Used profile: vibrant

KEY NOTES:
– stock camera performance is way better on X15U comlared to S23U. Less noise, better one shot indoor performance and less artifacts, way more natural.
– compared to gcam on S23U, a bit more contrasty, but digital zoom is better, faster lens switching, and better indoor night time shots when disabled night mode.
– color processing is very much similar between all lenses, but the 70mm had a bit less lifted shadows.
– without night mode, better low light capablitities.
– digital zoom gives results with a bit too much contrast.

So, got the Samsung 2 years ago and was always happy. It was my first ever phone with an actual dedicated zoomlens. And as a bonus it had 2 of those.
It changed my persoective on smartphone photography.
After the opportunity to get a brand new camera, but my findings that the samsung was seriously just as good of IQ than my sony a5100 aps-c camera, I instead used the opportunity and went for a higher end camera-phone.

My overall findings:
Camera quality is really good, way better stock output than on my samsung, although the processing of colours is not always to my liking, but for the most part the vibrant mode is pretty good. But I like the processing on the S23U WITH GCAM just a tad more with its lifted shadows ans little bit less contrast. Photos of digitally zoomed focal lengts have too much contrast. But it feels so nice not to worry about degrading quality with digitally zooming between lenses. Which makes me use the camera way more freely and on a whole other level. Also cause gcam is slower in use cause of switching lenses is manually done.
I still prefer the gcam look of the S23U a tad bit more though.

I miss some of one ui features and battery life actually seems worse, which is weird. Also accessoires are not easy to find. The phone was expensive too and if the vivo x200 pro was available natively in my county at the time, I would have choosed that one. (Which at the moment it suddenly is which is a bummer)

WAS IT WORTH THE UPGRADE?
Overall, the real advantages I hoped for came true actually: that I didnt have to use gcam anymore, and digital zoomed focal lengts between lenses give better results. So the experience feels way more free. Altough its not perfect, it is better on many things.