Hey guys it’s Sagar from Tecworkz, and hereis my very detailed camera review of the 2020 iPhone SE. I have had this phone for about 10 days, andin that time I have put it through rigorous Tecworkz style camera test. Till now I have clicked close to 750 imagesand videos
with it in various lighting conditions, and I am going to share about 70 of thosein this video, so you guys know how this camera performs in every one of these situations. Now the iPhone SE gets just 2 camera, oneat the front and one at the back. Looking at what other
manufacturers are doingby adding 3,4 or even 5 cameras just at the back of their phone, even thinking of a phonehaving a single camera sounds a bit out dated. With this phone Apple wants to show us thatthe number of cameras don’t mater, and you can achieve plenty with even a single rearcamera and a very capable processor and software combo to back it up.
Is this true, or is this going to be justanother average camera? Let’s find out. The one and only camera at the back gets thesame sensor as the iPhone 8 and the iPhone X. It is a 12 megapixel sensor with F/1.8 apertureand it gets optical image stabilisation.
It can shoot 4K videos at 24/30/60fps, 1080pvideos at 30/60/120/240fps, and 720p videos at 30fps. The front facing camera is also the same asthe iPhone 8. It gets a 7 megapixel sensor with F/2.2 aperture,and it can only record 1080p videos at 30fps.
These specs sound a bit underwhelming, butthe image signal processing on the A13 bionic chip and the computational photography features,give the new SE a totally different photography experience.
Interface of the camera app is similar towhat we saw on the iPhone 11 and the 11 Pro, with a few exceptions. Since this phone just has one camera, thereis no lens selection button, and there is no night mode option on this phone. Before we move on to the image and video samples,if you are new to this channel, please make sure to hit the subscribe button and the belicon next to it. That way,
you wont miss out on any of theamazing videos on this channel. As I mentioned at the start, I took a lotof images in various lighting conditions, but we are going to start with the ones thatI took in bright day light. I am going to be honest with you guys, whenI went out to take these images, I had already dismissed the camera on this phone by lookingat its specs, and I wasn’t expecting too much from it. But as I started taking these images,
I wassurprised by how well they turned out. You can see for yourself how good these imageslook. Although this is just 12 megapixel sensor,that too a 2 and a half to 3 year old one, it can capture plenty of details. Even as I zoom in on this image, you can seehow sharp the image is. On the 1st day, the weather was bright andsunny, and on the very next day, it was raining and completely overcast. Which is actually good because I got to seehow the SE performed in these situations.
And just as I expected, it did not disappoint. Even in this diffused light, it kept on capturingdetailed images, and wonderful looking colours. Speaking of colours, like in typical Applefashion, they are very well balanced, and not overly saturated. No matter the lighting conditions, the whitebalance is perfect in each of these shots,
and the colours look exactly as they werein real life. Now this is one of my favourite shots fromthe iPhone SE. This was one of the 1st shots I took withit, and I wasn’t too sure if it would turn out even half as good as it actually did. Looking at everything from the colours todetailed and dynamic range is just amazing in this shot, and this is when I knew thatthis phone is no joke when it comes to the camera. I like that instead of saturating them andadding a lot of contrast,
Apple chooses to keep the colours looking natural. If you don’t like how they look, you canalways edit these images and make them look however you want. The one touch edit option in the built ineditor works like a charm. Thanks to the next gen SmartHDR, Dynamic rangein these images is very impressive. Again this is the same sensor from the iPhone8 and the iPhone X, but I have used both those phones, and I don’t remember the dynamicrage on those phones being so good. So this is all thanks to the A13’s imagesignal processing and iOS 13. Just look at these shots, there is so muchinformation in the shadows, and highlights are also not blown. This is another one of my favourite images. We are going to look at it again later on,but for now look at the colours of the sky, and how well this phone did to capture somany details in the shadows and in the sky.
Coming to close up shots. Again, these look amazing. Just as you would expect form a good camera,just pull it out, walk up to your subject, it sets the focus without any hesitation ortrying too hard, and within a flash you have such good looking close up shots. Now it is monsoon season, so you are goingto see lot of water drop shots in my videos, but leaving that aside, try to analyse thisshot.
It was still raining, so the droplets werechanging continuously, and the trees in the background were also moving because it waspretty windy. But the iPhone SE has no problem taking thisshot. I also had the OnePlus 8 at this time, andwhile it ended up taking the shot, it took a lot longer to set the focus. You can see the subject closest to the camera,or the part that I tap,
Look at how well it separates the subjectfrom the background. It still missed to keep some strands of hairin these shots in focus, but it was windy when I took these shots, so I wont read toomuch into it. And I am really happy with the portrait shotsfrom this iPhone SE.
The only disappointing part for me is, youcan’t take portrait mode shots of objects. This was same on the iPhone XR. Since both of them have single camera, thesoftware needs to detect a face in the frame so it can separate it from the background. Other than that, I dint find the portraitmode on this phone to be any different from the portrait mode on the iPhone 11, and thatis saying a lot. Now moving on to images in artificial andlower lighting conditions. It does well and manages to keep the imageslooking good, even as the light starts to go down,
a few extra milliseconds, which results in very usable images. But as the light lets lower, more and morenoise started to creep in these images. Even then, some of its images turn out tobe phenomenal. We have seen this image before, but this timefocus on low light aspect of it. The sun had almost set, and it was
gettingpretty dark for a smartphones camera, but the SE still managed to pull out this incredibleimage.
When there is ample light around, it stillmanages to take good images, with colours looking as they are in real life. But as we zoom in, we see a lot of noise,and very less details in the dark areas. Unlike the iPhone 11, there is no night modeon this phone.
It has the same A13 processor as the iPhone11 series, and I am sure night mode depends on software rather than on the camera sensor,so Apple could have enabled it on this phone. But for some reason, they did not. Leaving this phone in the dark, pun intended. Now even without the night mode,
if thereis some ambient light, you can take good looking images with it. Honestly, so far, the low light performancehas been the only underwhelming part of this camera, that too when you are in very lowlighting conditions. If you are in indoors or at some place thereis plenty of ambient light,
it can still take good images. That brings us to the front facing camera. Before the iPhone11, I was never too happywith the selfie camera on the iPhones. And since this phone again uses the same sensoras the iPhone 8, I was not expecting to like it, but once again I was wrong. I was judging it based on the on paper specs,and those don’t tell the complete story. Look at these selfies,
they are sharp, coloursand skin tones look good, and even as I zoom in, we see them being very detailed. Apple’s is doing some magic in the background,and that is making all these images look really good. Even the portrait selfies are amazing fromthis phone.
This doesn’t have the true depth sensorarray like on the iPhone X, XR, or the 11, so all of the blurring is achieved via software,and I would say it is going a really good job. Unlike other android phones that we saw insome of my recent videos, this iPhone SE manages to capture really good dynamic range in theseportrait selfies.
Now this phone is doing better then the iPhone11, when I have multiple faces in these portrait selfies. because the iPhone 11 just blurryout the 2nd face even if it is just a few centimetres behind me, but the iPhone SE isdoing well to keep it in focus as well. So the Selfie camera gets a thumbs up fromme. Here is a video from the front facing cameraof the iPhone SE. This video is capped at 1080p 30fps. You can see how it is handling overall coloursof the scene,
exposure and stabilisation when I am walking around with it. Coming to the video performance. iPhone SE can shoot the best videos in itsprice range. Look at how good this 4K 60fps video turnedout. I have a feeling that the stabilisation isnot on the same level as the iPhone 11 and 11 Pro, but these videos are looking verygood nevertheless. When it comes to slow motion,
it can shoot1080p videos at 120 and 240fps. While this video turned out much better thanI would have imagined, I still think Apple should give us a few more frame rate options. I am sure the processor is very much capableof handling 1080p 480fps footage as well, so I just hope Apple enables that with a softwareupdate. All in all, I am really impressed with thecameras on this iPhone SE. In my unboxing video,
I said that 3 thingsthat matter to me the most on any smartphone are the Software, Camera and the Battery. Even before this video, we knew that the softwarepart had been taken care off by Apple, and my 2 main concerns were battery and camera. Well I am happy to tell you, that other thanin very low light, the cameras on this 2020 iPhone SE are equipped to take on any of itsrivals. I am a bit disappointed with not being ableto take portraits of objects with the native camera app, but like I did on the iPhone XR,I can use some 3rd party apps like Halide to take.
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