The vivo X60 Series—Co-engineered with Zeiss, Challenging the Bastion of Pro Cameras

There are some surprisingly brilliant features on the vivo X60 Series that make these phones extremely desirable, especially to serious or pro photographers and videographers.

The spectacular, stunning, premium looking vivo X60 Series features flagship level details, specifications and performance. The series begins with the X60 to the left, with the X60 Pro (front and back facing) at the center, and the top-of-the-line vivo X60 Pro+ to the right.

Whether you are a professional, enthusiast or amateur photographer or filmmaker, or a regular creative individual, it would certainly be nice to have a device that you can easily carry with you everywhere, that allows you to instantly capture images and videos that look as good as though it’s been shot through a high-end professional camera.

Let us introduce you to the three members of the vivo X60 Series. The X60 Pro+ is the flagship, with top of the line specifications. Driven by the very latest Qualcomm Snapdragon 888 5G shipset, 12GB LPDDR5 RAM, and 256GB of high speed internal memory and Virtual RAM. It features four rear cameras in a dual main camera configuration (50MP ultra sensing GN1 sensor, f/1.57, with 100MP Super HD mode+ 48MP main customised, gimbal mounted Sony IMX 598 114 degree ultra-wide sensor + 32MP 50mm equivalent Pro Portrait lens + 8MP OIS enabled periscope optical zoom up to 5x and Hyper Zoom up to 60x). 

The X60 Pro and the X60 both use the flagship level Qualcomm Snapdragon 870 chipset. The X60 Pro model has three rear cameras (48MP main gimbal mounted f/1.48 + 13MP 2x portrait + 13MP ultra-wide angle), and a 32MP front camera. The X60 also has three rear cameras (48MP main sensor with enhanced OIS, f/1.79 + 13MP 2x portrait + 13MP ultra-wide angle).

There is a lot of attention to detail in the X60 Series, both internally and externally. The X60 Series is 5G enabled. Complementing its premium appeal is its beautiful design, slim profile, use of AG Glass with a satin finish for a feel and look of silk, and curved displays. The back panel material in the vivo X60 Pro+ is of particular note… Vegan Leather.

The vivo X60 Series is co-engineered with ZEISS. Here is a detailed view of the four cameras of the vivo X60 Pro+. Unlike other phones, including flagship phones, the X60 Pro+ offers two main gimbal stabilised camera systems (50MP f/1.57 ultra sensing sensor, and 48MP ultra-wide sensor), a 32MP 50mm equivalent Pro Portrait lens, and the 8MP OIS enabled periscope optical zoom. The T* denotes the ZEISS coating for all lens elements, and at the bottom, for the 8MP periscope zoom lens, is marked “ZEISS Vario-Tessar (denoting the famous lens design) 1.6-3.4 (the f number)/14-124 (equivalent focal length) ASPH (for the use of aspherical lens elements).”

Additionally, the X60 Pro+ and X60 Pro feature 3D Curved Display whereas the X60 features a 2.5D Display. The AMOLED displays have refresh rates of 120Hz and a touch response rate of 240Hz. Uniquely, the phones have been awarded with HDR10+ colour gamut, SGS Eye Care Display, and Hi-Res Audio certifications. Users can look forward to an immersive experience and long hours of daily viewing while being perfectly safe for the eyes.

Co-engineered by Zeiss

There’s a lot of magic in the vivo X60 Series, with sensors, optics and stabilisation, and with software and AI under the hood. In December 2020, vivo and ZEISS entered into a global partnership to jointly develop superior imaging optics and technologies for cellphones. The vivo X60 Series is the very first set of cellphones to emerge from this partnership. And it takes imaging to a whole new level, previously unseen in any cellphone.

Photograph by Amar Ramesh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. The brilliance, energy, beauty and elation of a smile, and its various forms and hues, became Amar’s muse. In this photograph Sumarani, a talented sitar player, in harmony with the universe, connects to her art and to her audience with her smile. Two aspects come together in this photograph. The ZEISS T* Coating has significantly controlled flare and ghosting, and Super Night Vision 2.0 has enabled rich colours and plenty of detail in a difficult stage lighting situation.

The X60 Series integrates the long-standing philosophy of user-oriented innovation that is at the heart of vivo’s phone and interface design, and world-renowned expertise in high-end optics and mobile imaging of ZEISS, to develop class-leading software and hardware capabilities. The combined best-in-class optical lenses, sensors, image processing algorithms and diverse multi-modal features allow users to enjoy camera technologies that were previously only limited to professional photographers. The vivo X60 Series is now raising the bar to a whole new level, challenging dedicated or high-end cameras. 

“Having used high-end mirrorless and dedicated video cameras until now for both personal and professional work, I couldn’t help but marvel at the quality and ease delivered by the vivo X60 Pro+. I can easily see it being my primary go-to device for quick, personal work.”

–Amar Ramesh, Photographer and Founder of Studio A

The three immediately visible qualities of the X60 Series directly derived from the partnership with ZEISS are…

ZEISS T* Coating for Enhanced Light Transmission

This is a nano-coating over lens surfaces, perfected by ZEISS over decades, first with their own professional lenses, and now for smaller lenses for smartphones. The T* Coating, enhances light transmission and reduces reflections, effectively avoiding stray light, ghosting and other aberrations or artifacts, to hugely improve overall image quality, sharpness and clarity.

Optical Enhancements for Reduced Distortions

Visible in photos made with the wide angle lenses in smartphones, faces, objects and lines distort, especially towards the edges of the frame. Optics redesigned by Zeiss, the vivo X60 Series eliminates these unwanted distortions. Buildings and monuments remain straight and faces remain beautiful with the X60 Series. 

Photograph by Amar Ramesh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. In this photograph, Kabilan, a Therukoothu folk dance artist transforms himself into a divine state, as he smiles through all the colours of time and space. Made using the 32MP 50mm equivalent Pro Portrait lens, the background, despite being relatively close to Kabilan, is transformed into beautiful swirling bokeh that surrounds and highlights the main subject. This is the ZEISS Biotar Portrait Style, unique to the vivo X60 Series.

ZEISS Biotar Portrait Style

Unique to ZEISS lenses, is a certain visual appeal prominently visible in the separation and blurring of the backgrounds on the vivo X60 Series. This brilliant feature allows users to create professional-looking portraits, with excellent center sharpness and unique, ‘swirly’ harmonious bokeh with any dappled background, which appear to rotate around the subject. 

That is just the beginning… 

The vivo X60 Series phones are able to instantly capture photos and videos in lighting conditions that would make a professional think twice. In other words, where a professional would need to think, calculate, and plan a shot in a tough situation, and use a whole bunch of gear like focus rigs and body-mounted stabilisers, the vivo X60 Series enables all this immediately, with no additional accessories, all hand-held.

Photograph by Amar Ramesh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. In this image, Threnethra, an Editor of photographs, poses for a photograph herself, and shows the value of smile. The 32MP 50mm equivalent Pro Portrait lens shows off its classic portraiture angle of view. ZEISS optical engineering ensures zero distortions in any part of the subject. The T* coating ensures that contrast in both light and colours are maintained true to life.

Gimbal Stabilisation 2.0

The original Gimbal Stabilisation was invented by vivo and first seen in the X50 Pro. Rather than stabilise optics, vivo uniquely developed a gimbal-based three-axis technology that stabilised the entire sensor and optics module, allowing a far greater freedom of movement and more refined stabilisation for both still images and video. Even today, this is path breaking for smartphones, and allows the best-in-class stabilisation. The X60 Pro+ and X60 Pro take this to the next level. 

Photograph by Anis Shaikh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. High octane energy is Anis’ muse. As a motorsports photographer, Anis sees the joy and spirit that athletes and sportspeople have in pursuing their passions. In this story, Anis follows two close friends, Sangram Devekar Patil and Varad Swapna More, both well known in the enthusiast biking community, on their quest for biking challenges and adventure. Shooting with the various options and modes available with Extreme Night Vision 2.0 and aided by Gimbal Stabilisation 2.0 in the vivo X60 Pro+ brings extraordinary details to life from a scene that has little to no light. In this particular photograph, Sangram and Varad take a break against the backdrop of the city, photographed using the Panorama Night mode.

The vivo X60 Pro+ and X60 Pro is enabled with the next gen Gimbal Stabilisation 2.0. Both devices utilise the very latest VIS 5-axis video stabilisation technology while the X60 Pro+ is even equipped with a second Ultra-Wide Gimbal Camera. Wide lenses generally provide much better results with stabilisation. With the X60 Pro+, users can use this to their benefit to obtain perfectly clear shots of objects in dynamic motion, with far greater accuracy than ever before.

What does this mean in real life? For videographers, you can eliminate external gimbals completely. Walk, run, shoot another bike while you are riding pillion on a moving bike… The vivo X60 Pro+ and Pro can shoot beautifully steady, stabilised footage that looks like it has been done with an external professional level stabiliser. Now imagine the possibilities with that!

“Action photography is all about speed with stills, and stabilisation with video. You only get a split second to react. I was extremely surprised to see how fast the X60 Pro+ responded. Not only superb processing speed, but also focus, overall response and fantastic stabilisation. No other phone can capture action and deliver the expanse of professional looking results like the vivo X60 Pro+ at this point.”

–Anis Shaikh, Motorsports Photographer and Photography Editor, Overdrive

For still photographers, this allows a huge level of creative freedom, in being able to make long exposures without any camera shake, or in this case, smartphone shake. Background blurs with the foreground subject steady, light streaks with fireworks, or portraits in shade or low light. All of these are now easily possible with the vivo X60 Pro and X60 Pro+. With these phones, as a photographer, you are now only limited by your imagination.

A third magnificent benefit that advanced photographers will find very exciting is the Pixel Shift Ultra HD Imaging feature. Seen only in very few flagship mirrorless cameras and DSLRs, this feature uses the Gimbal Stabilisation of the X60 Pro+ and X60 Pro to vibrate or ‘shift’ the sensor while making 8  lightning quick exposures, thereby superimposing full pixel level colour information into every single pixel of the captured image. This essentially quadruples effective resolution, thus hugely improving sharpness and enhancing zoom clarity. It also has the added benefit of getting perfectly accurate colours, thus improving tonality and removing moiré.

Photograph by Anis Shaikh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. Speed and control go hand in hand for an experienced biker. Varad demonstrates, as he zooms past the photographer. Getting the shot in situations where the action is extremely quick and in close proximity is difficult in the best of circumstances, and always necessitates professional camera gear to capture. Aided by Gimbal Stabilisation 2.0, the ultra-wide angle lens of the vivo X60 Pro+ allows action to be frozen even though the phone and the subject both are in motion.

Extreme Night Vision 2.0

When the whole is much more than the sum of its parts, it is usually because great design and engineering enable great implementation. The Extreme Night Vision 2.0 is a set of features derived from an extremely smart use of Gimbal Stabilisation, excellent optical design with fast apertures (for instance, f/1.47 on the X60 Pro), improved flare and glare control (ZEISS T* Coating), improved sensors (IMX 598 and GN1 on the Pro+), AI noise removal algorithms at high ISO, and AI bases HDR algorithms for better colours. Working together, these features enable the largest number of low light and extreme low light shooting options among smartphones yet. 

The X60 Series phones are capable of shooting in extremely low levels of light, with barely any illumination, or even with no illumination at all. The level of detail enabled by the X60 Series is unlike any other smartphone, and can surpass many dedicated cameras too. For those who enjoy night photography, the X60 Series brings out the shades and moods of the night in all its magical brilliance.

A variety of situational modes and filters are present to make use of low light and very low light—Ultra Wide Night Mode, three sets of Stylish Night Filters, Panorama Night mode, and HDR Super Night Portrait mode. In situation with extremely low or no light at all, Extreme Night Vision 2.0 kicks in automatically, ready to show a rich level of detail that is invisible to the human eye. 

Photograph by Anis Shaikh, with the vivo X60 Pro+. Sangram rides through it all! Mud and slush make the biggest thrills of riding on an extreme dirt track, meant to challenge the best bikers. The vivo X60 Series incorporates a brilliant Pro Sports Mode to capture the split second details of extreme action, and to freeze motion. In the case of the vivo X60 Pro+, the Pro Sports Mode can even be combined with optical zoom to capture action at 1, 2 or 5x, to get up-close for superb detail.

And a Whole Lot More… 

Among the many other modes that makes it easy for the creatively inclined to produce spectacular quality, are Super Pano mode, Pro Sports Mode, Kids Snapshot mode, Multi-Style Portrait modes and Long-Exposure Mode, Macro mode, among others.

For those who are keen on video production, the X60 series offers a Cinema Mode with a cinematic wide-screen view of 2.35:1, 3-mic Spatial Audio Recording (3D sound recording, available on the X60 Pro and X60 Pro+) with directional sound zooming as well. The vivo X60 Pro+ includes the benefit of modes like Super Night Video, and HDR10+ Video Recording in a larger colour gamut and dynamic range, for that professional, instantly graded look.

With so many amazing creative options to enable and talk about, one might even forget the most important feature… that all of this is achieved by a very smart, intelligent, connected device that you can take with you absolutely anywhere. The vivo X60 Series might turn a few heads for all the right reasons. But being a smartphone, the X60 Series will just as much be unobtrusive (unlike a camera), allowing you to shoot uninterrupted, with ease, in any situation, and produce spectacular results every time.