Xiaomi Mobile Workflow Comparison

Xiaomi Mobile Workflow Comparison, below is the same shot taken in both Jpg & Raw formats with the Xiaomi Mi Sphere, then I’ve used different mobile post editing workflows to compare the difference to see which turns out to be the best.

Unstitched Raw DNG file

Unstitched JPG file

It’s best to click on the 3 little dots in the top right, turn off the autogyro & follow. Then you can click & drag around anywhere & it’ll stay put to compare. Click once on the photo to hide the info & thumbnails to have a clear look around, double clicking will go to fullscreen mode.

^{Click For Interactive 360º}

The best to worst:

Excellent – Raw DNG opened in Snapseed using the fine tune tool, saving it as jpg, then run through Mi Sphere Converter. Ever so slightly more details than the jpg.

Excellent – Jpg run through Mi Sphere Converter, then colour graded with Snapseed fine tune tool. This is on par with the Raw and you have to look very very closely to notice any difference.
Very Good – Snapseed HDR 100% – Mi Sphere Converter. This is surprise for me, for the quick workflow this is right up there. When you zoom in to read the signs this is actually sharper than any of the others, but is is over saturated? Personally I’d be happy to upload this. If speed is your thing then this is a winner.
Good – Jpg then run through Mi Sphere Converter. With no colour grading at all. Downloaded from the cam then just run through MSC that’s it. This is the way to go if you want to be quick and aren’t bothered with colour grading.
OK – Raw DNG then opened in Snapseed, I tried upping the HDR to 100% saving it as jpg, then run through Mi Sphere Converter. The whole image has a washed out look, so don’t waste your time with this. You can’t shortcut Raw, always best to fine tune.
Poor – JPG straight from the Misphere app and uploaded. No doubt the worst, you can clearly see stitching errors on the bench and the edge of the building. In fact you can actually see the entire stitch all around if you look close enough.

Summary

Well the top two are so closely matched its hard to choose between them to be honest the difference is barely noticeable and you can easily adjust the colours to your preference. Even though Raw does give more detail and overall best outcome using a computer, I think on mobile this is negated somewhat. Personally i’ll be using Jpg for the majority of the time. Remember Raw takes an extra 3 seconds to fire the shutter, so for this reason alone is why I’ll choose Jpg for everyday use and leave Raw for when i’m not on the move and have time to edit on the computer. If i’m in a real rush then the very good quick hdr snapseed – msc will be the way to go.

You can find my in depth Xiaomi Mi Sphere review here.