DCW Reader Review: the Sony Xperia Z5 camera – Cityscapes (Sponsored)

This is a well-seen image, and Martin showed great skill in reacting quickly to compose it so well. The 5x Clear Image zoom in the Xperia Z5’s camera enabled him to get in close from across the road and frame this scene, focusing our attention on the man’s umbrella and the coinciding sign.

At the heart of the Xperia Z5 is Sony’s backlit, next-generation 1/2.3-inch CMOS Exmor RS™ sensor, which allowed Martin to capture the vibrant colours in this street art.

The Xperia Z5 picked up colours and details perfectly; they are strong and vivid, straight from the camera, despite it being a very dull, overcast and wet day. And when viewed on the Full HD screen, they are outstanding.

With the Xperia Z5 fully-charged, Martin headed to Brighton beach for a few hours of solid photography. With the phone set to ‘Superior Auto’, he shot a sequence of images showing the waves and the shell of the West Pier. He then selected the frame that captured them best against the fierce sky in the background. Back home, he added some further enhancements to make the waves appear even more dark and powerful.

Working in the City of London, the cityscapes challenge was perfect for Ray, who found that the Xperia Z5’s 23MP camera was the ideal tool for documenting architecture.

Ray mostly captured the beauty of London using the Xperia Z5’s Superior Auto mode, which provided nice, even exposures.

Setting the Z5’s handy Grid Lines feature provided a nice guide to capture perfectly lined perspective shots.

Liz wanted to shoot her cityscapes at night to test the Xperia Z5 camera’s low-light capabilities. She found the dusk and night shots sharp and clear, and “certainly better than I would expect from a camera with a small sensor.”

Liz found that focusing and image processing in low light was noticeably faster than on her previous smartphones. What’s more, she was able to pick up reflections on the water at dusk with pleasingly little light flare in her scenes. The high-res 23MP imaging sensor (which is also shared by the Xperia Z5 Compact and Z5 Premium phones in the range) ensures that images are large and full of detail, too.

For those wanting to control more aspects of image capture with the Z5 camera, the Manual Mode can be used to set the exposure value and white balance settings. Here, Liz tweaked her white balance settings to capture more vibrant colours in these facades.