vivo NEX Dual Display review

Familiar 12MP camera with many add-ons

The vivo NEX Dual Display has a 12MP main camera at its disposal. In fact, since it doubles as a selfie shooter as well, it is a bit harder to give it such a designation. Then again, it is technically not the only camera on the phone. It is accompanied by a 2MP, f/1.8 module, used only for depth sensing. Then there is a TOF (time of flight) camera/sensor added to the mix as well. We don't quite get the need for both since the latter can definitely pick up more accurate depth info. Vivo claims that the 2MP unit is in place to help in low-light shooting conditions. Especially for video. Spoiler alert - that's not really the case, but more on that in a bit.

Ignoring the "add-ons" for a bit, the main 12MP snapper is actually quite familiar. It consists of a Sony IMX363, 1/2.55", 1.4µm sensor behind an f/1.8 lens. Extras here include 4-axis OIS and PDAF. This is actually the very same camera module as found on the Xiaomi Mi Mix 3, Mi8, Nokia X7, Nokia 8.1, Asus Zenfone 5 and 5Z, to name just a few. It is also present in the original vivo NEX S. This is no coincidence either since, despite some major design differences, the pair of devices were actually developed in tandem. Their major difference is the alternate approach to solving the selfie camera "issue".

Before we get into the quality section, let's take a quick look at the camera app and its features. Especially those related to the second display and using the main camera as a selfie shooter. In tune with the rest of the Funtouch launcher, the camera interface is a bit overcrowded. On the top side, a settings wheel hides away most of the important stuff. HDR and Portrait toggles are also here.

Camera UI

vivo still refuses to include proper photo resolution controls. Instead, you get an aspect ratio selector, and you have to know that the sensor has a native aspect of 4:3 to get the maximum available resolution. Technically, you could get higher-res photos using the 24MP toggle, but this one uses simple interpolation from the native 12MP.

The available shooting modes are at the bottom - Manual (Pro), Panorama, AI Face Beauty, Photo, Videos, and AR Stickers. The AI Face Beauty allows you to tune various aspects of your face such as chin, nose and eye size.

Portrait lighting modes

Vivo wasn't shy in copying Apple's studio lighting modes either. You get a separate menu for those, complete with familiar icons. Some options definitely work better than others here. There is also a professional mode for stills, a full-featured one, no less. It has ISO, shutter speed, white balance and manual focus.

Pro mode

Overall, the camera app is pretty feature-rich. There are plenty of options and modes available, they are just not presented in the most convenient and orderly manner.

Camera quality

Given its fairly common camera module we have plenty of other devices to compare the NEX DD to in terms of camera quality. Quite a few flagships, no less. Well, if we had to sum up our findings it would go something like this:

The vivo NEX Dual Display come a little bit closer to flagship camera quality than its vivo NEX S sibling. Most of the noise-related issues have been ironed out and the processing is much more mature. Still, a measurable gap between the vivo and true flagship camera quality and experience remains.

To elaborate a bit, the vivo NEX Dual Display feels pretty competent as a point and shoot camera. Detail is plenty, but that was the case with the original software on the vivo NEX S back when we reviewed it. Just to clarify here, we very much expect that the improvements we are observing in vivo's camera science on our NEX DD unit are already present or alternatively coming soon to its NEX S sibling.

vivo NEX Dual Display camera samples

Things that have been improved since our NEX S review include colors and sharpening. Or rather lack thereof. The NEX DD is no longer quite as trigger-happy with the sharpness slider, so to say. The processing looks a lot more mature. Colors are more subdued and closer to real life.

vivo NEX Dual Display camera samples

The one improvement that we found most noticeable, though, is the improvement in noise levels. Overall, the NEX Dual Display captures a lot less noise than its sibling. This is easily observable even under the fairly rough and less than ideal weather and lighting conditions we have been having lately. Less captured noise naturally means less work for the noise suppression algorithms - which left problematic marks on the NEX S camera samples.

HDR: Off • On • Auto • Off • On • Auto

Dynamic range has also seen a bump up, compared to the NEX S. It is still a step down from great flagship camera yardsticks like the Samsung's or Apple's latest devices, but it's a rather small step down. Plus, just to reiterate once again, our shooting conditions were pretty hard. Naturally, this prompted us to turn to HDR for help.

HDR: Off • On • Auto • Off • On • Auto

That, however, was a less than ideal solution. In its current implementation HDR is prone to upping the overall exposure of the shot. This, in turn, almost always leads to clipped highlights. On top of that, the Auto setting very rarely decides to come through and enable HDR. Given that it is prone to making many shots worse, we started to appreciate the clumsy auto detection. The only time we had any degree of success with HDR was in manual mode and combination with spot exposure metering on a brighter spot in the frame. Use it at your own risk.

The vivo NEX Dual Display has a tendency to overexpose

Speaking of HDR and odd exposure bumps, this issue is not isolated to HDR alone. It might very well be tied to it, but often times we found that the NEX Dual Display metering simply decides to go for a brighter exposure for no apparent reason. Thankfully, this almost never happened on the first shot of any given set we took. So, perhaps it might just have something to do with AI?

Jovi AI in camera

Yes, indeed one of the few places that vivo's smart AI assistant Jovi remains active in this "global" FuntouchOS ROM is within the camera app. By default, it is active and shows its presence via small icons in the bottom left corner of the viewfinder. Scene detection is a bit hit and miss, but it can detect easy scenes like a skyline or mountains reasonably consistently. Perhaps a combination of Auto HDR and some active Jovi scene optimization are the reason behind the exposure metering issues, but we couldn't quite put our finger on what was causing it.

Portrait light and bokeh

The vivo NEX Dual Display has a few nifty extra features for shooting human subjects. First off, we have portrait mode. It is the typical affair, but vivo does add in the option to adjust a fake aperture value on screen and change the intensity of the effect.

Portrait mode

Now, this is where the TOF camera should really shine. It has all the data it needs to really measure accurate depth information. From there on it should be very easy to separate the background from the foreground (at least in theory).

Portrait mode samples on a plant

However, that is really not the case here. Try as we might, the bokeh effect really turned out good enough. Just to be clear - the actual bokeh looks good, but the subject detection is very, very poor.

Portrait mode samples on a human subject

So, maybe, the algorithm is specifically tuned to work with a human subject. The TOF sensor doesn't really have any such limitations, but we definitely had to try. And detection turned out just as disappointing. Fiddling with the effect intensity had little effect on accuracy as well. Bummer. Especially since we know what phones like the Google Pixel 3 can do with one camera, while the NEX DD has not one, but two extra sensors it can potentially extract depth information from.

On to Portrait light effect, then. Vivo has a total of five modes here positioned on a wonky slider that does a fairly good job at imitating the iOS look for said feature but is really hard to actually use.

Portrait light effect: Studio • Stereo • Loop • Rainbow • Monochrome background • No mode

Going through them one by one, 'Studio' seems to simulate a single light source shining at a 45-degree angle convincingly enough. 'Stereo' apparently attempts to simulate a symmetrical light as well, but it frankly ends up looking more like a "makeup" filter more than anything else, taking away skin texture and complexion. 'Loop' is even weirder - kind of similar to Stereo, but just more light added in? 'Rainbow' is something else. A shining multi-color light as if someone is holding a giant crystal just outside the frame and it shines more lens flares than we care to count on the opposite side. The monochrome background is probably the only effect we liked. It is not quite the iOS Studio lighting, nor is it trying to be. The results look good, although we can clearly see the detection failing - that red lantern in the bottom right is definitely not in the foreground.

Beauty mode

Vivo went all out for its beauty mode. While using the main display the feature actually has a face and a body mode. Each of these is littered with features. It's pretty much like opening the character creator in SIMS. Everything is on a slider.

Extensive Beauty mode

We can only imagine the TOF sensor is being leveraged in some way here. Interestingly enough, when using the rear display, or in other words selfie mode, the body tab gets dropped as an option. You can only do modifications to your face.

Beauty mode for selfies

On the flip side, this does open up the option to make a 3D scan of your face. That sounds nifty, the idea presumably being it should make the corrections it applies even more accurate or at least recognize you and apply them automatically in the future. However, despite our best efforts, we couldn't scan even a single face successfully. The vivo NEX Dual Display simply kept complaining that we should hold it upright, all the while frequently crashing the camera app and the whole camera API. Apparently, it's just broken at the moment.

Beauty mode samples

As far as results go, it's a mixed bag, but with enough patience and playing around, plus careful posing, you can probably get the shots you are after. You probably want to be as conservative as possible with the intensity sliders, though, since you can easily go overboard and end up with hilarious results. Most effects are based around rather simple "liquefy" effects. This, in turn, often leads to warping effects appearing around the subject. Especially visible with straight edges. This is something we really thought the TOF sensor would assist with, since it, in combination with some recognition AI, should be able to separate out the human subject quite well from the surrounding. If that were the case, though, we wouldn't be seeing quite as intensive distortion effects around the subject. All things considered, vivo seems to be under or miss--employing the TOF tech for both portraits and beauty mode.

Selfie camera quality

This is clearly a loose differentiation here, seeing how the whole idea of the Dual Display setup is to enable the user to snap selfies with the main camera setup. This is pretty nifty in more ways than one. Probably the most important benefit of capturing your likeness with a full-featured camera is the clear boost in quality you get and the PDAF, ensuring you always remain in focus.

Selfies at different distance

Well, "always" might be a bit strong here, since the NEX Dual Display is a bit sluggish when it comes to re-focusing at times. You might have to tap on the viewfinder just in case. Here are a few more "non-selfie" selfies for you to enjoy.

More selfie samples

In case you were wondering, yes, unfortunately, the weird sudden exposure changes do sometimes happen while using the NEX DD in this manner as well.

Weird random exposure changes

It does make a lot of sense since we are still using the very same camera and with the very same app. Speaking of which, however, the camera app does actually feature quite a few tweaks to cater to the rear panel and more specifically the selfie experience.

Selfie camera UI on the back screen

Of course, you still get access to all the same modes and features as on the main display only this time around (get it) these are laid out on in a much more convenient manner on a nifty rotating UI element. Also, remember the RGB array on the top rim of the camera module and those neat light effects we talked about? Well, these actually continue on the bottom rim as well. The pack of the glass hump that actually sits above the rear display. That means that the bottom half of the animation is actually handled by the rear display. You can bring it up by toggling the Portrait light mode. It clearly serves no purpose other than visual eye candy, but we still find it kind of cool. If only it didn't involve a weird glass hump on top of the rear panel.

This seems like the perfect place to mention another nifty feature the NEX Dual Display has. It is actually a rare example of both the panels working in tandem to create a good and arguably value-added experience.

Using both screens as a viewfinder at the same time

Pressing the small "split-screen" style icon in the camera UI turns on the second display. Or rather simply both of them, since you can have it work both ways. So now both panels show the viewfinder. The idea here is that your subjects might appreciate knowing if they appear good on the photo you are snapping.

Poses feature

There is also something called Pose baked right into the camera UI. What this does is bring up and overlay a photo of a certain pose on top of the camera UI. Naturally, you can also choose to place the said image on the rear panel while snapping a picture of someone else. The idea here is for easier and clear suggestions for poses and arrangements. There are quite a few locally stored images of "poses," but vivo has also included an online repository for more. Frankly, we would have almost deemed this a great idea with an awesome implementation were it not for the fact that you can not change the orientation of the pose image. Almost all of these are vertical, making horizontal camera use with a pose overlay annoying and not as helpful.

Last, but definitely not least, vivo has a couple of fill lights hidden away near the left and right edges of the camera module. These can be turned on for photo and video and are actually pretty bright. Their most obvious use, of course, would be taking selfies in the dark, since their effect is best at close range.

vivo NEX DD fill lights: Off • On • Off • On • Off • On

You can only toggle the fill lights for photos while using the rear display, for some reason. Using the photos normally leaves you with only the flash as an option to light up darker scenes.

Flash: Off • On • Off • On

Here are some more still in less than ideal lighting conditions as well.

Low-light samples

Before we move on to the video section, here is the vivo NEX Dual Display in our photo compare tool for your pixel-peeping pleasure.

vivo NEX Dual Display against the vivo NEX S and the Xiaomi Mi 8 in our Photo compare tool

Video quality

The vivo NEX Dual Display can capture up to 4K video at 60 fps. It can either get saved into the more compatible, but less efficient H264 format or you can opt for H265 HEVC for smaller file sizes at little to no cost to quality.

Camera UI

There is a dedicated video UI, complete with its own proper viewfinder and settings screen, which we definitely appreciate. One thing we find particularly odd though is that vivo went out of their way to provide extensive resolution and frame rate controls and even explain what the difference in compatibility and potential size between H264 and H265 is. All the while, there are still no clear resolution controls for stills. Weird.

Video beauty mode

One nifty extra feature trick the NEX Dual Display can pull off is having the same AI Beauty mode from the photo mode work while recording video. Again, it's a hit or miss experience, but still an impressive extra little feature.

As far as actual video quality is concerned there is very little left to be desired.

Detail, sharpness and colors all look great. The bitrate remains very stable. Dynamic range could use a bit of work, but it's nothing to fret over.

4-axis optical image stabilization is included for the main camera. It works across all recording resolutions. Walking with the phone clearly shows it trying to stabilize the footage. However, there is quite a bit of nasty Z-axis shake left behind. It almost looks like very rapid focus hunting. Definitely not ideal.

Having read vivo's claims of low-light video improvements from the secondary 2MP camera on the vivo Dual Display we definitely took it for a spin. Unfortunately, we didn't really notice any extra brightness or more detail or less noise in the end results.

Worse still, covering the small 2MP snapper did not appear to have any discernible effect on low-light video quality at all. Perhaps another case of early or unfinished software messing with our experience?

Finally, here is the vivo Dual Display in our extensive video compare database.

vivo NEX Dual Display against the vivo NEX S and the Xiaomi Mi 8 in our Video compare tool

You can download short untouched samples as well - 2160p/30fps (10s, 53MB), 1080p/30fps (10s, 23MB).