950 XL Camera and editing app questions

[DaveGx]

Just got the 950 XL. So far I'm liking it. Have some questions though.

1. Phone specs say 20 MP camera. Camera options show 16 as the highest. Why?

2. For those that love taking pics and do so often, which is the best format setting? 16 MP or the 8 MP + 16 DNG?

3. Are there any GOOD editing apps that do not down grade the photo quality? Every app that's worth a damn in it's editing abilities, unfortunately uses a degraded copy of the photo which I find counterintuitive. Why should I bother editing photos on my phone when the quality will be lower than original photo?

 

[cincykid76]

Change the aspect ratio to 4:3 for higher mp. If you plan to edit on pc with programs such as lightroom/photoshop then user dng. As far as editors on the phone, I like and use the following: Photoshop Express, Black, Camera 360Sight, Fantasia, and Photo Shader... There are a lot of good apps for editing on the phone... If I had to pick only one it worked either be Fantasia, or PhotoShader.

 

[Exup]

Just got the 950 XL. So far I'm liking it. Have some questions though.

1. Phone specs say 20 MP camera. Camera options show 16 as the highest. Why?

2. For those that love taking pics and do so often, which is the best format setting? 16 MP or the 8 MP + 16 DNG?

3. Are there any GOOD editing apps that do not down grade the photo quality? Every app that's worth a damn in it's editing abilities, unfortunately uses a degraded copy of the photo which I find counterintuitive. Why should I bother editing photos on my phone when the quality will be lower than original photo?

1. in 16/9 it's ?16 MP and in 4/3 it's the 20MP (19usable). it's normal to be like this in digital photography

2. check this article: Windows 10 Camera: Oversampled vs full resolution vs RAW


3. with option of saving both versions, you can use a pc later. (I use fhotoroom )
At the phone I use fhotoroom (indeed in some filters it looses quality...the end result is way worst than using the same app on PC for example), photoshop Express or Camera360 sight.

I hope it helps.

 

[RumoredNow]

Just got the 950 XL. So far I'm liking it. Have some questions though.

1. Phone specs say 20 MP camera. Camera options show 16 as the highest. Why?

2. For those that love taking pics and do so often, which is the best format setting? 16 MP or the 8 MP + 16 DNG?

3. Are there any GOOD editing apps that do not down grade the photo quality? Every app that's worth a damn in it's editing abilities, unfortunately uses a degraded copy of the photo which I find counterintuitive. Why should I bother editing photos on my phone when the quality will be lower than original photo?

1. Your 20MP sensor is round. The 4;3 19MP image is cropped out of that and so is the 16:9 16MP image. As Exup says, this is typical.





2. Personally, I almost always shoot 16:9.

• Camera gets 5MP jpg + 16MP dng (Lumia 1520)
• If I want a quick point and shoot I use Camera360 Sight and capture 16MP jpg
• If I want to compose a shot and capture a High Res jpg I use ProShot Classic or ProShot
• If I know I want to do post shot processing on my laptop I go with Camera and the 16MP dng file

3. I love the filters in Camera360 Sight and it does a decent job editing basics. Rawer on the phone will edit dng to jpg and do a good job, but as you say it downscales the resolution. BLACK has some lovely effects for B&W conversion. Sketch Camera can do some nice effects Vinci is great. Hyperlapse and Slowly for video effects...

Lately I have been using a two stage method on PC to edit dng. Fotor on desktop can convert dng to jpg at 100% and then I edit the result in Polarr Pro. Here's an early example from my first experiments with this approach: http://forums.windowscentral.com/nokia-lumia-1520/250141-44.htm#post3467897

IMHO, if you are shooting 16MP or higher, it doesn't hurt if you have to crop later and the results should still be very usable. I'd rather have the wider field to start rather than a couple MP more on a narrower pic.

 

[Revanth Ravi]

Pickart and Fhotoroom also good.

 

[quadxeon]

3. Are there any GOOD editing apps that do not down grade the photo quality? Every app that's worth a damn in it's editing abilities, unfortunately uses a degraded copy of the photo which I find counterintuitive. Why should I bother editing photos on my phone when the quality will be lower than original photo?

For editing your photos on a computer I'd recommend Capture one or Lightroom. Copy the DNG files to your computer and you will be able to do non destructive editing.
Both offer superior image quality and are part of my editing workflow for landscape photography, including my 1020 and 950 XL as cameras.