iPhone 4S vs. iPhone 4, Galaxy S II, Nokia N8 and Amaze 4G

Siri’s sweet and all, but for many of us that new eight megapixel sensor and f/2.4 aperture lens are what really makes Apple’s iPhone 4S an appealing upgrade. We spent the weekend shooting around New York City with the iPhone 4S, along with some other top smartphones — the iPhone 4, Samsung Galaxy S II, Nokia N8 and HTC’s Amaze 4G — in order to determine just which phone’s camera reigns supreme. And in order to capture video and stills with consistent framing among all five devices, we secured each smartphone to that homemade quintuple cameraphone mount that you see above — it may be an early prototype, but it got the job done. Jump past the break to see the results, and check out our comprehensive iPhone 4S sample gallery below.

The iPhone 4S is a pleasure to shoot with. The camera is ready to capture its first image within a second of launch, and tapping to focus after recomposing is painless and speedy. With advanced options limited to a grid overlay and HDR shooting, its interface may be too simple for some, but third-party apps are available should you want a bit more control. The camera functions identically to its iPhone 4 predecessor, but its f/2.4 maximum aperture (compared to f/2.8 with the iPhone 4) means that you’ll be able to snap higher quality photos in low light. Its image quality rivals many point and shoot cameras in most conditions, though if you tend to shoot in the dark, you’ll want a dedicated camera with a more powerful flash.

Apple’s iOS may offer one of the simplest camera interfaces, but it’s by no means the most powerful. Want manual control over exposure, white balance and ISO sensitivity? The Galaxy S II, Nokia N8 and Amaze 4G let you do it all with just a few taps. Overall, we were most often pleased with photos we shot with the iPhone 4S, despite its lack of advanced features. Exposure and white balance were most accurate with Apple’s finest, and images were plenty sharp on their own, though not as sharp as those from the Amaze 4G, which appears to add sharpening by default.

We were quite pleased with the iPhone 4S’s 1080p HD video, which looked smooth, sharp and vibrant. iPhone 4 owners will need to keep in mind that higher-res video means much larger file sizes, however — a 160MB, two-minute video that we shot with the iPhone 4 tipped the scale at 390MB on the 4S. Those eight megapixel photos take up more space too — a 2.2MB five megapixel iPhone 4 photo was 3.1MB on the 4S. Check out the table below to see how file sizes stack up against the other cameras in our showdown.

Update: Images from the Nokia N8 are not in line with those we’ve captured in the past. We’re troubleshooting our device sample and will update this post accordingly.