Galaxy S7 edge - great for daytime landscape shots

For obvious reasons, the Samsung Galaxy S7 edge has to take the place of Note 7 in this round-up.

Yet despite being around six months older than the rest of the smartphones in the shootout, the S7 edge's 12-megapixel camera turns out to be no slouch.

It took the best daytime landscape shots with sharp rendition of pixels, great dynamic range and natural blue skies.

Buildings look sharp, even when they are at the edge of the image.

The landscape shots at night also turned out to be the best in this round-up.

The lights in buildings were correctly exposed, with the night sky equally tame without being too dark or too bright.

Colour reproduction was spot-on as well.

With selfies, I got smooth skin rendition and sharp details.

The results are second only to the LG V20's.

However, the selfies look over-processed as almost everything - background and foreground - is sharp.

Without a dual-camera system like the Apple iPhone 7 Plus, portrait shots prove to be more difficult.

It also lacked the wide-aperture function of Huawei Mate 7 for that bokeh, or blurred background, effect.

Under indoor incandescent lighting, images shot without flash tend to be a little warm, but not as much as with the LG V20 or Apple iPhone 7 Plus.

However, when flash was activated, the images have a very un-natural magenta hue.

TECH SPECS

PRICE: $1,098 (without contract)

REAR CAMERA: 12-megapixel 26mm f/1.7

FRONT CAMERA: 5-megapixel 22mm f/1.7

Verdict: The Samsung Galaxy S7 edge's camera is stellar when it comes to landscape - day or night - and selfies.

This article was first published on Dec 21, 2016.
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