Pixel 7 Pro Hands-On: Google's Bigger Phone Puts a Lot on Its Third Camera
Google's Pixel 7 Pro has a better zoom and a slight redesign compared to last year's Pixel 6 Pro.
Google's $899 (£849, AU$1,299) Pixel 7 Pro is taking the most expensive spot in the company's phone lineup, and like last year's Pixel 6 Pro is using its larger size and third camera to set itself apart. Also like last year, the phone costs $300 more than the standard $599 (£599, AU$999) Pixel 7. The phone goes on sale Oct. 13, with preorders for both the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro starting immediately.
The announcement came during Google's fall product launch event on Thursday, during which the company also announced the Pixel Watch. Google previewed all three products in May, but only revealed more details about their pricing, availability and features during this week's event. Both phones run on Google's new Tensor G2 chip and have a slightly updated design with a more prominent metal camera bar on the back. Google has also made improvements to the zoom on both phones' cameras, but only the Pixel 7 Pro has a dedicated 48-megapixel telephoto lens and supports macro photography.
The Pixel 7 and 7 Pro are part of Google's ongoing efforts to compete against Samsung and Apple, which rule the global smartphone market. The new phones also signal Google's approach in doing so, which boils down to undercutting its competitors' prices, focusing on camera quality and developing exclusive software features for its phones.
Zoom quality is one of the biggest areas Google chose to improve when it comes to the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro's camera. The Pixel 7 Pro has a 5x optical zoom compared with last year's 4x, along with other zoom tricks too.
Both the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro's main 50-megapixel camera can crop in for 2x zoom view and a 12.5-megapixel resolution photo, Google claims. That's exactly what Apple did with its iPhone 14 Pro.
Google uses the same idea with the Pixel 7 Pro's dedicated 48-megapixel telephoto camera. It ordinarily shoots at 5x zoom, but cropping the central pixels from the frame produces a 10x view and a 12-megapixel photo.
When you're zooming between 2.5x and 5x, the Pixel 7 Pro will fuse data from the main and telephoto cameras. That enables it to blend in detail from the telephoto and main cameras for better image quality than digital zoom alone would provide, Google said.
The Pixel 7 Pro can also zoom in at up to 30x digitally, compared with the Pixel 6 Pro's 20x digital zoom. That's a longer reach than the iPhone 14 Pro's maximum of 15x, but won't magnify distant subjects as much as the Galaxy S22 Ultra's 100x digital zoom.
During my brief time with the Pixel 7 Pro, I zoomed in at 5x in Google's demo room and took a photo of the detailed architecture on the ceiling. It looked crisp and detailed in the moment, but it's hard to tell without looking at it on a bigger screen.
The Pixel 7 Pro is getting another extra camera feature missing from the Pixel 7: macro photography mode, courtesy of the ultrawide camera's autofocus. The camera kicks into this mode automatically when you're setting up a macro shot, but you can also turn it off by tapping a symbol on the screen in the camera.
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The company says that both phones will also be able to take photos more quickly in darker, night settings (what it calls "Night Sight") thanks to Google's new Tensor G2 chip. In a demo, Google showcased how the Pixel 7 Pro was able to capture a Night Sight image in 1.25 seconds, while the Pixel 6 Pro took 5.25 seconds to take the same shot. That's a big deal because night mode photos -- across all phones, not just Google's -- generally take a longer time to process during capture. That can make it hard to hold the camera still, sometimes resulting in blurry or unfocused images.
Google's new Pixel phones will also have a new feature meant to make your old photos look better, too. Photo Unblur leverages the Tensor G2 processor to sharpen blurry photos that may have been taken on an older camera. You'll be able to access this feature on either phone in the edit menu in the photos app.
With the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro, Google also wants to make it easier for people who are visually impaired or that have low vision to take selfies. With Guided Frame, the Pixel 7 or 7 Pro can verbally direct you on how to position your phone in order to capture a good selfie. The feature comes as Apple has also been coming up with new ways to leverage the sensors inside the iPhone to help the visually impaired. Apple's Pro iPhones, for example, can help the visually impaired detect people and locate nearby doors by using their lidar sensors.
As for video, the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro will both be getting a new Cinematic Blur mode that's essentially portrait mode for video. That might sound familiar to iPhone users since Apple added a very similar feature last year starting with the iPhone 13. Like other high-end phones, the Pixel 7 and 7 Pro are also getting improved video stabilization.
2022-10-08 21:51:48
