This year, I've had the chance to take pictures with some great smartphones. I was amazed by the Samsung Galaxy S22 Ultra's 10x zoom, the Xiaomi 12S Ultra's huge sensor and beautiful portraits, and the Google Pixel 6A's ability to take sharp photos of a rambunctious toddler in low light, which seemed impossible. I could reach into my cabinet, grab one of these phones, and use it as my main camera right now. I won't, though! I'm using the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 right now, and I can tell you that it's a joy to take pictures with.
You're right. While you were watching AEW Dynamite, you might have seen an ad for a foldable with bright colours and catchy pop music. Right now, that's my go-to camera.
The hardware of the camera is nothing special. There is a 10-megapixel camera on the inside display, a 12-megapixel ultrawide camera, and a 12-megapixel main camera that seems to have been slightly upgraded. In Samsung's marketing materials, it says that the sensor is "65% brighter." This is a lie, because a sensor's job is to collect light, so it can't be "brighter." Samsung is trying to say that the pixels are a little bit bigger, so they might be able to gather more light. Anyway, all of this is to say that the reason I like using the camera on the Z Flip 4 doesn't have much to do with cameras.
It's the act of folding. I must be a fool, because I've tried shooting with the Z Flip 4 in all the ways that Samsung's ads show, and reader, I like it. I put the phone on top of the microwave with its L-shaped screen open and filmed myself making a latte. Why? I'm not sure. But I sped it up in the camera app, set the music to "Love You So" by The King Khan and BBQ Show, and posted it on TikTok. It has been seen more than 200 times, which makes me feel terrible. I'm not sure what I really got out of this, but it was fun.
The Flip is also a great way for grandparents to find new things to watch. I can put the Flip on a table where dirty toddler hands can't reach it, and film my grandchild doing cute things, like smashing cups together while yelling and farting loudly. The old people love that crap.
The Fold helps me here because I don't have to: a) try to take a selfie-style video of this; I don't have to: a) use something like PopSockets to prop it up; b) fiddle with some other mechanism to hold it up; and c) change the angle to get the right shot. When I'm done, I can just (gently) slam the thing shut to stop recording. However, the phone will close in on itself at the end of your video clip, so you might want to cut that part out.
All of this is fun, but if you don't have a toddler and don't want to show off your latte art skills on TikTok, I probably haven't convinced you that the Flip 4 camera is good. But think about this use case: if you have the camera app open and the phone is in an L shape, you can tap an icon to move the image preview to the lower half of the screen. You shoot what's in front of you, but you look down at the image preview, kind of like an old-fashioned twin-lens reflex camera.
This also means that you can take photos from a lower angle or in a more natural way without sticking your phone out in front of your face and making everyone feel awkward because they know you are taking pictures of them. Please keep in mind that I'm not saying it's okay to be creepy or weird around strangers. I'm just saying that it's nice to take photos of your friends without pulling everyone out of the moment so quickly.
I don't take many selfies either, but it's nice to be able to use the main camera on my phone when I do. Even though you have to compose it on the cover screen with an image preview the size of a postage stamp, I'll take that tradeoff for the much better image quality, especially when the lighting is low. Who knows, maybe my home coffee shop will really take off on TikTok, in which case I'll have to step up my selfie game. If it does, you can be sure I'll be ready with the Flip 4.
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