Google Thinks AI Can Make You a Higher Photographer: I Dive Into the Pixel 10 Cameras

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If an organization releases new telephone fashions however does not change the cameras, would anybody listen? Fortunately that is not the case with Google’s new Pixel 10, Pixel 10 Pro and Pixel 10 Pro Fold telephones, which make a number of developments within the {hardware} — howdy, telephoto digicam on the base-level Pixel for the primary time — and in addition within the software program that runs all of it, with generative AI taking part in a fair larger function than it has earlier than.

“This is the first year where not only are we able to achieve some image quality superlatives,” Isaac Reynolds, group product supervisor for the Pixel cameras, instructed CNET, “but we’re actually able to make you a better photographer, because generative AI and large models can do things and understand levels of context that no technology before could achieve.”

Modern smartphone cameras should be greater than glass and sensors, as a result of they must compensate for the bodily limitations of those self same glass and sensors. You cannot count on a tiny telephone digicam to carry out in addition to a big glass lens on a standard digicam, and but the photographs popping out of the Pixel 10 fashions surpass their optical talents. In a name that lined loads of photographic floor, Reynolds shared with me particulars about new options in addition to problems with how we are able to belief photographs when AI — in Google’s personal instruments, even — is so prevalent.

Pro Res Zoom provides generative AI to succeed in 100x

The new Pro Res Zoom function is prone to get probably the most consideration as a result of it strives for one thing exceptionally troublesome in smartphones: long-range zoom that is not a fuzzy mess of pixels.

You see this on a regular basis: Someone on their telephone spreads two fingers towards the display screen to make a distant object bigger within the body. Photographers die a little bit every time that occurs as a result of, by not sticking to the primary zoom ranges — 1x, 2x, 5x and so forth — the particular person is counting on digital zoom; the digicam app is making pixels bigger after which utilizing software program to attempt to clear up the consequence. Digital zoom is actually higher than it as soon as was, however every time it is used, the particular person sacrifices picture high quality for extra zoom within the second.

A close up on street lamps


Enlarge Image

A close up on street lamps

At as much as 30x zoom, the Super Res Zoom function upscales the picture for a pointy consequence.

Andrew Lanxon/CNET

Google’s Super Res Zoom function, launched with the Pixel 3, interpolates and sharpens the picture as much as 30x zoom stage on the Pixel 10 Pros (and as much as 20x zoom on the Pixel 10 and Pixel 10 Pro Fold). The new Pro Res Zoom on the Pixel 10 Pro pushes method past that to 100x zoom — with a major carry from AI.

Past 30x, Pro Res Zoom makes use of generative AI to refine and rebuild areas of the picture based mostly on the underlying pixels captured by the digicam sensor. It’s much like the know-how that Magic Editor makes use of if you transfer an object to a different space within the picture, or kind a immediate so as to add issues that weren’t there within the first place. Only on this case, the Pixel Camera app creates a generative AI model of what you captured to provide the picture crisp strains and options. All the processing is carried out on-device.

Pro Res Zoom takes the delicate zoomed-in model (left) and makes use of generative AI to rebuild a model that is sharper and extra detailed (proper).

Patrick Holland/CNET

Reynolds defined that one of many elements driving the creation of Pro Res Zoom was the environments the place individuals are taking photographs. “They’re taking pictures in the same levels of low light — dinners did not get darker since we launched Night Sight,” he mentioned. “But what is changing is how much people zoom, [and] because the tech is getting so much better, we took this opportunity to reset and refocus the program on incredible zoom quality.”

Pro Res Zoom works greatest on static scenes akin to buildings, skylines, foliage and the like — issues that do not transfer. It will not attempt to reconstruct faces or individuals, since generative AI can typically make them stand out extra as being artificially manipulated. The generated picture is saved alongside the picture captured by the digicam sensor so you possibly can select which one seems greatest.

The generative AI has added real looking texture and sharp edges to the zoomed-in picture at left.

Patrick Holland/CNET

What about consistency and accuracy of the AI processing? Generative AI photographs are constructed out of pixel noise that’s shortly refined based mostly on the enter driving them. Visual artifacts have typically gone hand-in-six-fingered-hand with generated imagery.

A person uses a Pixel 10 Pro XL camera's Pro Res Zoom feature to zoom in on a far away architectural detail.

Using Pro Res Zoom on the Pixel 10 Pro XL to seize distant particulars.

Andrew Lanxon/CNET

But that is a distinct sort of generative AI, says Reynolds. “When I think of Gen AI in this application, I think of something where the team has spent a couple of years getting it really tuned for exactly our use case, which is image enhancement, image to image.”

Initially, individuals inside Google had been fearful about artifacts, however the result’s that “every image you see should be truly authentic to the real photo,” he mentioned.

Auto Best Take

This new function looks as if a pure evolution — and by “natural,” I imply “processor speeds have improved enough to make it happen.” The Best Take function was launched with the Pixel 8, letting you seize a number of photographs of an individual or group of individuals, and have the telephone merge them into one photograph the place everybody’s expressions look good. CNET’s Patrick Holland wrote in his review of the Pixel 8, “It’s the start of a path where our photography can be even more curated and polished, even if the photos we take don’t start out that way.”

Four people sitting on a bench on a sunny day looking at the camera.


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Four people sitting on a bench on a sunny day looking at the camera.

Even when some of the subjects here were deliberately trying to fool the Pixel 10 Pro’s Auto Best Take feature by closing their eyes or gazing elsewhere, the camera has created this natural looking composite where everyone looks good.

Patrick Holland/CNET

That path has led to Auto Best Take, which does it automatically — and not just grabbing a handful of images to work with. Says Reynolds, “[It] can analyze… I think we’re up to 150 individual frames within just a few seconds, and pick the right five or six that are most likely to yield you the perfect photo. And then it runs Best Take.”

From the photographer’s point of view, the phone is doing all the work, though, as with Pro Res Zoom, you can also view the handful of shots that went into the final merged image if you’re not happy with the result. The shots are full-resolution and fully processed as if you’d snapped them individually.

“What’s interesting about this is you might actually find in your testing that Auto Best Take doesn’t trigger very often, and there’s a very particular reason for that,” said Reynolds. “Once the camera gets to look at 150 items, it’s probably going to find one where everybody was looking at the camera, because if there’s even one, it’ll pick it up.”

Improved Portrait mode and Real Tone

Another improvement enabled by the Pixel 10 Pro’s Tensor G5 processor is a new high-resolution Portrait mode. To take advantage of the wide camera’s 50-megapixel resolution, Reynolds said the Pixel team rebuilt the Portrait mode model so it creates a higher quality soft-background depth effect, particularly around a subject’s hair.

The Pixel 10 Pro’s new high-resolution Portrait mode does a better job of separating the subject from the background, even with challenging situations like curly hair.

Patrick Holland/CNET

Real Tone, the technology for more accurately representing skin tones, is also incrementally better. As Reynolds explained, Real Tone has progressed from establishing color balances for people versus the other areas of a frame to individual color balances for each person in the image.

“That’s not just going to mean better consistency shot to shot, it means better consistency scene to scene,” he said, “because your color, your [skin] tone, won’t depend so strongly on the other things that happened in the image.”

The Pixel 10 Pro has done a good job of photographing skin accurately, even when the light is affected by other factors such as panes of colored glass in this example. 

Patrick Holland/CNET

He also mentioned that a core component of Real Tone has been the ability to scale up image quality testing methods and data collection in the process of bringing the feature’s algorithms to market.

“What standards are we setting for diversity and equity, inclusion across the entire feature set?” he said. “Real Tone is primarily a mission and a process.”

Instant View feature in the Pixel 10 Fold

One other significant photo hardware improvement has nothing to do with the cameras. On the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, the Pixel Camera app takes advantage of the large internal screen by showing the previous photo you captured on the left side of the display. Instead of straining to see details in a tiny thumbnail in the corner of the app, Instant View gives a full-size shot, which is especially helpful when you’re taking multiple photos of a person or subject.

Unfolded Pixel 10 Pro Fold phone showing the camera app on the right screen and previous photos captured on the left.

On the Pixel 10 Pro Fold, when you take a photo it’s displayed on the left-side screen in Instant View.

Google

Camera Coach

So far, these new Pixel 10 camera features are incorporated into the moment you capture a photo, but Reynolds also wants to use the phones’ cameras to encourage people to become better photographers. Camera Coach is an assistant that you can invoke when you’re stuck or looking for new ideas while photographing a scene.

Kenny sulaimon alex cooper doing pixel camera demo

Using Camera Coach at the Made by Google 2025 event.

Google/Screenshot by Viva Tung/CNET

It can look at the picture you’re trying to take and help you improve it using suggestions such as getting closer to a subject for better framing or moving the camera lower for a more dramatic angle. When you tap a Get Inspired button, the Pixel Camera app looks at the scene and makes suggestions.

“Whether you’re a beginner and you just need step-by-step instructions to learn how to do it,” said Reynolds, “or you’re someone like me who needs a little more push on the creativity when sometimes I’m busy or stressed, it helps me think creatively.”

Watch this: Pixel 10 Pro and Pro XL First Look: Familiar Design, New AI Tricks

CP2A content credentials

All of this AI being worked into the photographic process, from Pro Res Zoom to Auto Best Take, invariably brings up the unresolved question of whether the images we’re creating are genuine. And in a world that is now awash in AI-generated images that look real enough, people are naturally guarded about the provenance of digital images.

For Google, one answer is to label everything. Each image captured by the Pixel 10 cameras or touches Google Photos is tagged with C2PA Content Credentials (Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity), even if it’s untouched by AI. It’s the first smartphone with C2PA built in.

“We really wanted to make a big difference in transparency and credibility and teaching people what to expect from AI,” said Reynolds. “The reason we are so committed to saving this metadata in every Pixel camera picture is so people can start to be suspicious of pictures without any information.”

Marking images that have no AI editing is meant to instill trust in them. “The image with an AI label is less malicious than an image without one,” said Reynolds. “When you send a picture of someone, they can look at the C2PA in that picture. So we’re trying to build this whole network that customers can start to expect to have this information about where a photo came from.”

What’s new in the Pixel 10 camera hardware

Scanning the specs of the Pixel 10 cameras, listed below, you’d rightly notice that they match those found on last year’s Pixel 9 models, but a couple of details stand out.

A Pixel 10 Pro phone lying face down amid leaves and grass.

The camera array on the back of the Pixel 10 Pro.

Andrew Lanxon/CNET

For one, having a dedicated telephoto camera is no longer one of the features that separates the entry-level Pixel from the pro models. The Pixel 10 now has its own 10.8 megapixel, f/3.1 telephoto camera with optical image stabilization that offers a 5x optical zoom and up to 20x Super Res Zoom.

It’s not as good as the 48-megapixel f/2.8 telephoto camera used in the Pixel 10 Pro and Pixel 10 Pro XL (the same one used in the Pixel 9 Pros), but that’s not the point. You don’t need to give up extra zoom just to buy a more affordable phone.

Another difference you’ll encounter, particularly when recording video, is improved image stabilization. The optical image stabilization is upgraded in all three phones, but the stabilization in the Pixel 10 Pros is significantly improved. Although the sensor and lens share the same specs as the Pixel 9 Pro, the wide-angle camera in the Pixel 10 Pro models necessitated a new design to accommodate new OIS components inside the module enclosure. Google says it doubled the range of motion so the lens physically moves through a wider arc to compensate for motion. Alongside that, the stabilization software has been tuned to make it smoother.

Camera Specs for the Pixel 10 Lineup

Pixel 10 Pixel 10 Pro Pixel 10 Pro XL Pixel 10 Pro Fold
Wide Camera 48MP Quad PD, f/1.7, 1/2″ image sensor 50MP Octa PD, f/1.68, 1/1.3″ image sensor 50MP Octa PD, f/1.68, 1/1.3″ image sensor 48MP Quad PD, f/1.7, 1/2″ image sensor
Ultra-wide Camera 13MP Quad PD, f/2.2, 1/3.1″ image sensor 48MP Quad PD with autofocus, f/1.7, 1/2.55″ image sensor 48MP Quad PD with autofocus, f/1.7, 1/2.55″ image sensor 10.5MP Dual PD with autofocus, f/2.2, 1/3.4″ image sensor
Telephoto Camera 10.8MP Dual PD with optical image stabilization, f/3.1, 1/3.2″ sensor size, 5x optical zoom 48MP Quad PD with optical image stabilization, f/2.8, 1/2.55″ image sensor, 5x optical zoom 48MP Quad PD with optical image stabilization, f/2.8, 1/2.55″ image sensor, 5x optical zoom 10.8MP Dual PD with optical image stabilization, f/3.1, 1/3.2″ sensor size, 5x optical zoom
Front camera 10.5MP Dual PD with autofocus, f/2.2 42MP Dual PD with autofocus, f/2.2 42MP Dual PD with autofocus, f/2.2 10MP Dual PD, f/2.2
Inner camera n/a n/a n/a 10MP Dual PD, f/2.2


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