S21 Ultra vs 12 Pro Max vs Pixel 5 - Morning Camera Comparison (Photos & Videos) By In Depth Tech Reviews

Welcome back Youtube you have Emad again from In-depth tech reviews and here’s my morning camera comparison between the S21 ultra, the 12 pro max and the pixel 5, I did this comparison in a whole new way to make sure by the end of this video you will get a clear idea about each camera and which one is the best for you, keep in mind that this is the morning camera comparison and the night camera comparison will be uploaded in the upcoming weeks. So, let’s see how each camera will perform but before getting started let’s make sure to subscribe and hit the bell icon to get notified every time I post a new video. Let’s start with the landscape category, first, you can look at the labels below to know the settings used in each phone and here’s the first shot. I can immediately see the iPhone produced the brightest image followed by the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 shot is under exposed a bit too much. When it comes to colours, the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 colours are close, but the S21 Ultra is slightly more saturated, only the 12 pro max’s colours are noticeably different and the building colour is more yellow, so, which one of them is more colour accurate. To figure this out, here’s a RAW image from my Sony a6400 mirrorless camera which is the most colour accurate across all of them, I didn’t apply any edits and the shot is taken at the same time with the other 3 phones, Am gonna put it next to each one to see which phone has the most true to life colours.

From what I see the Pixel 5 has the most true to life colours, followed by the S21 Ultra while the iPhone colours have warmer tone which makes the building colour look more yellow than what it should be. Overall, it depends on your personal taste which one you like the most, I personally prefer the look coming out of the 12 Pro Max because it’s more eye catchy, the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 shots are still good to me because they more accurate colours, but both need more exposure in my opinion to look better specially the Pixel 5 as its image is too dark for my taste. And here is how the S21 Ultra’s shot will look like using the scene optimizer or in other words Samsung’s AI to enhance the scene, in my opinion it saturated the colours a bit too much, so, am gonna continue the comparison without the scene optimizer. And here’s the ultra-wide version of the same shot, they all have the same colours reproduction as their wide-angle counterparts, the S21 Ultra & the 12 Pro Max both have 12 MP sensors with 120 degrees FOV verses a 16MP sensor with 107 degrees FOV in the Pixel 5 so, you get less in the shot but with better resolution. Before comparing the details, let’s see more images to confirm if the same differences in colours reproduction will continue.

Again, the 12 pro max has the brightest image followed by the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 is the darkest. When it comes to colours accuracy the Pixel 5 still the closest to reality, followed by the S21 Ultra but with more saturated colours as expected and the 12 Pro Max’s colours are more yellow. And here’s the Ultra-wide version. One last image and the differences are consistently the same so, now we have a clear idea about the colour’s reproduction of each phone under direct sunlight, but what if we did the same in a dimmer lighting condition. Here’s the first shot under the shades, Still the 12 Pro Max and the S21 Ultra has the same levels of exposure but the Pixel 5 in this shot is not as dark as before which is better.

When it comes to colours, the trend we saw in the previous images does not exist here specially with the 12 Pro Max, in this shot the 12 pro max has the coolest image by far instead of having warmer colours as expected, the S21 Ultra’s image is too warm, with a lot of colour saturation even though the scene optimizer is turned off, the Pixel 5 is also leaning towards the warmer tones and saturated colours but not as aggressive as the S21 Ultra. Comparing that to the reference image from my Sony a6400, none of them is close to reality but the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5 are the best options in my opinion, while the S21 Ultra is far from accurate. One more shot under the same condition, the Pixel 5 and the 12 Pro max both have much cooler white balance compared to the S21 Ultra, and both are the closest to reality when it comes to colours, the S21 Ultra still has the warmest white balance with more saturated colours so, it’s not as accurate as the other 2 phones. In the shadows, I found the ultra-wide versions of the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 look noticeably different from their wide-angle counter parts, In the case of the S21 Ultra, the ultrawide has cooler tone and less saturated colours than the wide angle so, the photos look better, The ultrawide of the Pixel 5 on the other hand is has warmer tone than the wide angle and this behaviour didn’t take place in photos under direct sunlight, while the 12 Pro Max’s ultra-wide versions look almost the same as the wide angle which is a plus as you won’t get two different looking photos from the same phone. So, that will take us to the following conclusion, under direct sunlight the 12 Pro Max will always produce the brightest image, with warmer tone so, the colours have a yellow tint which is not that accurate, but overall, it produces the best-looking images in my opinion.

The Pixel 5 will always produce the darkest image, with high colour accuracy but, overall, the image looks dull and washed out. The S21 Ultra is somewhere in between the two when it comes to the exposure and the colour accuracy is good. In the shadows, the iPhone will have cooler tones than expected, with good colour accuracy. The Pixel 5 sometimes lean towards warmer tones and sometimes towards cooler tones which is not consistent, but it has good colour accuracy overall. The S21 Ultra images are too warm and the colours are saturated so, they are far from being colour accurate with the exception to the Ultra-wide lens that has more balanced colours and white balance.

So, these are my findings but at the end of the day choosing one over the other is subjective and depends mainly on your personal taste so, you will be the judge which camera you like more and please let me know in the comments which one is your camera of choice. Now let’s compare the details. This is the 1st shot I compared earlier, now, let’s zoom in to see the difference in detail. Right of the bat, The S21 Ultra has a lot of software sharpening so the details look artificial while the Pixel 5 and the 12 Pro Max have more natural looking details, with the edge going to the iPhone over the Pixel 5 for its higher level of detail, so, the win goes to the 12 pro max followed by the Pixel 5 and the S21 Ultra comes third. But this is not the full potential of the S21 Ultra, switching to the 108MP mode adds a lot more details without software sharpening so it looks as natural as the other 2 phones and even better due to the higher resolution.

So, in this case the win goes to the S21 Ultra, followed by the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5 comes third. When it comes to the ultra-wide, the Pixel 5 is definitely the winner here thanks to the higher resolution, the 12 Pro Max comes next with decent amount of details while preserving the natural look as we saw earlier, and the S21 Ultra once more is using aggressive software sharpening that makes the details look un-natural but this time there isn’t 108MP to make things better. So, overall, in this category, if we gonna put the looks aside, The S21 Ultra should be the winner as it can shoot impressive amount of details using the 108MP mode, the 12 Pro Max comes 2nd if the S21 Ultra is set to 108MP but at the 12 MP resolution the iPhone was better, the Pixel 5 comes third as it produced very soft images that lacks details. In the ultra-wide shots, the Pixel 5 produced the highest level of detail but it has a narrower field of view and because of this I will give the win to the 12 Pro Max as it will give you wider field of view and still preserving a very good amount of detail, and I will call it a draw between the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 as the S21 Ultra was better in the FOV while the Pixel 5 was better in the level of detail. And when it comes to the looks, I think most people will prefer the 12 Pro Max for its brighter images and the consistent results coming from the wide & ultra-wide lenses, followed by the S21 Ultra as it’s images are bright enough but not as bright as the 12 Pro Max plus there are inconsistences between the wide and the ultrawide lenses, the Pixel 5 will come third for its darker images and also inconsistent results between the two lenses.

But, This is just an assumption based on my personal experience. Now, let’s move on to the HDR comparison. Here’s the first shot and let’s start with the sun, I see the 12 Pro Max and the S21 Ultra are equally good in handling the sun while the Pixel 5 shot is slightly blown out. Moving down towards the subject and here the Pixel 5 shows a lot of noise, but the subject is well exposed which is a plus. The 12 Pro Max did well when it comes to the level of noise even at extreme zoom levels, but the subject is under exposed.

So am gonna call it a draw between the two And the S21 Ultra was the best, first there is almost zero noise in the shot even when I zoom in extensively, secondly the subject is well exposed and I can clearly see the details in the shadows. Let’s see another shot, here all of them handled the shadows really well but, the Pixel 5 was the best in handling the highlights by far which is unexpected based on the previous image, the S21 Ultra was the 2nd best and the 12 Pro Max was the worst. Let’s see one final shot in a more challenging condition, here the 12 Pro Max was the best by far, as the clouds are clearly visible through the cut out, the Pixel 5 was the 2nd best as I can barely see the clouds, while the S21 Ultra’s shot is completely blown out, I tried to take this shot on the S21 Ultra many times, I also tried to tap to focus on the cut out in the ceiling but with no joy. So, in the wide angle HDR I will call it a draw between the 3, the S21 Ultra was the best in the first shot, the Pixel 5 was the best in the second and the iPhone handled the 3rd really well. Let’s take a look at the HDR of the ultra-wide lens, the results are pretty much the same as the wide angle but this time the 12 Pro Max handled the sun better than the S21 Ultra, while the S21 Ultra was better in exposing the subject so, am gonna call it a draw between the two and the Pixel 5 comes next.

One more shot, and this time the Pixel 5 is the worst, it was the best in the same condition using the wide-angle, but things changed completely with the ultra-wide lens. The 12 Pro Max is the best this time followed by the S21 Ultra. So, the 12 Pro Max is the winner when it comes to the ultrawide HDR, followed by the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 comes third. Now, let’s move on to the portraits. In this category am gonna compare colours, subject isolation, portraits with moving objects and portraits with the sun in the background.

Let’s start with the difference in colours, we already talked about how each phone process colours in the landscape category, so, let’s put them side by side with my Sony’s a6400 reference photo to see if they do the same in portraits. In direct sunlight the results are the same as what we have seen in landscape shots, the 12 Pro Max has warmer tone, the Pixel 5 has the most true to life colours and The S21 Ultra is very similar to the Pixel 5 but with more saturated colours Let’s see one more portrait in the shadows, the Pixel 5 image was too cool, the 12 Pro Max has a cooler tone than its previous image but not as cool as the Pixel 5 and the S21 Ultra had a warmest image. Based on the reference photo the S21 Ultra has the most natural looking portrait followed by the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5 is the least accurate. Now let’s compare the subject isolation, the first difference I see is in the blur effect, the 12 Pro Max has the most natural looking bokeh, the Pixel 5 is the second best while the S21 Ultra’s blur effect looks unnatural. The second difference I see is in how each phone applies the blur effect, the Pixel 5 is using one lens, so, the software isolated all the padlocks in the scene, kept them in focus then blurred the background, while the other 2 phones blur objects based on how far they are from the camera which is more realistic.

Other than this all phones preformed equally good. Let’s see a more challenging situation, in this shot the 12 Pro Max didn’t even activate the portrait mode and it took a normal shot, the Pixel 5 blurred the background but missed a lot of areas between the gears, the S21 Ultra was the best as it blurred all the areas without any issues which is impressive, usually phones face a hard time dealing with objects like this. Now, lets see how things will go with the sun in the background, once more the iPhone didn’t activate the portrait mode, the Pixel 5 blurred the right side only and the left side is completely in focus and the S21 ultra once more did an amazing job in identifying the subject and blurring background properly producing a very good-looking portrait. One more portrait with the sun behind, the S21 Ultra was the best, the subject is well exposed, and it blurred the background nicely, the Pixel 5 produced impressive results as well, but the subject is slightly under exposed, the 12 Pro Max activated the portrait mode this time but the subject is over exposed and washed out. Finally, let’s see a portrait of a moving object, in this scenario the Pixel 5 and the 12 Pro Max managed to blur the running water which is impressive, and this is the only scenario where the S21 Ultra lacked behind it missed to blur the water and I tried many times to make this happen, but it didn’t work.

Now let’s compare the selfies, the first difference I see is in the skin tone, the S21 Ultra and the Pixel 5 have natural skin tones as the beauty mode is turned off, while the 12 Pro Max doesn’t have a beauty mode option but it’s certainly using a beauty mode behind the scenes as my skin is softened and the tone is unrealistic. So, let’s compare it with my Son‎y’s a6400 RAW image, sorry I couldn’t align the a6400’s image because of the different resolution and field of view so, I took a small piece from the image to compare the skin tone and the colours. From what I see the Pixel 5 has the most natural skin tone followed by the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max is far from realistic And the S21 Ultra is the best in handling the black colour as you see my t-shirt and face mask look almost the same as in my Sony‎’s image while in the other 2 photos the black colour is washed out. So, I think the subject looks the best in the S21 Ultra’s image because the blacks are on point, and the skin tone is a tad different from the reference photo. The Pixel 5 is the 2nd best as it handled the skin tone better than the other 2 phones, but the blacks are washed out.

And the 12 Pro Max comes third due to its forced beauty mode that makes the skin look unnatural plus it couldn’t handle the black colour well. The second difference is in the background exposure, colours and white balance, the S21 Ultra over exposed the highlights and the trees look washed out with low colour saturation and cooler tones, while the sky colour is accurate. The 12 Pro Max has better exposure than the S21 Ultra but the colours are saturated, with warmer white balance. The Pixel 5 exposure is on point and the colours are well balanced in terms of saturation, but there is a pink hue in the shot. Next the details, the S21 Ultra has a 40mp mode for the selfie camera which is used in this shot and yes it has the most detailed image but the 12 pro max did a great job using it’s 12 MP sensor, I can barely see a difference between the two, the Pixel 5 has an 8MP sensor and the details are less than the other 2 phone but the results are not bad for the resolution.

So when it comes to the details the win goes to the S21 Ultra, followed by the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5 comes third. And finally, the HDR, I see all of them did a great job, but the Pixel 5 colours are washed out with more contrast than the other 2 phones. So, beside the looks the win goes to the s21 ultra, followed by the 12 pro max and the pixel 5 comes third. But if the 12 Pro Max’s hidden beauty mode is a showstopper for you, the S21 Ultra will be the best option followed by the Pixel 5 Selfie Portraits Next the selfie portraits, and here’s the first shot, I see the S21 Ultra has the most natural looking colours and skin tone, the Pixel 5 added more contrast to the shot so, my skin tone is not as natural as in the S21 Ultra’s shot plus the black and white colours are muted, the 12 Pro Max still using it’s hidden beauty mode so my skin tone is unnatural and the white balance is leaning towards warmer tones. And when it comes to the subject isolation the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max are equally good while the Pixel 5 blurred a small portion of my ears.

In selfie portraits the S21 Ultra has a maximum resolution of 10 MP, the 12 Pro Max is 7.2 and the Pixel 5 has the same 8MP resolution, the 12 Pro Max shows the same level of detail as the S21 Ultra despite its lower resolution and the Pixel 5 has the softest image that lacks details. And in the HDR performance the S21 Ultra was the best followed by the 12 Pro Mac and the Pixel 5 comes third. So, If we gonna put the looks aside the win goes to the S21 Ultra for the best HDR performance plus it had the same performance as the 12 Pro Max in subject isolation and details, the 12 Pro Max comes 2nd for having slightly worse HDR performance followed by the Pixel 5 as it lacked behind in the three areas. Next the zoom comparison, and in this category am gonna only compare the level of detail and ignore anything else. And here’s the first 7x shot to match the maximum zoom level of the Pixel 5.

As expected, the S21 Ultra is the best thanks to the 10MP 3x telephoto lens, the 12 pro max comes second using its 12MP 2.5x telephoto lens and the pixel 5 is the worst as it’s only using the main sensor. Moving towards the 12x which is the maximum zoom level of the 12 pro max, the S21 Ultra is now using the 10x periscope so, the quality improved instead of being worse after zooming in, the 12 pro max quality started to fall apart but still slightly better than the pixel 5 even at higher zoom level. Let’s go even further and here’s the 30x zoomed image and the quality still better than the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5 which is insane. Here’s the 50x and the quality still better Finally, the 100x and shockingly the quality still better than the other 2 phones, so the S21 Ultra zoom capabilities are insane and no other phone is even close. Now, let’s talk about the videos, in this category am gonna show you how the videos look like using the maximum resolution and frame rates every phone can get in each mode.

In this sample all phones are set to 4k60, the S21 Ultra’s HDR10+ and the 12 Pro Max’s 10-bit Dolby Vison HDR both are turned off as I don’t have the tools to edit these videos and the Pixel 5 doesn’t have any HDR settings. As far as I see the S21 Ultra has the most saturated colours, the Pixel 5 footage is the least saturated and the 12 Pro Max is somewhere in between, the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max have almost the same exposure while the Pixel 5 is slightly darker, all videos are smooth, and I didn’t notice any rolling shutter, for the HDR & stabilization am gonna talk about them in detail later in this video. Now let’s try the 8k resolution of the S21 Ultra, it has the same colours reproduction as the 4k video but there are a lot of other differences, first you get a maximum of 24 frames per second so,you won’t get the same versatility of the 4k videos that have a lot more frame rates to choose from, the video is cropped so, the field of view is noticeably narrower than the other 2 phones, the 8k resolution is hardly supported on other devices and the video size is extremely big, the only advantage you get with 8K videos is the more details Now let,s move on to the ultrawide videos, the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max are set to 4k60 while the Pixel 5 can shoot at maximum resolution of 4k30 so, it won’t be as smooth as the other 2 phones, also the field of view of the Pixel 5 is 107 degrees vs 120 degrees in the other 2 phones, the colours reproduction of all phones is no different from what we have seen in the wide angle videos. Now let’s compare the HDR starting with the wide angle lens, in this comparison am gonna pick the most challenging scenario to push each phone to its limits, before starting the video playback you can clearly see the Pixel 5 and the S21 Ultra have a good start and the highlights are somehow visible, while 12 Pro Max started with a blown out highlights, let’s start the play back to see how things will change, after 5 seconds exactly I can clearly see the highlights in the Pixel 5 and the S21 Ultra videos while the 12 Pro max still struggling, let’s continue and after 3 more seconds things started to be clear on the 12 Pro Max but not as good as the other 2 phones, also the Pixel 5 is the best at this stage, so take a look at this area and you will see it’s more visible in the Pixel 5 video, starting from this point all phones caught up and everything is clear, but the win goes to the Pixel 5 followed by the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max comes third. Let’s do the same with the ultrawide lens, this time the S21 Ultra has a slightly better start than the Pixel 5 and the 12 Pro Max still the worst, other than this I see pretty much the same HDR performance as in the wide angle.

So, with the ultrawide the S21 Ultra was a tad better than the Pixel 5 and the 12 Pro Max comes third Next the video stabilization, and here I have a whole video comparing the stabilization of the 3 phones by mounting all of them on a FPV drone to see how good each one in handling the extreme movements, so, if you want to check it out please click the link showing now on the screen or in the description below. But to sum up the 12 Pro Max was the best performer using the wide angle lens at 4k30 fps without any special stabilization modes, The Pixel 5 was the best after using the it’s active stabilization mode but the video resolution was 1080p at 30 frames per second, finally the 12 Pro Max once more was the best using the ultra wide lens at 4k60 frames per second. Talking about the stabilization, the Pixel 5 has 2 extra modes that don’t exist in the other 2 phones, the first one is the cinematic pan that can allow you to take cinematic videos like the one shown now on the screen, it records the video at 60 frames and slow it down to half speed to give you this cinematic look. The second one is called locked which can shoot very steady zoomed videos, so, here is a 5x zoomed video on all phones handheld and as you see the Pixel 5 footage is stable as if the phone is on a tripod while my hand shake is visible in the other 2 phones. Finally let’s compare videos using the front facing camera, First, the S21 Ultra and the 12 Pro Max can record at 4k60 while the Pixel 5 can shoot at 1080p30 frames per second, the S21 Ultra’s HDR was the best, the 12 pro max comes second as the sky and the subject were slightly blown out, and the Pixel 5 comes third as the highlights were totally blown out plus my skin tone was unnatural Now am done with my comparison So, let’s sum up everything, if we gonna focus only on the fundamentals keeping any extra features aside, the S21 Ultra was the best in most categories and it deserves to be the winner, The 12 pro max lacked behind the S21 Ultra in some areas but, it was a very strong competitor and the pixel 5 comes third and I don’t blame the Pixel 5 for the third position as it costs $700 less than the other 2 phones, this difference alone can get you another 5G phone, but I blame Google for not releasing a flagship this year so, hopefully the Pixel 6 will keep up with the competition.

So, that’s pretty much it for today that was my morning camera comparison between the S21 Ultra, the 12 Pro Max and the Pixel 5, so, stay tuned for the night camera comparison in the upcoming week. So, I hope you like my video and if you do please hit the subscribe button and subscribe for more videos, thank you for watching.

Source : In Depth Tech Reviews