Mobile/Camera Upgrade

 I recently upgraded my Pixel 7 Pro mobile phone to the Pixel 10 Pro, predominantly to take advantage of the better camera and improved battery performance. I managed to get a good trade-in price for the Pixel 7 Pro (£402) and the deal included a £100 voucher for the Google store. Updates are guaranteed for another 7 years so I'll be stuck with this phone for some time.

As a Google product, artificial intelligence (AI) is at the heart of the Pixel 10 series so it will take me a while to understand how to get the best out of the camera. It has been a while since I logged onto my Blogger account as we've been away on a short break. In that short period, Google has added some new 'beta' features to Blogger 'to create a more engaging reading experience with the help of Google'. This is another example of AI in action. With just a single click, Blogger will add a Google search link to any keywords that its AI has identified. I have used this function to provide all the links above. This new feature will be of fairly limited use to me since my links will, in most instances, be to specific websites or web pages.

As mentioned above, one of the main reasons for upgrading the phone was to take advantage of the improved camera quality and features. The Pixel 10 Pro offers up to 100x zoom, albeit using the lower resolution (12 MP) sensor; AI is used to sharpen up the image. When using the 50MP sensor, optical zoom up to 30x is possible. Our recent Devon holiday included a short walk along the Tarka Trail with plenty of opportunities for a bit of bird watching. As we walked alongside the River Taw estuary, I took this picture of an oystercatcher using the 30x optical zoom with 50MP sensor (Photo 1).

Photo 1: Oystercatcher, River Taw Estuary, Devon (5th Oct 2025)

Using the lower resolution sensor (12MP) with 100x zoom, the photo is grainy and fuzzy (Photo 2).

Photo 2: Oystercatcher, River Taw, 100x Zoom without AI (5th Oct 2025)

Fortunately, the AI algorithm sharpens up the picture sufficiently to enable bird identification (Photo 3) ...

Photo 3: Oystercatcher, River Taw, 100x Zoom with AI (5th Oct 2025)

I'll be looking at other features in the near future.