[Huawei P40 Pro Questions & Answers] Klosterbruder:
EXIF data? Answers to me previous questions? :)

These are important information, e. g. telling me about the aperture of the lens used, making a difference regarding depth of field, possibly explaining why you *perceive* a picture as not okay.

Besides that:

Similar quality, similar sharpness - if not identical.

This time, there was more distance to the subject, widening the depth of field, the "sharpness range."

Let's assume the picture was taken with the main 50 MP camera, having an aperture of f/1.9 - a big difference to the aperture of the telephoto lens with f/3.4.

The smaller the f-number, the larger the physical lens opening. And the larger the physical lens opening, the shallower, smaller the depth of field.

Meaning: With a shallow depth of field, a few millimeters more or less distance to the subject can make the difference between razorsharp and blurry. Result: Only objects exactly within the depth of field are rendered sharp.

With a wide depth of field and a larger distance, like with the telephoto lens, it's less crucial, every part of the flower will be sharp.

I would show you example pictures if I was allowed to use external links - but my post count is still too low.

Just try taking pictures of the same flower with different lenses, one with the 50 MP main camera, one with the telephoto lens. With the latter, increase the distance till the flower roughly occupies the same space in the viewfinder as with the main camera.

Important: Use a zoom factor of 10, not 5 - this makes sure your really switch to the telephoto lens. At present, there's a software bug causing the camera to often use horrible digital zoom for 5 x instead of the real telephoto lens (seems to be connected with the metered subject's distance). You can check this by covering the rectangular telephoto lens with a finger. If the picture vanishes, the lens is doing it's job.

You'll find out that the photo taken with the main camera has sharp and blurry areas, while the photo taken with the telephoto lens is rendered sharp everywhere.

That's the results of aperture and distance.

And that's why I don't see anything wrong with your first flower picture: Wide open aperture, small distance = tiny depth of field = tiny area of sharpness.

The way it should be because we all like that bokeh effect (blurry background, making the subject stand out) more than typical "flat" smartphone pictures.

But this benefit is paid with a drawback, the small depth of field, rendering everything outside that "sweet spot" blurry.

Perfectly normal, nothing to write home about. ;)

Oh wait, I'll dare to post a link anyway - hope the moderators won't kill me for that impertinence.

Just took two quick photos right outside my house, clearly showing the effects I explained above.

http://waagerecht.com/kram/Flower_comparison.jpg

Picture is quite large, so be warned. :D

Telephoto: ISO 50, f/3.4, 1/196 s. Main lens: ISO 50, f/1.9, 1/846 s. Both shot in Photo auto mode, no AI.

About that numbers: ISO 50 tells me there should be no grain in the picture; the higher the ISO, the more grain in the picture.

f/3.4 tells me there's a wide depth of field, so there should be no greater blur. Also tells me the telephoto lens was used. f/1.9 tells me to expect blur everywhere outside the "sweet spot", main lens used.

1/196 and 1/846 tell me about very short exposure, so in-motion unsharpness (camera shake, moving subject) is very unlikely.

And because the telephoto lens has a smaller aperture of f/3.4 (and lenses with a higher curvature), less light reaches the sensor, thus exposure time is greatly increased, 1/196 s versus 1/846 s.

See why I asked for that data?

You'll see that the telephoto shot is all sharp (until you zoom in; lower sensor resolution plus digital zoom, today's modern pestilence), you can even see the structure of the green leaves, while the main camera shot has everything blurred except the flower's pistils.

That's just the way cameras work.

So enjoy your fine camera, it does a great work and does it right. ;)