere, the brightness overall and ask yourself this: DOES THIS LOOK REAL?

I brightened up the GS4 result with photoshop, I guess you can do the same with exposure compensation on the GS4, and it's similarly bright as the One night mode.

But does this look more real capture of a dark night scene than what the GS4 originally did? :)
[Galaxy S 4 General] gavinfabl:
The S4 has much better detail. The One cannot zoom in and this night shot is like a scenic distance shot, whereby the One doesn't take a shot you can zoom in. Night shots at a party , the One will excel. It's close up etc and there's enough detail at this proximity.
[Galaxy S 4 General] foxy4270:
Athough HTC One captures more light during night scenes...the results are not realistic at all.

it can not capture the sense and the atmosphere of the night correctly.

Galaxy S4 night scenes seem more realistic.
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
I realize that "better" is entirely subjective. Like I said, I'm just happy to see some actual low light shots from the GS4 coming from reviewers, unlike the farce that was GSMArena and a few of the other early reviews.
[Galaxy S 4 General] gavinfabl:
As a point of interest, I found the HDR mode on the One took the best night shots. It was able to shoot without blur as well.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
It may be subjective, but coming down to a comparison to a DSLR, you BET like with PhoneArena, the S4 would be closer to the DSLR here as well, cause no dark night scene is realistically as bright as the One and the Lumia does captures.

This is the GS4 in normal mode and night. I don't think much brighter than the one on the right would be realistic capture of the street at night.

But you haven't answered my question, this always gets skipped: how many shots do you do in complete darkness, and why?
[Galaxy S 4 General] ipmanwck:
Lol. I agree I don't take snaps in complete darkness but mainly artificial light / indoors.

Custom Stock Rom 4.1 Eternity

Brilliantly Stock
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
That's nice and all, but again, that picture is taken at dusk. You can still see blue sky through the tree in both images. You can see shade on the ground from the trees blocking sunlight.

I've actually addressed that question a few in this thread.. First of all, there is no camera on earth that will take a photo in "complete darkness". Secondly, I went through all of the photos that I've taken on my phone in the last 2 years and found quite a few night shots that didn't come out at all with the flash. I can post a few when I get home, if you would like. They are mostly at night events, concerts, camping and the occasional backyard kegger. I had more of those than landscape shots, I will say that much.
[Galaxy S 4 General] BoneXDA:
Those are actually windows and the scene is actually taken at night. Look at the yellowish street light on the bottom and the redish one far at the top.
[Galaxy S 4 General] aliveon2legs:
I'll take your word for it and agree that the shot on the right is adequately bright for a night shot. It is kind of hard to tell what is going on in these shots, though, with regards to lighting level and sources of light that are or are not present. At first glance I thought the building in the background was on fire.
[Galaxy S 4 General] msavic6:
How does the S4 do in artificial lighting, such as in a restaurant or in a room with incandescent light?
[Galaxy S 4 General] pack21:
+1, think the same.