BlackBerry KEYone Review - Camera Review
Camera
A return to form for BlackBerry? Sort of
Sections
- Page 1 BlackBerry KEYone Review
- Page 2 Software and Performance Review
- Page 3 Camera Review
- Page 4 Battery life and verdict Review
BlackBerry KEYone – Camera
Camera tech is an area BlackBerry has traditionally struggled with, which is why I was pleasantly surprised to find the KEYone’s 12-megapixel rear camera is actually quite good.
The Sony IMX378 sensor used is the same as the one in the Pixel, which remains the best camera phone around, but it’s not implemented quite so well here. It works nicely in regular light and matches, if not beats, competing headsets such as the OnePlus 3T on picture quality, but can’t equal the iPhone 7 or Samsung Galaxy S8.
Pictures in regular light feature suitably realistic colours and aren’t oversharpened. The autofocus also feels snappy and generally all the photos I took in regular light were more than good enough for sharing on social media.
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The BlackBerry camera app also has a fairly intuitive UI that makes it easy to change things like white balance and the photo’s aspect ratio, which by default is set to 3:2.
Low-light performance is a little hit and miss, but far from terrible. Photos in low light pick up some noise and the autofocus does begin to struggle, but these are issues you’ll have with pretty much every smartphone, regardless of price. The f2.0 aperture also ensures the issues aren’t as pronounced as they are on most competitors, like the Huawei P10.
The KEYone can record video in 4K at 30 fps, though doing so will rapidly eat up its 32GB of storage. Recording without a tripod will also result in fairly shaky, unpleasant-to-watch footage.
The 8-megapixel front camera is a similar story and is more than good enough for video calls, or selfies in regular light, though again noise and autofocus issues creep in when shooting in dim conditions.
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Editorial independence
Editorial independence means being able to give an unbiased verdict about a product or company, with the avoidance of conflicts of interest. To ensure this is possible, every member of the editorial staff follows a clear code of conduct.
Professional conduct
We also expect our journalists to follow clear ethical standards in their work. Our staff members must strive for honesty and accuracy in everything they do. We follow the IPSO Editors’ code of practice to underpin these standards.
