If you are a fan or connoisseur of Xiaomiyou may have noticed how in recent times the brand has sought to demonstrate that it is at the “vanguard” in the world of cameras for smartphones.
Among the recent examples, we have the Cinemagia campaign with the Xiaomi 11T; are “Master every scene” with the 12 and 12 Pro; are new alliance with Leicawho showed his first look with the 12S Ultra; and the most recent, Mega moments with the Xiaomi 12T Series, that its Pro version has a 200MP camera.
With an R&D team dedicated to artificial intelligence (AI) photo enhancement, created in 2018It is not news that each step of the brand seeks to be more daring, taking into account that a large part of the users buy a Smartphone for its camera.
Of course, there are limits, because a mobile camera will always fall short once morest a specialized one, this due to hardware issues, lenses, among other characteristics. Even so, this does not mean that the brand wants to stop shortening the gap even more, its current goal being something almost unthinkable: the starry sky.
Xiaomi and astrophotography
To make your #Megamoments campaign come true, Xiaomi Chile invited the specialized press to a special activity in the Elqui Valley, Coquimbo, one of the best skies in the world. Here they sought to achieve a rather ambitious goal: getting us to experience Astrophotography with a Xiaomi 12T Pro.
Astrophotography is the search to capture images of celestial bodies, that is, taking pictures of the sky itself, its stars and planets. Although it might “sound simple”, a series of requirements are required to obtain good results: a sky far from the city to avoid light noise, favorable weather conditions, and equipment that allows extracting all possible information.
For the activity, which lasted one day, Xiaomi initially trained us with a subject matter expert group called Astrophotography Chile, which took us to practice at different points of the famous valley. Here we have several practices in the Mirador de Paihuano and the Piedra del Huanaco, to then arrive at the Río Mágico Ecological Park, where we would return at dawn to practice everything we learned.
Xiaomi 12T Pro: Setup y Features
Before getting to the result of the experience, it is good to understand how these types of photos are taken at night. What you want to capture in the night photos set to astrophotography is to capture the entire sky, so you must be in a very dark place and you will not see the result until the photo is captured.
Setup
In addition, it must be used in PRO mode of the camera to leave a defined configuration and use a tripod so that the photo is not ruined by the large amount of exposure.
The white setting should be “Cold” (regarding 3000 to 4000K), the exposure time should be around 15 seconds, the manual focus to infinity and avoid using the flash, preferably try a flashlight or another smartphone.
Xiaomi 12T Pro
It is also good to understand what Xiaomi has on its team. Its main chamber has:
- 200 MP, f/1.7, (wide), 1/1.22″, 0.64µm, PDAF, OIS
- 8 MP, f/2.2, 120˚ (ultrawide), 1/4″, 1.12µm
- 2 MP, f/2.4, (macro)
The Pro mode of the MIUI camera has a White Balance (WB) from 2000 to 8000, Focus to Infinity, burst time from 1/4000 to 30 Seconds, and the option to occupy the Wide or Ultra Wide. The maximum Ultra HD of the camera is 50MP in Pro, which also allows you to display the Histogram and capture in RAW with DNG format.
In summary, the 200MP camera is not fully usable in PRO mode, limiting to only 50MP for the best conditions, but in exchange you can have all the tools you need. In addition, it allows you to take the photo in its maximum raw quality (RAW), to later edit it in your favorite photo program.
Clarifying, I might sound unfavorable for the camera with “where are those missing 150MP«, but the power of a lens does not come from how many megapixels you have, but how much quality it captures in its optimal condition.
As an additional, the weight of the captures is also an important point and also limits smartphones. A 200MP photo can weigh between 60 to 70 Megabytes (MB), giving you a surprising dimension of 16384 x 12288 pixels. A JPG photo in Pro mode can ask for a maximum of 5 MB, giving you a dimension of 8168 x 6144. On the other hand, RAW files remain in DNG, with a weight between 25 to 35 MB.
Astrophotography with a Smartphone
With a stop at the Cancana Observatory and back at the Río Mágico Ecological Park, it was time to put the smartphone to work. Thanks to the starry sky, we had a few hours to photograph as much as we might.
Clearly, the experience was with the basics of the mobile, so we did not have external flashes and our tripod was one for $5 USD, conditions to see if it was really possible to carry out the activity. After doing several tests, we can confirm that The answer is yes.
Experimenting, we were able to verify that, keeping the mobile still and following the setup indicated above, it is possible to take good photos in totally dark places, like 12 AM. Xiaomi’s own photography menu (MIUI) gives you enough tools to experiment, while the quality of the screen makes it easy to realize that you failed to keep trying.
Speaking of the technical section, the camera manages to take the spectrum of the sky well, and can even give you the chance to play with some options to improve the results. Part of this is due to the way the AI works and the power that the Snapdragon 8+ Gen1 gives it, which once you know the pattern of operation, allows you to improve the results even more.
Although you can try with another smartphone, with the same setup, the results are not the same and it shows. We compare it with a Poco F4 GT in the same conditions (JPG) and the difference regarding the focus and the quality of the sample is appreciated.
This can also be quite noticeable when doing Light Painting, drawing with light directly on the photograph. The smartphone captures the lighting effects well by changing a couple of setups, delivering quite nice results without much effort.
If we talk a little more regarding other professional examples, the smartphone allows you to make TimeLapse of hours. Among the experiments, we saw how some photographers managed to do one of 5 hours and with a battery to spare, taking the interval quite well in long periods of time.
Concluding, we can say that Xiaomi has managed to cross a barrier that seems to be impossible with current Smartphones, being able to take souvenir photos with some practice. You don’t need to be an expert to take a great photo, just be patient, find a good place and admire the sky with your smartphone.
WE THANK XIAOMI CHILE FOR THE INVITATION TO CARRY OUT THIS ACTIVITY
WE ALSO THANK THE PHOTOGRAPHERS DANIEL PINILLA Y VICTOR AUVELEZ FOR TIPS TO ACHIEVE THESE RESULTS