You’ve likely used HDR in your smartphone camera. Now, Ultra HDR brings you the benefit of more enhanced contrast in your photos. I am here to help you understand it, in easy, non-technical language.
If you use your smartphone camera extensively, you have definitely seen the HDR option somewhere in there. the location differs from one phone brand to another. In many cases, you will find the option to enable or disable it buried in your smartphone camera’s settings. And sometimes, when you are capturing a photograph, a prompt shows up on the screen to capture the image with HDR on or off. HDR is short for Ultra Dynamic Range. in 2023, Google developed an enhanced version of HDR that will be coming to a smartphone near you (or in your hand) soon.
If you are buying or already use the Google Pixel 8 or Pixel 8 Pro, those are the first smartphones that capture photos in Ultra HDR. Other smartphone brands will definitely jump on the new technology. Note that there are two sides to this: the first is capturing Ultra HDR, and the second is displaying it. I explain both sides in the sections below.
Table of Contents
The transition from HDR to Ultra HDR
A basic understanding of HDR is required for you to understand what Ultra HDR is. So, we shall begin with a quick comparison of both.
HDR enhances image quality by dynamically adjusting brightness, contrast, and color to improve the image. To give you an idea of what it does, if you have been observant when using the Google Photos app to edit your images, applying “Dynamic” to it delivers more colors, better contrast, and increased brightness compared to the original appearance of the image; right? Ultra HDR improves on that by providing crisper, vibrant colors, and greater contrast. It attempts to improve on the image by making it more realistic That is the summary of the differences between the two. All of the technical details boil down to these benefits.
If still interested in learning more about HDR, our earlier article, What is HDR camera? is a good place to read up more.
How Ultra HDR works
Remember how I pointed out that HDR makes images better with more vivid colors and better contrast? When you are taking the photo in HDR mode, your phone captures extra information about the brightness and color intensity in different parts of the image, and then uses the information to enhance the appearance of the image. The secret is in the extra data. This extra data is called metadata (you don’t have to bother about the term, but it is a good idea to remember it should you run into documentation that mentions it).
In the case of Ultra HDR, the process is similar; only that it gets much better results. It dynamically adjusts brightness and contrast in the captured image. Google’s Ultra HDR primarily works at the point of capturing the image. Here’s how it operates, explained in three distinct phases:
Capture Phase: When you take a photo in Ultra HDR mode, your phone’s camera captures multiple exposures of the same scene. These exposures cover a wide range of brightness levels, from shadows to highlights.
Processing Phase: The camera software analyzes these exposures and combines them intelligently and adds extra information that is saved with the image. This info goes around with the image, even when you share it via Bluetooth or over the Internet. This processing happens on the device you are capturing with.
Display Phase: Now that you have captured an Ultra HDR image, you need to be able to view it on a compatible device – that is, a device with an HDR-capable display. If the viewing device is compatible, that extra info saved with the image is used by the device to adjust color, brightness and contrast to display an enhanced version of the image.
Bigger file sizes
Because Ultra HDR JPEGs include additional data that enhances image quality, this extra information increases the file size compared to regular JPEGs. The practical implication is that you will end up with slightly larger image files.
Ultra HDR Is Automatic
You are going to love this, especially if you are not a professional photographer. When it comes to adjusting the level of HDR enhancement in Ultra HDR images, it is primarily an automatic process. There is nothing for you to do apart from select Ultra HDR mode in your phone’s camera, point at the subject, and shoot. It is all done behind the scenes. You don’t need to manually tweak any settings.
Compatibility and Supported Devices
For capturing, Google’s pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro are the first smartphones to capture in Ultra HDR. The selection of smartphone cameras supporting this new technology is still severely limited. You can expect the upcoming Pixel 9 series cameras to support it as well.
As for compatibility in displaying Ultra HDR images, photos captured using this new technology are saved in JPEG format. As such, any platform that supports displaying JPEG images can display them. Those with HDR support will display them in their enhanced formats, while those without HDR support will display them in their non-enhanced format.
Any devices running Android 14 or higher with screens that support HDR is supported and will display those enhanced images in their full glory. If not supported, the devices will display the images, but the enhancements of the photos won’t be visible. So, even if your device is not HDR-compatible, it will display the images but in their non-HDR appearance.
As per available information at this time, Ultra HDR images work on platforms like Google Chrome (or any Chromium-based browser) running on Android 14 or Windows 11/macOS. Devices with HDR-capable displays and compatible operating systems can fully showcase them.
As more devices get Android 14 and more apps are updated to support the new technology, more people will be able to view the enhanced images on their mobile and on their computers.
3rd Party camera Apps
Originally, only camera apps that use the Android Camera2 API could capture Ultra HDR images. Camera2 API is built into Android OS and is often used by phone manufacturers, including Samsung and OnePlus, among others. App developers use the CameraX API, which did not originally support the new technology, thus excluding 3rd party apps from it. But that is set to change. In 2024, Google is updating the CameraX library to support the new technology to allow 3rd party apps with built-in camera functionality to be able to capture photos in Ultra HDR mode.
To wrap this article up, more and more phones will be released with the ability to capture photos in Ultra HDR mode, and more and more devices will be released with the ability to view the full enhancements of the technology. Some say this is a gamechanger in smartphone photography. I am not convinced it is, but it is an exciting development that anyone interested in capturing better photographs can benefit from.