Music Hey guys it’madan from Tecworkz, and in this video, let us compare the cameras on the OnePlus Nord with the ones on the POCOX2 and the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max. We have to look at over 80 image and video samples from these 3 phones, including a few Gcam samples, so we are not going to waste a lot of time looking at the specs of all these cameras. Let us just look at the main ones, and I will talk about the rest while we are looking at the image samples.
OnePlus
OnePlus
The main camera on the OnePlus Nord gets a48 Megapixel Sony IMX586 sensor. This is the same sensor as the Oneplus 8,7T Pro, 7T, 7 and 7 Pro, but since the processor and ISP are different on all these phones, their camera performance is also not the same. POCO X2 comes with a 64 Megapixel Sony IMX686sensor, which is actually the successor to the IMX 586 sensor on the Nord. And the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max also gets a 64Megapixel primary camera, but this is Samsung’s ISOCELL GW1 Sensor, which is again a new camera sensor.
The OnePlus Nord costs the most, but it also gets the oldest sensor with a lower megapixel count than the others for its main camera. Does that mean it already lags behind Poco X2 and the Note 9 Pro Max in the camera department? or will its newer processor help it deliver better results than the other 2? Let’s find out. But before we head over to the image and video samples, if you are new to this channel, please make sure to hit the subscribe button and the bell icon next to it.
That way you won’t miss out on any of the amazing videos coming up on this channel. We will start with the day time image samples. Since it is monsoon season in my city, all the images are in rainy and overcast lighting conditions.
We know that all 3 can take very good images in bright sunny lighting conditions. If you want to take a look at the images in bright lighting conditions, you should check out my detailed camera reviews of these 3phones. I will leave cards to them on the top right corner of the screen, and also link them in the description section.
Redmi Note 9 Pro
All are capturing a lot of details but there is a difference in the way they capture colours.
POCO X2 captures a very weird green tint in some of the shots like this. colours from the Nord and Note 9 Pro Max are closer to how the scene actually looked. In this shot, there are more details in the shadows in the image from the OnePlus Nord, and its image also looks better overall.
POCO X2
Out of the 3, POCO X2 is capturing the most saturated colours. Everyone perceives colours in a different way, so which one of these images you like, will depend on your colour preference. There isn’t a big difference between the note 9 Pro Max and the Nord, but to my eyes, colours from the Nord look more natural.
Again you can see that weird shift in colour from the POCO X2. This issue has been there since the last couple of software updates. I hope people at POCO are aware of and are working on fixing it. There is also more contrast in the images from the POCO X2 and Note 9 Pro compared to the Nord.
It also captures a bit cooler colour tones, whereas the Redmi and POCO tend to lean on capturing warmer colours. If we zoom in, we see the images from Note 9 Pro max and POCO X2 have added a bit of artificial sharpening, which also results in more grain or noise in their images. Whereas the one from Nord looks a bit softer in comparison.
But you will notice all this only when you zoom in 3-4 times, which is not we normally do with all images on our smartphone. What you might notice without zooming in is the dynamic range these phones capture.
Nord ended up capturing more details in the shadows compared to the other 2. All these do good enough with the HDR mode, so I kept the auto HDR on the POCO and Note 9 Pro Max, and Ultra Shot HDR on the Nord in the Auto mode all the time.
Again the difference is not much but the Nordis showing more details in the shadows and also preserving the highlights. For this shot, Note 9 Pro Max showed the best dynamic range.
In this shot, again Nord showed the best dynamic range. Its subject shows more details and the highlights in its image are not blown out.
Now you can use Gcam on all three phones to take better HDR shots. You can see Gcam improves the HDR shots on the Redmi and POCO by a big margin, and it improves the colours in the shot from the one plus Nord. Here is another Gcam shot from all 3 phones with HDR enhanced turned on. Here one from the Nord did much better than the other 2.
There are more details in the shadows in its image, and colours also look more pleasing.
Clicking images outside, Gcam on the Note 9 Pro Max is the one that ends up capturing most details, followed by the POCO X2 and then the Nord captured the softest images. One from the Nord is also showing very warm colours with the Gcam. Look at these images and try to decide for yourself, which one looks better to you.
Coming to the close-up shots, all 3 do a good job of keeping the subject in focus. POCO X2 is the slowest one to set the focus for these shots. Nord has a slightly wider aperture, but the sensor on the other 2 is larger so the background in their close up shots is blurred out a bit more.
The minimum focusing distance seems to be the best on the Note 9 Pro Max. It means, with it, you can get much closer to the subject and still be able to set the focus.
It also captures better colours while taking close up shots. If you want to get even closer to the subject, all 3 gets macro cameras, but the Nord and POCO X2 get 2-megapixel sensors which done capture enough details. While the Note 9 Pro Max gets a 5-megapixel microsensor, making its images stand out and look better. With the Nord, you can’t even get as close to the subject as you could with the other 2. Now there is a fix to take a better macro shot on all these phones.
Instead of using the Macro camera, you can use the primary camera and digitally zoom in 2-3 times, and those images look much better than these lower resolution macro shots.
I am showing these shots from the OnePlus Nord, but you can do this on all 3 phones. Like the Macro lens, all 3 also get an an8-megapixel camera with a wide lens, and here are how those images look, compared to ones from the primary camera.
This lens lets you capture more of the scene compared to the normal lens from the same spot. The wide shots are sharpest from the OnePlus Nord, and it also captures the best dynamic range. You might have noticed the change in colour and white balance as we switch from the main to the wide lens on all these phones.
This is the main issue with lower and-budget phones, manufacturers don’t spend a lot of time in matching the colour temperature and while the balance between these lenses. Images from these wide lenses are also not as sharp as the ones from the primary camera Because the sensors and lens optics for these cameras aren’t as good as the primary ones.
I wish all manufacturers stop wasting money in the depth and the macro camera and include a better quality wide lens which could also take good macro shots.
While none of these phones gets a telephoto lens, You can still take 2x digitally zoomed-in shots on all 3 phones. Ones from the OnePlus Nord seem to be the sharpest in this case as well.
They might look a bit soft if you don’tzoom in on them, but that is because the other 2 are trying to apply artificial sharpening to make their zoomed-in shots look more detailed, But that also brings up a lot of noise.
All the images from the primary sensor have been 16-megapixel pixel binned ones from the POCO X2 and the Note 9 Pro Max and 12-megapixel ones from the OnePlus Nord. But all 3 let us take higher resolution images as well. Here are 48-megapixel images from Nord and64 megapixel images from the POCO and Redmi compared side by side.
64 Megapixel images from the Note 9 Pro max are showing the most details, while the 48-megapixel images from the Nord are very soft in these defused lighting conditions. As we zoom in, you can see there is barely any sharpness in the Nords’ 48-megapixel images when compared to the other 2.
If you plan on taking a lot of higher resolution images, Redmi Note 9 Pro max gives you the best possible results. You should also know that these images are3-4 times larger in terms of the file size, and to see any difference between these and the pixel binned images, you will have to zoom in 4-5 times.
Considering all this, I feel it is best to stick with the default 12-megapixel images on the OnePlus Nord and 16-megapixel ones on the other 2 for almost all of your shots. Coming to the portrait shots.
All three are good at detecting the edges of your main subject and separating them from the background. But if I had to choose, I will say POCO and note 9 Pro Maxise doing a better job. OnePlus Nord misses out on some strands of hair as you see here, in most of its portrait shots, and some people are also calling ghosting.
While in reality, those are just undetectedstrands of hair. You can take zoomed-in portraits with the Nord, but there are just digitally zoomed in and the actual subject is very soft in the zoomed-in portrait shots. Nord also takes the longest to detect the edges and for these portrait shots.
Even tough Nord is not the best at edge detection, dynamic range is best in its portrait shots. Look at how well the Nord managed the highlights in the background, while the other 2 blew them up. Now thanks to the amazing software processing, you can take portrait shots even if you cover the depth sensor on all 3 phones. But on the POCO and Redmi, there is a bit less bokeh or blurred area in the background if you cover the depth sensor, where,s on the Nord, results are the same if you cover the depth sensor or not.
This has got many people outraged, OnePlus has really included this depth and macro sensor just so that can say that Nord gets a quad camera setup.
While the camera on the Nord is pretty good, it is getting a bad repo because OnePlus tried to mislead people with these 2 useless cameras. Anyways, switching to Gcam on all 3 will give you much sharper looking subjects and a much better dynamic range and overall better-looking portrait shots.
If you have the POCO X2 or the Redmi Note9 Pro max, and you want to improve your portray shots, use a good Gcam mod and see your phone take so much better portrait shots.
The only downside is, you can’t see how the portraits are going to turn out before you click them. You will have to wait until after you have clicked the image, to see if the edge detection is accurate or not.
The Note 9 Pro Max and POCO X2 get a movie mode.
This lets you take 21:9 wide portrait shots with black bars at the top and bottom. This gives these portrait shots a very nice cinematic feel. Just make sure to take these shots in plenty of light, else there will be a lot of grain or noise on your main subject.
All 3 can take a portrait of objects, and edge detection is even better while taking portraits of objects. Other than the slightly different colours from all 3 and slightly less contrast in the images from the OnePlus Nor d, theses portraits of objects look equally good from all 3 phones.
I am very impressed with these phones because they even managed to detect and separate the black turn wheel on top of this fire hydrant. It is black and there is a dark tree behind it, but they still did a good job keeping it in focus. Occasionally they might miss out on keeping some parts of the subject in focus, but the portraits of objects from all are very good for the most part.
Now let us move to images shot in lower and artificial lighting conditions. All 3 can take good images when there is some ambient light around.
Some people might have you believe that the indoor low light performance of the OnePlus Nord is really bad, but that not the case.
You can look for yourself the kind of images can take.
It is actually taking brighter, sharper images with less noise compared to the other 2, in these indoor artificial lighting conditions.
In this shot, Nord tried to cool the colours in the image, while the Note 9 Pro Max and POCO X2 are showing actual colour of the light in this lobby. We see this in most of the Nord’s low light images.
It tries to cool down the warm lights. Other than that, as we zoom in Nord has captured the most details while adding the least amount of noise in the overall shot.
As we get to even lower light, Note 9 Pro Max and POCO X2 seem to be taking slightly brighter images than the OnePlus Nord. All 3 phons get the night mode for even lower lighting conditions, and with it turned on, Nord ended up capturing the most amount of details. Even when there is some light around, you can use the Night mode on these phones to make them capture more details and less noise.
It was raining while taking these images, so the Note 9 Pro Max and POCO X2 barely captured any details in the scene at all, while the Nord still did a pretty good job. Its images get even better with the night mode turned on. For some reason, Redmi and POCO made this scene look much darker than it actually was.
But they added a lot of light when the nightmare was turned on. Still, Nord is the one which ended up capturing most details in this shot.
OnePlus Nord also handles the exposure from lights in a better way, both with and without the night mode turned on, and look at how good its image is looking compared to the other 2.
Now you guys wanted me to include the low light Gcam samples in this video, so here are the Gcam samples from all 3 phones, with night mode, turned on. Again, images from the OnePlus Nord are the sharpest and most detailed amongst all 3.
It also captured noticeably less noise in these night mode images compared to the other 2. And overall its Low light shots look better, both with the stock camera app and even with the Google Camera app. One thing to keep in mind, if you have people in your shot while taking night mode images, ask them to be very still for 3-4 seconds, because any movement, results in a blurry looking night mode shot.
That brings us to the front-facing cameras. Nord and the Note 9 Pro Max get 32-megapixel front-facing cameras, while the POCO X2 comes with the 20-megapixel selfie camera. All 3 can take sharp selfies, with a lot of details.
Nord has a tendency to overexpose the selfies, so in most of these shots, I had to tap on my face to help it expose better. And in some selfies, POCO X2 has added a sepia like an effect out of nowhere.
I feel the Nord is capturing the most natural-looking selfie followed very closely by the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max.
Nord gets a secondary wide camera at the front, which lets you take much wider selfies. This comes in handy when you want to get more of your friends in the shot.
Again you can see that Nord is having the most balanced colours in this selfie, and POCO again tried to introduce that weird warm tint in its image. All 3 can take portrait selfies as well. POCO X2 gets a secondary depth sensor for this, which I think is just as useless as the rear depth sensor on the OnePlus Nord. Because even without it other 2 are doing an equally good job of detecting the edges accurately.
Again looking at the skin tones, overall colours and the dynamic range, I like the Portrait selfies from the OnePlus Nord.
Since the background is blurred out and just the face is in focus, we get an illusion that the portrait selfies are sharper than the normal ones.
Here is a video from the front-facing cameras on the POCO X2, OnePlus Nord and the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max. You can see how all these phones are handling overall colours of the scene, exposure and stabilisation when I am walking around with them. All 3 can take 4K 30fps videos with their rear primary cameras.
Ones from the OnePlus Nord and POCO X2 are electronically stabilised, while the one from Redmi Note 9 Pro Max is not. If you want stabilisation on the Note 9 Pro max, you will have to drop the resolution down to 1080p. These videos are extremely stable from all 3 phones.
Now, these are rainy and overcast conditions, so not exactly the ideal conditions to show the actual video capabilities of these phones, but if I had to choose one, I will go with the Nord for shooting all my videos.
So after looking at well over 75 image and video samples, you might have a pretty good idea of which one takes better images in which conditions. For Selfies and Low Ligh,t OnePlus Nord is better.
In normal daytime, all are almost on the same level, but Nord captures more natural-looking colours with a much better dynamic range than the other 2. Macros are best from the 5-megapixels sensor of the Note 9 Pro Max, but you can use the trick that I mentioned to get better macros from any phone.
For Portraits, I again choose the Nord because of the dynamic range that it captures, and with the Gcam installed, it gets even better.
Nord is again better at shooting videos. So yes OnePlus Nord is definitely better in this comparison, but the difference is not that much. Other than in dynamic range, if you are not looking at these images side by side, you won’t notice a big difference between them straight away.
If you are looking to get the best camera phone amongst these 3, OnePlus Nord is the one to get. But if you have a budget of under 20K, You can go with the POCO X2 or the Redmi Note 9 Pro Max, and you will still end up with a very capable set of cameras.
Personally, If I was looking to choose between the POCO X2 and Redmi Note 9 Pro max, I would go with the Redmi, just because POCO seems to have messed up the cameras on the X2 with the last few software updates. Well, you guys saw all these images too, so who do you think did the best? let me know in the comments.
And if you are still undecided, or if you don't agree with my analysis of these images, you can go back to the start of the video, Mute it, watch it in the highest
the resolution that your device supports
(preferably on a bigger screen), and draw your own conclusions that way. If you end up liking any one of these phones and would like to purchase them, I will really appreciate it if you get it from the affiliate links in the description section.
That is it for this video guys. Please hit the like button if you enjoyed this video, and subscribe to the channel for more quality tech videos like this. You can also check out some of the other videos from this channel. This has been Sagar, and I will catch you guys in the next video, Take care.
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