OnePlus imaging director says camera on OnePlus 7 Pro can compete with those on first tier phones

The OnePlus 7 Pro features a 3x optical zoom. Wired spoke with OnePlus imaging director Simon Liu about several aspects of the phone's photography system, and Liu says that adding an optical zoom to the OnePlus handset was something that fans of the company requested on the company's forum. The upstart manufacturer had said that the OnePlus 5, launched in 2017, was equipped with 2x optical zoom. However, that turned out not to be true. The phone came with a 1.6x optical zoom and digital imagery took it the rest of the way. Since then, OnePlus has stuck to digital zoom until now. Liu says that the OnePlus 7 Pro will provide competition with "first tier" smartphones. He adds, "I don’t think we can beat them, but the imaging world is always subjective."

The OnePlus 7 Pro also features 10x digital zoom and surprisingly, there is no Time-of-Flight (ToF) depth sensor on the device. This measures the time it takes for infrared light to bounce off a subject and return to the phone and can provide more accurate depth measurements and 3D mapping. It also is used for Augmented Reality applications.  Liu notes that OnePlus users are going to notice a difference between images taken with older models and those snapped with the OnePlus 7 Pro. "Our pictures are a lot more detailed compared to our previous phones," he says.

While many phones make a big point of using AI modes to optimize the settings of certain subjects, OnePlus' scene detection is done behind the scenes. Liu says that the tuning might be tweaked for certain shots, but any changes made are not drastic. "If you’re trying to shoot a plant and the camera tells you it’s a dog, that’s not useful," the imaging director points out. Also, OnePlus decided to make the bokeh effect look more natural this year, toning it down a bit. Liu says that the blur appearing in portraits is more in line with what you would see with a professional camera. He points out that last year, the effect was artificially boosted so that users could see that it was there.

The OnePlus 7 Pro has a triple camera setup on the back that includes a 48MP sensor, the 8MP sensor with the aforementioned 3x optical zoom, and a 16MP sensor with an ultra wide-angle lens. The 16MP selfie snapper is found in a pop-up housing that allows the phone to be free of any notches. The device will come with a 6.7-inch AMOLED curved display sporting a 90Hz refresh rate for smoother viewing and game playing experience. For the first time in OnePlus history, the screen has a 1440p QHD+ resolution (1440 x 3120, a 19.5:9 aspect ratio). The Snapdragon 855 Mobile Platform is under the hood and there will be three different configurations: 6GB RAM/128GB storage, 8GB RAM/128GB of storage and 12GB RAM/256GB storage. A 4000mAh battery keeps the lights on, and can fast charge at 30W. An Android 9 Pie based version of OxygenOS is pre-installed and color options will be Blue, Gray, and Brown.

The 4G version available in the states could be priced at $699 for the model with 6GB of memory, $749 for the unit carrying 8GB of RAM, and $819 for the OnePlus 7 Pro with 12GB of RAM. The 5G variant of the OnePlus 7 Pro, which will not be available in the U.S., could be priced at $899 and up.

The OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro (both 4G and 5G versions) will be unveiled on May 14th with the launch expected on May 22nd.