We tested the "night photo" mode of Pixel 3: a great success



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A seasoned hacker from the XDA Developers forum found out how to exploit the "night mode" of the Google Pixel Photo app in advance. And we can say that the result is striking.

Google Pixel 3

Google Pixel 3

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Google Pixel 3 XL

Google Pixel 3 XL

Operation of the price table

The price offers are listed in ascending order of price. Prices shown are inclusive of VAT (all taxes included). The shipping price shown is the cheapest price offered by the merchant. The Numerals refer in its price tables the merchants who wish to be present on the condition of displaying prices with VAT (TTC – all taxes included) and to present an excellent level of quality of service and customer satisfaction. This listing is paying. Our price tables are not exhaustive on all offers and merchants on the market. The offers in the price tables are updated daily and several times a day for some shops.

During their visits to our test benches, we already welcomed the truly impressive photo performances of the Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL. Thanks to their magic algorithmic recipes, Google's new top-of-the-line mobile phones manage to do with a single photo module better than most of their competitors who ship two or three sensors.

Pixel turns on the light

But while they have already become references in mobile photography, the Pixel could very soon dig a little further their advances with the arrival of a night mode that improves, as its name suggests, photography in low light. Announced at the official launch conference of Pixel 3, this option Night Sight, as Google calls it, promised wonders. So much so that a clever hacker on the XDA-Developers site has put his hands in the grease for a preview of this feature.

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What promises to accomplish the night mode of Pixel 3X. (© Google)

This modified and freely downloadable .apk is nothing more than the official Google app with just the "night mode" switch going from off to on. Once installed, it does not replace the native app, a second photo app with the sweet name of Camera P3 just appear in the app drawer. We tried it on the Pixel 3 XL and the difference between auto mode and night mode is blatant. To make a literal word game, it's a little day and night.

© The Digital

While in automatic mode the phone sees virtually nothing, the night mode manages to bring up a subject, the second shot and a good dose of detail. How does the phone achieve such a result? According to our first impressions, this is a clever blend of basic photographic art and algorithmic miracle. When capturing the photo, the phone mills 3 to 4 seconds before delivering the result above. This interval allows him to do several things.

The algorithmic recipe

First, lengthen the pause time: In auto mode, the shutter speed is 1/17 s while the night mode is 1/3 s. In reality, the Pixel does not take one but a photo pack at 1/3 sec, and then combine them to try to capture as much light as possible. Secondly, the phone goes up to ISO, the automatic scene peaks at 5,280 ISO while the night mode climbs to 8,300 ISO. The two levers that are the pause time and the rise in ISO are well known photographers who take pictures in low light.

But where the algorithm takes over, it's on the processing side. With a break time of 1/3 of a second difficult to get rid of the blur, but Google is doing pretty well. And with an ISO sensitivity of 8,000, the scene should be filled with digital noise and chromatic aberrations, but again the phone manages to limit the breakage, even if we still see a little grain on some surfaces. In comparison, here is (below) what the iPhone XS gets in the same conditions.

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We guess small bits of armor, but little more. © The Digital

To see what it was like under controlled conditions, we went to our proud photo scene to take freehand readings. That's the result.

© The Digital
On a lit scene at 3 lux, the Pixel 3 XL captures a night scene that almost looks like it gets with a "full daylight". There is a slight blur, but the white balance is perfectly controlled and the level of detail admirable for a photo taken in such conditions.

Can not be impressed by the results of this mode night, especially when we know that it is still in beta and not yet officially deployed by Google. The processing work is quite striking and no doubt that Google uses the Pixel Visual Core, its chip dedicated to photographic processing, full tube. We'll talk more about Pixel 3's night mode performance once it's officially released by Google. But the beginnings are more than promising.

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