Yu Televentures, a Micromax Informatics arm has recently been in the news for their latest handset, Yu Yutopia. The company launched its most powerful phone last week, and we were on the grounds covering the event live. From then, we had a chance to play with the device, which is yet to ship to consumers who have pre-ordered it already. We bring you the exclusive detailed camera review of the acclaimed Yutopia handset.

But first let’s talk about the journey of Yu Televentures, a Brain Child of Rahul Sharma, which was launched last year in December when the company announced their first handset, the Yu Yureka. From there, the Indian brand has gone to launch various handsets in different segments. Such as Yu Yuphoria, Yunique, which was once crowned as the most affordable 4G LTE handset in the country until Lenovo A2010, PhiComm Energy 653 and ZTE Blade Qlux 4G was launched with almost similar pricing. Now Yutopia is company’s fourth handset, not counting Yureka Plus as separate handset but an upgrade.

Artificial Light – Gallery

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Talking about the camera capabilities of the device, it packs 21-megapixel image sensor, i.e. a Sony Exmor RS IMX230. It is considered to be one of the most powerful camera modules right now. Using the CMOS technology that is used in DSLR cameras as well, the rear camera on Yutopia promises to deliver one of its kind quality captures. Sony somehow managed to put such technology on a pretty small scale, if you compare the lens size of DSLR. Although, it does still leaves a big bump on the back, which company has utilized to look like a ring. The brand calls it a Saturn Ring.

Considered to be 2x light sensitive than the average 21MP sensor, it uses back-illuminated technology to brighten up the details in the capture. We tested the camera in various lighting conditions; low light, natural light and artificial light. What we saw was amazing, but we did have to struggle to take some simple shots. We would tell you when and why as we address the camera interface.

The company claims that they have used PDAF (Phase Detection Auto Focus) technology and Optical Image Stabilization (OIS) on this camera. It is claimed to be the first of its kind offering where you see both of these technologies used in one module. But when we were trying to capture the moments, it wasn’t that fast at some times. The camera app seemed to be lagging a lot, and that’s one of the reasons we initially felt that it was a total bust.

LowLight – Gallery

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But after spending continuous time with the camera, it was growing on us as we took more captures. We can’t measure the 0.2 seconds capture claim by the company, but it was certainly fast when it comes to Autofocusing. Although, I felt it was not ideally focusing on the object I wanted to focus, so eventually, I had to use the manual focus. What good is such technology if the smartphone can’t make the right usage of it!

The company also claims that it uses a special 77.3-degree wide-angle lens that should cover more area. But unfortunately, the 21.4MP resolution is not the 16:9, but instead it is 4:3, so it is quite similar to other 13-21MP cameras in terms of coverage. Now talking about the real outputs, we did like the camera samples that we took from the Yutopia’s camera. The color reproduction, white balance and saturation were quite impressive in normal mode captures. But when we started using the HDR mode, we noticed that they were over brightened by the camera app instead of offering much clearer details. The camera app offers many modes such as HDR including the Auto, Steady Photo, Night, Action, ChromaFlash, and OptiZoom.

Most of all these modes, the ones that I like include ChromaFlash and OptiZoom while night mode didn’t really help unless you have a tripod lying on your backpack. As the steady night, shots were not possible, even with the steadiest stance possible while capturing from a smartphone. Why I liked the ChromaFlash is because this feature was able to manage the true color of an object despite flashing LED lights on the scene.

Natural Light – Gallery

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Talking about the OptiZoom, we have seen this kind of feature earlier on Obi Worldphone SF1. This function mimics the optical zoom and thus increases the final image resolution, thereby reducing the noise in outputs. What’s interesting is that it actually works; you notice the improvement in quality once you compare the results of normal and OptiZoom.

Now moving to the talk of recording videos using the rear camera, the camera on Yutopia is capable of recording up to 4K video resolution shots. But are the shots any good, well, it’s not up to the mark of Samsung Galaxy Note 5 or either LG G4, but it does give quite a good performance when you compare it with 4K Video on OnePlus 2. Both OnePlus and YU handset has OIS that works to their advantage, as unwanted shakes don’t affect the video. Thus, the recording was quite smooth, which is the least expectation from such powerful sensor.

The front facing camera on the Yutopia is of 8-megapixel resolution, which is by OmniVision. The particular module that we are talking here is, OV8865, which is also used on Yuphoria, but as the main camera. It is quite interesting on the part of manufacturing that YU thought to put the same camera as selfie cam that was used on their other device as the main camera. Coming to its performance, the module offers good selfies, not the best among other selfie cams in this segment, but quite certainly an impressive one. It is said to be an 86-degree wide-angle lens that easily fit many family members at the dinner table. Although, I would say it needs work in terms of the low light captures, since the lens is used has only f/2.2 aperture, which means it captures less light.

Verdict

The Yu Yutopia has a massive 21MP rear camera and 8MP front facing camera, this configuration is quite a humongous. Though, the issue with this camera phone is mostly on the software part, whereas the company has done a great job in putting the top of the line camera hardware. But the most important part in the smartphone photography is consistency. You can’t continuously get good captures on this handset as the camera interface lags a lot. Meanwhile, there is no Pro or RAW mode offering, despite such great hardware specifications.

For the lesser pricing, you can opt for smartphones like Honor 7 and Moto X Play that offers better camera outputs. It will only make sense to go with Yutopia, if you’re more concerned with the horsepower than camera usability. Although, if you’d like some insight on the processing power and many other things apart from the camera, then you’ll have to wait for our detailed review of the device, which would be out soon. Stay Tuned!