Sunday debate - Telephoto vs Ultra-wide secondary camera

13 May 2018
Phones now come with more than one camera and we discuss which complements the primary sensor the best.

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  • D
  • AnonD-731363
  • SH3
  • 13 May 2018

Well to be honest my Moto X4 have a utra vide angle camera capable of taking panorama photos with ease and is good enough.
But to be exact phone primary fuction s calling other people and messaging.
The phones yet replaced audio recorders such as MP3 and MP4 walkmans disc mans, car navigations, game consoles but not personal computers, phone replaced diary as well and many else.
But the phone which will replace camera and profesional camera or telescope wont exist and it maybe never will be.
Even a 50 eur camera from wish.com doing much better photos than for example Samsung S9+, Note 8, Iphone X, Pixel 2 or Huawei P20 pro.

So to be honest a 400 eur average phone is great enough and for price you save on a flagship buy another device camera from Canon or Nikon.

    In my opinion Ultra Wide Camera is superior to Telephoto in smartphone, along the standard primary camera.

    For well sunny daylight use, 2X and 3X seems good, but to what extend?

    Places which are restricted to bring cameras there, are mostly unaware of smartphones. So those places are either closed spaces with low light or there should be a famous building or work of art and you are in the yard/surrounding toward it, again you are close to it.

    For free places, instead of holding a 1000+ USD handset for photography, you can have a 600 USD phone alongside a 400 USD compact superzoom camera such as Canon SX730 with 40X Optical Zoom Lenz and 1/2.3" 21MP sensor to catch furthest places as clear and detailed as possible. If anyone wants to capture the moon, they must pay more around 700 USD to buy a Nikon P900 with 83.3X Optical Zoom Lenz and 1/2.3" 16MP sensor to take shots.

    Its burden is extra 300g in your pocket or shoulder.

    Ultra Wide angle is good for mobile photography as both quality and visibility matters.

    - For photography enthusiasts, Mobile camera and even a superzoom camera won't be enough. So, those are excluded.
    - For those who are occasional traveler, A superzoom camera is must have; Sceneries are always unreachable, if reachable they will turn into buildings or at least all shots will contain some people in it.
    - For indoor, gatherings and formal occasions, zoom is useless, as you want to catch as much space as possible into a frame.

      The thing with telephoto lens is that the amount of zoom is only whole numbers. It is either 2x or 3x or similar. You cannot zoom in between these numbers, like you can do on a dedicated camera. So, if the perfect zoom in would be suppose 1.5x, then you are out of luck.
      With a wide angle camera, you can manage to fit more people in the photo and also keep the details intact, as you aren't going farther from the subject to do so. I find this one more useful in phones.
      I personally wouldn't necessarily make my decision based on what the second camera does though.

        • S
        • Simon
        • 7AH
        • 13 May 2018

        While the current telephoto cameras are nowhere near what they should be (higher zoom would be needed) they are still much more useful to me. I much more frequently need the zoom (the digital one is not a real zoom) that the telephoto lens mimics.

          • ?
          • Anonymous
          • X{X
          • 13 May 2018

          BrokenLawShaw, 13 May 20181 answer: I don't care...Probably the best answer.

            • D
            • Dave Granger
            • m5M
            • 13 May 2018

            28mm equivalent is wide enough for anything but group selfies, and you'd be using the front camera for that.

              • ?
              • Anonymous
              • mq4
              • 13 May 2018

              If I need a wide angle shot I'll take 2 side by side and stitch them together during post or I'll just use the panoramic option, within the oem software or 3rd party.
              So for me I'd prefer telephoto as its now optical and over time these will get better and better...

                Telephoto is more norm nowadays but still I prefer it. Wide-angle camera is useful too so, can't say. They both should get 50-50% votes each.

                  Surprising result so far.. surely wide angle lenses make more sense on the front facing camera, where you'd struggle to fit everything in the frame at arm's length? A telephoto on the back and wide angle on the front is surely the best of both worlds?

                    Current telephoto cameras are trash. I mean 2x/3x zoom is barely useful & thus kills the point of it's existence. I would vote for telephoto when they bring at least 5x manual zoom.

                    Ultra-Wide Angle cameras on the other hand are absolutely useful in their current state. They're not for every scene, but when the time calls for it, it comes very handy.

                    Also, B&W Cameras are also pretty cool if you're into artistic photography. I wouldn't count it out of the options to choose from. Just saying.

                      But, if ask me about which is really useful for most of the time, wide angle camera is the answer for me. I don't care zooming photos because sometimes you capture blurry pictures than getting wide shots that are more memorable.

                        BrokenLawShaw, 13 May 20181 answer: I don't care...Me too. I don't really use those glittery features that most people will not use it.

                          1 answer: I don't care...

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