Honor Magic4: What do you expect from it?
What we like
- A great Night mode
- A wide range of focus length
- The addition of the periscope telephoto lens
- Log and LUT available
Cons
- Less stable algorithm
- Poor glare control
- Brightness unchangeable in the Night mode
Honor revealed its new Magic 4 series, which first launched at the Mobile World Congress (MWC) trade show in Barcelona. The series includes four versions, namely the Magic 4, Magic 4 Pro, Magic 4 Lite and Magic 4 Ultimate. The UK launch happened on 12 May. The UK is getting the Magic 4 Pro only, not the regular or Lite models, and the Pro goes on sale on 27 May. Meanwhile the Magic 4 Lite is available now in some European markets. We have been lucky enough to get hold of the regular Magic 4 to put it through its paces in Inner Mongolia, China. So, let’s start with it.
Design and Handling
The four configurations can de distinguished easily from their outlooking. On the front the regular Magic 4 and the Magic 4 Lite have a single, central punch-hole selfie camera. While the Magic 4 Pro and Magic 4 Ultimate comes with dual front-facing cameras, found in the top-left corner of the display because of the addition of a 3D depth camera, for superior portrait shots and more secure 3D face unlock. As for the rear cameras, the latter two variants are capable of up to 100x digital zoom, yet the Magic 4 can only reach to 50x digital zoom.
On the rear, the Magic 4 comes in a choice of colors: Black, White, Cyan, Gold, made from a glass like substance for scratch proof.
It’s big, thanks to 6.81in curved screen which is an AMOLED at an FHD+ resolution, with refresh rate up to 120Hz. But it’s not too heavy at 199g.
Honor's traditionally “Eye of Muse” rear round camera array features a 50-megapixel main camera with a f/1.8 aperture, an ultra-wide-angle camera with another 50-megapixels with 122-degree field of view, and a 5x zoom periscope telephoto camera with 8-megapixels with OID optical stabilization. Another two partners included in the round model are a laser-focusing sensor, detecting deep information in real-time and a Flicker sensor, reducing flickers.
Theoretical Test
Note that zoom is not available in the RAW format, which leads to the JPG format used in sharpness and lens distortion tests.
001 Sharpness
We have used ISO 12233 charts with three rear cameras and now show you 100% crops at the center and corners to measure sharpness.
Summary:
The Wide (main) and ultra-wide lens are both sharp at centers, but the periscope telephoto lens appears a little soft at the center.
When it comes to edges, the difference is even greater. The Wide (main) and ultra-wide lens become softer, with the latter one reduced to a larger extent. The periscope telephoto lens has the worst sharpness, however, which is still acceptable.
002 Sensitivity
You can adjust the exposure manually when the Pro mode is on. Adjusting within a sensitivity range of ISO 50 to 6400, we shoot the image and analyzed details and dark parts in it to see how the image quality changes as the sensitivity increases by degree.
As you can see, the Magic 4 presents a relatively pure picture in terms of details and dark parts under ISO 800.
At ISO 1600, part of details is missed, and the dark part appears seriously smeared; at ISO3200, a lot of details are missed, and the dark part comes with the worst noise. Therefore, the sensitivity below ISO3200 is highly recommend to make sure the best image quality.
003 Lens Distortion
By shooting the equal-spacing striped grid with the above three lenses respectively, we observe the distortion of the image. As tested, there is only a slight pincushion distortion on the periscope lens, leaving out your worries in daily use.
*The wide main lens
*The ultra-wide lens
*The periscope telephone lens
004 Latitude
Its exposure from negative 4 to positive 4 stops can be adjusted manually. We adjusted the stops of exposure and pushed back to check out the picture.
As tested, details can be well maintained from negative 4 to positive 3 stops. At 4 stops over, pushed back details will lose at some extent, which is a hint of its protection for dark parts.
005 Stabilization
The three rear lenses are all equipped with EIS, or electronic stabilization, which is automatically turned on when the recording mode is switched on. We tested its stabilization by walking around quickly with the wide main and ultra-wide lens. Thanks to the built-in electronic stabilization, the Magic 4 shows more stable in vertical direction.
As OIS is exclusive to the periscope telephoto lens, the lens is more powerful than the above two lenses. As you can see that, even 10x zoom shooting can be achieved stably.
Real-world Experience
001 Imaging Performance
*The wide main lens
The 12-megapixel main camera can be used to reproduce realistic hair details and pleasing colors restoring the rich gradient details on the sky.
*The ultra-wide lens
The Honor Magic 4 Pro’s telephoto periscope camera matches its 90mm focal length with a 64MP resolution and an f/3.5 aperture for a roughly three and a half times zoom equivalent. That means the ability to capture more elements of the scene (currently most Android-powered phones have 13mm-16mm zoom equivalent)
*The periscope telephoto lens
The lens is equipped with 5x optical zoom, 50x digital zoom and 8 megapixels. It may be slightly lacking in color processing, but the faster focus speed will allow us to capture the moment when following a motorcycle moving at high speed.
002 RAW Format
In the Pro mode, we can turn on the Raw format to shoot. Compared to the JPG format, the Raw format can retain more details, easy to adjust in postproduction.
But it’s a pity that the Raw format can’t meet the needs of people who like to shoot wide scenes also because the focal length cannot be adjusted with the Raw format used, which means that only the wide main camera can shoot the Raw format images among the three lenses.
003 Super Macro
The wide main lens of the Magic 4 can be used to shoot close-up images, which unlike most of other phones won’t switch to the Macro mode automatically, reducing latency in shooting and facilitating faster capture of fleeting images.
Of course, you can also use Super Macro to shoot with the ultra-wide camera. That will present a rotating focus effect in the circumstance around the targeted subject.
004 Glare Control
The Magic 4 is humble in glare control, with noticeable glare when in direct contact with the light source. But used properly, it can also brighten up an impactful image which can be achieved only by using the ultra-wide and main lenses.
In the use of the telephoto in a backlighting environment, the image will show HDR-like effect, and for the time being we do not know its cause.
Occasionally, the Magic 4 algorithm is malfunctional. As we can see below, two big holes appear at the edge of the dune. But the good news is that this situation is not common.
005 Night Mode
The Magic 4 promises to scenic night shots with its unique algorithm. When using the function, you need to keep the phone immobile for 2 to 4 seconds. For your reference, we shot stars at Inner Mongolia’s night as following:
A slight shake during nighttime shooting does not affect the image, but if there are moving objects in the image, it will have some impact on the result, such as the swaying fire in the picture below. Moreover, the brightness of the highlights cannot be adjusted in the mode which will harm the image quality to a certain degree.
006 Portrait Shooting
In portrait photography, the Magic 4 comes with beauty and bokeh functions. Thanks to natural bokeh effect, there are no jagged edges around the person that are usually seen in other phones.
Video Photography
The Magic 4 has the ability to record 4K video at 60 fps with 16:9 or 21:9 internal recording frames.
001 LUT
The phone supports LOG capture for easy editing and nine pre-installed LUTs, and among which, the LUT footage is the most impressive one.
002 Log
Log footage gives you a wider dynamic range and can retain more detail in light and dark parts. However, when shooting, the higher grayscale will make it difficult to control the exposure of the image, and there is no good color-grading application available. As a result, you need to manually pull back colors in post-production process. Finally, that will lead to a complicated procedure.
003 Time-lapse
This function supports switching between focal lengths and shooting with the ultra-wide lens to obtain stunning time-lapse videos. And, because the camera is equipped with EIS, in the windy and sandy scenes, even though the phone appears to be shaky when shooting, the finished film still performs relatively stable when checked in post.
In short, the Magic 4's video performance is not as powerful as its picture shooting capabilities, but it’s capable of achieving a movie-like process of Log shooting, plus built-in EIS and OIS, which also improves the video further.
However, there is a common problem with current Android phones with no exception of the Magic 4. That is, the video interface is not simple and intuitive enough, that for novices is difficult to learn.
Verdict
The Magic 4 is a well-balanced flagship, with the addition of the periscope telephoto lens covering most of commonly seen scenes and giving more supports to nighttime shots.
As for prices, the regular model of Magic 4 will cost €899 ($1,000/£760) with 8GB RAM and 256GB storage, with the Pro model jumping to €1,099 ($1,220/£930) for the same specs. In the UK the Magic 4 Pro will cost £949.99. Meanwhile the Magic 4 Lite is available now in some European markets, starting from €349 for a model with 6GB RAM and 128GB storage. While not quite the best camera phone, it is one of the best options for the price.