Robert Scoble's Galaxy S II vs iPhone 4S camera test
plus.google.com
plus.google.com
Not a comparison, but it really does show that the iPhone4S camera is pretty damn good.
While not indicative of real-world use, comparison shots like this, IMHO, should be done with a stand... unless the only variable being tested is "likelihood of shakiness due to camera(phone) form factor."
Looking at the shots again, it does seem that the sharpest image, that of the original iPhone 4, is also the noisiest, iPhone4 autoexposure set it to high-iso/fast shutter I suppose?
The other thing are the colors, which seem much better in Samsung's picture. This, too, has nothing per se to do with the quality of the camera but it's settings. This time it's the white balance that's different. This is one of the things, where camera automatics are still often wrong. A small change of the subject can cause big differences. Moving a few centimeters more to the left is enough...
Again, you can try that with a "real" camera. A DSLR will let you choose the color temperature, but even cheap digital cameras have sometimes different modi for "sunlight"/"cloudy"/"artificial light". I won't go into details here (see [1]), sufficient to say that this can greatly affect a picture.
Also note that the picture from the Galayx II and the one from the iPhone 4S have roughly the same brightness and sharpness. Judging from the noise and resolution, the two cameras seem quite similiar (and are maybe even produced by the same factory).
TL;DR This comparison is not meaningful at all. For a professional result you would need to control the cameras completely manual and take a lot more pictures in different settings (light, reference colors, tripod, ...).
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Color_balance
EDIT: He actually made more than these three: https://secure.flickr.com/photos/scobleizer
Well, it's also worthwhile testing how well the automatic settings work -- that's how most folk will use the phone.
(All I really want in a camera phone is non-shitty low-light photos.)
Much of a muchness, IMO. The two are very close, and aside from things like color temperature (which I personally would discount and tweak later if desired - though I wonder if the white balance is configurable on either phone), they are all but equal.
His stream, which has some other test photos with commentary: https://plus.google.com/111091089527727420853/posts
Such people know how to insert themselves in the daily conversations and can count on the support of their followers to carry their views far and beyond. Most of the time those views are not much more than a catchy social hook. You Googling his name and reading this reply will likely cement Robert Scoble in your brain for a while longer.
I find it an interesting, albeit at times annoying, phenomenon. Like the Quora drama (in which Scoble was able to permeate into a lot of topics):
http://scobleizer.com/2011/01/30/why-i-was-wrong-about-quora...
http://www.quora.com/Dan-Kaplan/Sorry-Scoble-Quora-is-not-yo...
Heh, I love that. I'm going to use it.
I think that the 4S shot is too red/yellow compared to the Galaxy II. This sort of comparison is pretty subjective though.
(aside for evanwalsh: for the record I hate my Nexus One and have a 4S on the way)
Without making sure parameters & the software used were the same, such a casual comparison doesn't seems too useful to me.
You may be able to say "this photo looks right" but that's pretty darn subjective. Turns out we humans are kinda useless for tests like these. Past a few megapixels this stuff really doesn't matter because things like focus, lenses, and lighting are so much more important than resolution. The photos are "sharp" enough and none of these phones support mounting lenses or lights on anything. So its kind of arbitrary. Unless one of these phones has an especially shitty lens or focus or bad software, they'll probably just look mostly the same. I consider these long solved issues and don't expect much difference.