Smartphones more and more biting off the market share of photographic equipment. Of course, it is very interesting to watch the development of technology, but it is sad to see that the segment of amateur cameras and even more so entry-level cameras has practically disappeared. If you follow the history of our smartphone reviews, the progress in the quality of photos taken with the phone is simply impressive. Nowadays, not only expensive flagships are taking pictures, but also more or less budget devices. A striking example of such a smartphone, or, so to speak, relatively a budget smartphone, can be considered the hero of my previous review of Reno3 Pro from the Chinese brand OPPO, the photo capabilities of which made me very happy. Today we have on review the flagship of the above-mentioned company – OPPO Find X2. It’s more expensive and bigger, but can that shoot better? We will see in this review, Let’s start…
Since OPPO Find X2 is a top-end smartphone, it has the same characteristics. It has a powerful quad-core Snapdragon 865 processor, a powerful Adreno 650 GPU, 12 GB of RAM and 256 GB of storage. And also, there is powerful fast charging, but wireless, alas, no. There is a standard face recognition sensor and a fingerprint sensor that is located under the screen.
The smartphone is rather big. Height 164.9 mm, width 74.5 mm and thickness 8.0 mm. It will not fit into every pocket, and especially for girls, a smartphone will not fit into jeans. OPPO Find X2 comes in two exterior variations – black with a ceramic back panel and blue with a glass panel. Weight 196 gm and 187 gm, respectively. As you can already see, the blue version has arrived.
The screen deserves special attention. It is a 6.7-inch AMOLED with a resolution of 3168 * 1440 (QHD +). The screen is very bright, there is even an HDR mode which achieves an incredible 1200 nits of brightness. Moreover, the screen has a DCI-P3 color space, which is very rare, although, I must say, the Reno3 Pro also has this color profile. And the cherry on top is the screen refresh rate, which is as much as 120 Hz!!! Gamblers will appreciate it, but this does not really give us anything for photographers, unless, of course, you are a gambling photographer. Let’s move on to the camera.
A camera system of three modules is installed here, and if you remember, in OPPO Reno3 Pro 5G, the camera unit consists of four modules. That is, Find X2 shoots worse? Not a fact, let’s figure it out.
The main camera is equipped with a Sony IMX586 matrix with a resolution of 48 megapixels. Sensor size 1/2″, f / 1.7 aperture. 26mm equivalent focal length and OIS. One to one main camera Reno3 Pro.
The second module is a wide-angle camera with a Sony IMX708 sensor with a resolution of 12 megapixels and a size of 1/2.4 inches. Aperture f/2.2 and a focal length of 16mm. It is noteworthy that this module has autofocus and a minimum focusing distance of only 30mm.
OPPO calls this wide-angle module a movie camera, however, only 4K 30fps video is available for it, and not 60fps, as on the main module.
The third module provides the user with 2x optical zoom. The manufacturer does not say which matrix is installed here. Sensor resolution 13 MP, equivalent focal length 52 mm, aperture f/2.4.
Optical stabilization is a big plus. Additionally, there is a 5x hybrid zoom, which works well, but it cannot be said that it is good, without a tripod it is rather difficult to shoot anything acceptable.
And there is also a 20x digital zoom, which, in general, is not at all applicable for high-quality shooting.
So, what do we see in comparison with the more budgetary Reno3 Pro? The main module and the tele-module are the same here. But the differences lie in two things. Firstly, this is the absence of an additional fourth module, which is responsible for the formation of the depth of field map. In fact, I have not been able to prove the effectiveness of this kind of additional module in any smartphone, so we will not consider this either a plus or a minus. But the real plus of the Find X2 camera is the wide-angle module. A similar module in Reno3 Pro had mediocre image quality, but here we got a sensor with a resolution of 4 megapixels larger and the size of this sensor also became larger. Additionally, we have a large aperture ratio. As a result, you can see a really improvement in image quality.
The wide angle lens module for a smartphone, in my opinion, is the most necessary module. In practice, I noticed that the majority, to whom I belong, shoot with the wide-angle module, rather than the main one, which always has the best quality. The fact is that a wide angle creates dynamics in the frame, makes the image unusual, and this attracts the viewer’s eye.
In addition, when there is a lack of space, for example, when shooting indoors, a wide angle makes it possible to fit more details and objects into the frame. Therefore, I consider the improved wide-angle module in Find X2 a very big plus.
Of course, the picture received on a wide-angle module has a loss of detail associated with the work of artificial intelligence. Moreover, if you turn off the work of AI in the application, then it will be noticeable only in the color rendering, it will become more natural, but the problem will remain in detailing. Even with a slight increase, we can observe a blur of details, the character of which resembles a brush stroke. By the way, here’s an interesting life hack for you – we enlarge the photo by 2-3 times and get a picture as if it were painted in oil and no photoshop.
The short focus distance gives wide possibilities of shooting both in landscape photography and in macro. The most spectacular macro photographs are obtained with electronic magnification using the wide-angle module. Macro mode turns on automatically when focusing distance is short. To avoid uncontrolled switching between modules, it is best to use the Pro mode, where you can manually select the module to which you want to shoot at the moment.
The Camera app is the same as in the Reno3 Pro. Unfortunately, saving files in RAW has not yet been brought into the standard application. Although if this is really necessary, then you can use a third-party application that cope with this successfully.
Of the additional interesting functions, there is a panorama, which stitches frames quite efficiently. To heighten the effect, I recommend shooting panoramas holding the smartphone vertically, so much more detail is captured vertically than when shooting horizontally.
Night mode is not bad. I decided to experiment and try to capture the starry night sky. Holding a smartphone in my hands, nothing happened – the picture came out insanely noisy. But when mounted on a tripod, the camera perfectly renders all the stars, and even those that are not visible to the naked eye, but the sky in the picture turned out to be completely black. As a result, we got such a black poster with white dots, and if it were not for the familiar constellation Ursa Major, then it would be rather difficult to understand that this really is a starry sky.
There is a tile-up mode, which, unfortunately, lacks any settings. You cannot select an acceleration factor or shooting interval, which is not very convenient.
Tilapse above, if you noticed, has a horizontal movement, I achieved this effect by installing Syrp on such a motorized head:
You can get this kind of movement in post-production, but then there will inevitably be a loss of resolution and the movement will look a little unnatural.
Video Quality of OPPO Find X2
The OPPO Find X2 camera can shoot 4K @ 60fps video, which is already a kind of standard for flagship smartphones. However, there is a small correction. This resolution and frame rate can be obtained only on the main and tele-module. And the wide-angle module can shoot 4K @ 30fps, and then it immediately becomes clear why OPPO called this module a cinema module. If you remember about the Reno3 Pro, then the wide-angle camera there could only record video 1080 @ 30fps.
To get the maximum zoom range when shooting wide angle to tele video, 4K @ 30fps must be enabled. At the maximum 10x magnification, chromatic aberrations are inevitable on contrasting objects, I must say, quite strong aberrations.
Also, the camera copes very poorly with the direct hit of the sun in the frame – everything becomes overexposed, all the details disappear, and artificial intelligence, trying to correct the situation, finally kills the picture.
I was pleased with the presence of double stabilization – optical and digital. However, it only works in Full HD at 60fps. The stabilization is great, it does a good job with the steps. Still, if you want the highest quality video stabilization, you should think about the Steadicam. Firstly, you will be able to shoot smooth 4K, and secondly, when shooting with a tele-module, no built-in stabilization or even enhanced electronic stabilization can save you, in any case you need additional devices – a tripod or Steadicams.
By the way, about the demonstrated model of the Steadicam above Zhiyun SMOOTH-X. After my review of this device, I began to receive many questions about the compatibility of the gimbal with certain smartphones. Indeed, the official list is very limited and this is due to the design features of the smartphone holder. OPPO Find X2 is not on this list and in fact it cannot be installed perfectly balanced, as the volume buttons are clamped by the holder and this leads to incorrect smartphone operation. However, the silicone case that comes with the Find X2 phone saves. The smartphone in this case fits perfectly into the Steadicam. So, keep armed with this technique and this applies to any other smartphones.
Conclusion
OPPO continues to delight the photo capabilities of its smartphones. However, I can’t say that I am as enthusiastic as with Reno3 Pro. Overall, the OPPO Find X2’s camera is indeed better, but at the same time, the price here is significantly higher. It should be clarified that the user overpays here not only for a slightly improved camera, but also for more powerful hardware, which is not so important to us for photographers.
OPPO Find X2 has the best wide-angle module, which gives cool picture, cool macro and high-resolution video, which Reno3 Pro 5G does not. The rest of the cameras are completely identical. So, if a wide angle is important to you, then OPPO Find X2 will be an excellent choice, and if your budget requires savings, then read the Reno3 Pro review.
