Text/Liu Yong

Edited by/Zhang Xiao 

The smartphone industry has entered another intense period of new product launches.

From imaging flagships to high-end all-rounders, smartphone manufacturers are rolling out new generations of products. Larger sensors, longer zoom ranges, stronger stabilization, and continuously upgraded computational photography remain the highlights of various product launches—even though the imaging capabilities of smartphones have undergone multiple iterations, the war surrounding the camera lens shows no signs of stopping.

The reason is not hard to understand. As foundational experiences like performance and screens gradually mature, imaging remains a crucial anchor for smartphone manufacturers to sustain differentiation and compete for high-end users.

But problems have also arisen.

As hardware parameters continue to converge, how much competitive advantage can be gained by simply stacking sensors and competing on pixel count?

At the same time, user demands for imaging are evolving. Taking a clear photo is no longer the sole objective. Recording a concert, capturing fleeting emotions, shooting a cinematic video, and enabling ordinary people to create great works without mastering complex techniques are all becoming new questions that smartphone imaging must answer.

This has also given imaging competition a new direction. On September 21, vivo released the X500 series and announced the elevation of dynamic imaging to a company-wide strategic priority, introducing the Blueprint Dynamic Imaging Technology Stack in an attempt to extend competition from traditional static photography to dynamic imaging experiences like video and Live.

With all manufacturers striving to enhance imaging performance, why has vivo chosen to make dynamic imaging a strategic core? Is this a proactive layout in response to changing user demands, or an inevitable choice as smartphone imaging competition enters a new phase? And to truly bring professional creative capabilities into everyday life for the masses, what technical and commercial hurdles must vivo overcome?

01 Dynamic Imaging: Difficult but Right

Why are smartphone manufacturers still competing fiercely in imaging?

One key reason is that as the foundational experiences of smartphones mature, imaging remains one of the few core capabilities that can simultaneously influence consumer purchasing decisions, product differentiation, and brand perception. Processor performance can be measured through benchmarks, and screen parameters can be compared at product launches, but whether a photo is clear enough or a video is stable enough is ultimately tested in users' real lives.

For smartphone manufacturers collectively striving to break into the high-end market, imaging is not just a hardware configuration but a product value that consumers can directly perceive.

However, imaging competition is also facing new challenges. Over the past few years, manufacturers have continuously upgraded sensor sizes, zoom ratios, low-light algorithms, and portrait effects. Computational photography has enabled smartphones to produce impressive photos in many scenarios. But as foundational image quality improves, the difficulty of establishing differentiation solely through hardware parameters is increasing.

At the same time, the ways users document their lives are changing. Dynamic content like short videos and Live streams is becoming more prevalent. People want to capture not just a single moment but also the stage at a concert, the movement of an athlete, the sounds of friends gathering, and those fleeting emotions.

This means that smartphone imaging competition is extending from "taking a good photo" to "recording a good process."

Static imaging remains important, but dynamic imaging offers manufacturers new competitive space. Especially for brands aiming to establish professional imaging recognition, video is not just about image quality but also involves a complete experience encompassing shooting continuity, color performance, motion tracking, and post-production creativity. Whoever can truly integrate these aspects has the opportunity to establish new differentiation beyond existing imaging competition.

However, moving from photography to dynamic imaging is not simply about porting photo features into video mode.

The technical requirements for the two are markedly different.

When taking a photo, a smartphone can integrate information from different exposures in a short time through multi-frame synthesis and computational photography. In contrast, video requires real-time image acquisition and processing in every consecutive frame. Exposure cannot frequently change, colors cannot shift abruptly, focusing must keep up with subject movement, and stabilization cannot come at the cost of significant loss of field of view or unnatural image distortion. Even if single-frame quality is excellent, flickering, motion blur, or inconsistent colors during playback will degrade the overall viewing experience.

More complexly, smartphones must accomplish these tasks within limited physical space and power constraints.

High-specification video requires continuous use of sensors, processors, and imaging algorithms. The higher the resolution, frame rate, and dynamic range, the greater the demands on real-time processing power, thermal management, and energy efficiency. Meanwhile, smartphones must also balance thinness, battery life, and everyday usability.

This makes dynamic imaging a typical systems engineering challenge: sensors determine how much information can be captured, chips affect processing efficiency, algorithms determine how the image is rendered, and optical and electronic stabilization jointly influence stability in dynamic scenes.

vivo has chosen to elevate dynamic imaging to a company-wide strategic priority at this stage precisely because it is not dealing with an isolated video function but a technological system that requires sustained investment.

On September 21, 2026, vivo released the X500 series and introduced the Blueprint Dynamic Imaging Technology Stack, listing high dynamic range, high signal-to-noise ratio performance, professional stabilization, dynamic consistency, and cinematic color as its five core technical capabilities. According to vivo's product planning, this system aims to enhance overall performance from shooting to final output through sensor, imaging chip, and algorithm synergy, rather than relying solely on a single parameter as a selling point.

Among these, dynamic consistency deserves particular attention. Photos can be improved locally through post-processing, but video is a continuous visual experience. Whether exposure, color, and focusing remain natural when users move the camera, switch scenes, or transition from indoors to outdoors often determines the final viewing experience more than the peak quality of a single frame.

The same goes for stabilization. What users truly need is not a specific stabilization rating on a spec sheet but consistently stable footage when shooting while walking, tracking moving subjects, or using long zoom.

In other words, dynamic imaging truly tests not whether a smartphone can produce a beautiful video but whether it can consistently deliver stable results in complex, unpredictable real-world scenarios.

Of course, elevating dynamic imaging to a strategic direction does not mean the industry has already formed a new competitive landscape, nor can leadership be determined solely by technical announcements. Other brands are also continuously investing in video shooting, computational photography, and professional creative capabilities. For vivo, introducing a technological system is just the beginning; subsequent success depends on proving through actual product experiences whether these capabilities can be reliably delivered and whether consumers are willing to change their purchasing choices accordingly.

However, from an industry development perspective, dynamic imaging has indeed opened a new technological frontier for smartphone manufacturers.

For vivo, the value of this path lies not just in shooting better videos but in whether it can translate professional imaging capabilities into product experiences that ordinary users can easily use.

This leads to the next question: When dynamic imaging requires such complex technical support, how can vivo prevent professional capabilities from remaining in the hands of a few creators? How can it enable ordinary users to achieve better creative results without learning complex shooting techniques? This will determine whether dynamic imaging remains merely a high-specification feature of flagship smartphones or truly expands the boundaries of mass mobile creativity.

02 Raising Professional Ceilings, Lowering Mass Barriers

If dynamic imaging tests smartphone manufacturers' systemic technological capabilities, the more practical question is: What can these technologies ultimately offer users?

For smartphone manufacturers, a gap has always existed between professional imaging capabilities and mass user experiences.

On one end are professional creators who care about image quality, dynamic range, color depth, encoding formats, and post-production flexibility, seeking greater creative freedom from smartphones. On the other end are ordinary users who may not understand these professional concepts but want to easily capture clear, stable, and atmospheric videos at concerts, travels, or gatherings.

Focusing solely on raising professional ceilings may confine imaging capabilities to spec sheets and a few creators' workflows. Conversely, lowering barriers too much may limit the product's extension into professional creation.

vivo is attempting to address both questions through its dynamic imaging strategy: on one hand, continuing to expand the boundaries of smartphone imaging's professional capabilities; on the other, leaving complex technical processing to the system as much as possible, allowing users to focus more on content itself.

First, consider the professional ceiling.

Historically, smartphone video shooting has primarily served daily documentation. As sensors, processing chips, and algorithms improve, smartphones are beginning to take on more complex creative tasks. For professional creators, video quality means more than just high resolution—it includes whether highlights and shadows are adequately preserved, whether clarity is maintained during fast motion, and whether sufficient color grading and editing flexibility exist after shooting.

This is where vivo's dynamic imaging layout is noteworthy. Around the X500 series, vivo has incorporated high-specification video, professional Log video, and related post-production workflows into its product capabilities.

Take high-frame-rate video as an example. Higher frame rates offer greater creative space for slow-motion footage but also increase data acquisition and processing demands. Log video preserves greater adjustment flexibility for post-production color grading but requires users to have some post-processing knowledge. The significance of professional encoding and color workflows lies not just in making video specs look better but in minimizing barriers between smartphone shooting and post-production.

The underlying competitive logic is that smartphones are no longer satisfied with being supplementary tools to professional equipment but aim to become independent devices capable of handling more creative scenarios.

Of course, this does not mean smartphones can fully replace professional cameras. Lens systems, sensor sizes, thermal management, and control space in complex shooting environments still constitute real differences between devices. What smartphones truly need to prove is whether, beyond portability and ease of use, they can offer sufficiently reliable professional creative capabilities.

However, raising professional capabilities is only half the problem. For the broader user base, richer professional features may also mean higher operational barriers. Users may not know what Log is or understand the relationships between shutter speed, exposure compensation, and color space. If a feature requires users to learn a complex knowledge system before use, it is unlikely to become part of everyday imaging experiences for the masses.

Thus, lowering barriers does not mean simply reducing a few operational steps but transforming technical complexity into product usability—whether the system can recognize shooting scenarios and provide reasonable suggestions, automatically handle more appropriate processing in backlight, low-light, and motion scenes, and deliver finished footage that meets expectations without complex post-processing will all affect the practical value of imaging technologies.

For dynamic imaging, this capability is especially crucial.

Video shooting typically occurs in faster-changing, less forgiving scenarios. Concert lights flicker in an instant, children and pets move unpredictably, and travel highlights cannot be repeated. Users have little time to adjust parameters, let alone complete professional setups before each shot.

At such moments, a smartphone's value lies not just in offering more optional features but in helping users achieve stable, natural shooting results even when they cannot think quickly.

This is where AI and computational photography come into play. Through scene recognition, parameter optimization, and intelligent processing, smartphones can attempt to delegate parts of the work that previously required experienced judgment to the system. However, automation does not mean unconditionally making decisions for users.

A good intelligent imaging experience must balance automatic processing and user control: for ordinary users, operations should be simple enough; for creators with higher demands, the system should retain necessary adjustment space.

From this perspective, professional ceilings and mass barriers are not two unrelated product paths. The former determines how far technology can go, while the latter determines how many people can ultimately use it. Professional features validate a smartphone's technological potential, while usability determines whether these capabilities can enter real life and create sustained user value.

For vivo, the challenge of its dynamic imaging strategy lies precisely here.

Technological specification upgrades are relatively easy to showcase at product launches, but true experience differences often emerge only after extensive testing in complex scenarios. Whether professional features are sufficiently reliable, whether automatic processing feels natural, and whether users can experience coherence throughout shooting, editing, and sharing all require long-term product refinement.

Therefore, what dynamic imaging truly pursues is not making all users professional creators but ensuring professional capabilities are no longer exclusive tools for a few. For users requiring fine control, smartphones should offer a sufficiently high creative ceiling; for ordinary users who just want to document life, smartphones should minimize operational costs. Only when both needs are met within the same product system can dynamic imaging transform from a high-specification feature into a broadly valuable product capability.

Achieving this requires more than a single generation of technological breakthroughs. It demands long-term R&D accumulation, hardware-software synergy, and continuous understanding of user needs.

This brings the question back to vivo itself: Why has vivo chosen to make dynamic imaging a strategic core? What technological accumulations can it leverage, and how must it convert these advantages into long-term product competitiveness?

03 Why vivo?

Elevating dynamic imaging to a company-wide strategic priority means vivo aims to answer not just how to make a flagship smartphone shoot better videos but how to build a differentiated capability that can continuously accumulate and iterate as smartphone imaging competition enters a new phase.

This path is not without barriers.

Dynamic imaging requires the collaborative work of sensors, chips, algorithms, and software experience, as well as long-term product refinement and user feedback. For vivo, what truly merits discussion is not the breakthroughs it has achieved in a specific technology, but why it has chosen to concentrate its resources on dynamic imaging at this juncture and whether its previously accumulated capabilities can support this transformation.

First, there is the strategic starting point provided by long-term accumulation in imaging.

From establishing a global imaging strategic partnership with Zeiss in 2020 to continuously advancing research and development in optical technology, imaging algorithms, and professional portrait experiences, vivo has developed a relatively clear technological path centered around mobile phone imaging. The collaboration between the two parties is not limited to brand co-branding but extends to specific areas such as joint development of optical systems, coating technologies, portrait styles, and telephoto lenses. In 2025, vivo and Zeiss further renewed and expanded their cooperation, proposing to continue exploring a broader matrix of imaging products and an imaging ecosystem.

This means that vivo's advancement in dynamic imaging does not start from scratch. The past accumulations in optics, sensors, chips, and algorithms in the field of static imaging provide a foundation for video capabilities; however, when the competitive focus shifts from single photos to continuous footage, these capabilities need to be reintegrated and validated.

Particularly noteworthy is that vivo does not simply understand dynamic imaging as an upgrade in video parameters but categorizes it into five directions: high dynamic range, high signal-to-noise performance, professional stabilization, dynamic consistency, and cinematic color. Behind this technological layout is a reorganization of the complete link (Note: " link " is translated as "chain" in this context, referring to the imaging process chain) for video shooting: sensors are responsible for collecting information, chips provide real-time processing capabilities, algorithms improve image performance in complex scenes, and software needs to translate these technologies into functions that users can directly utilize.

However, existing accumulations can only explain why vivo is qualified to enter the field but are insufficient to explain why it has elevated dynamic imaging to a company-level strategy.

A more critical reason may lie in the changing cycle of imaging competition.

As more and more manufacturers acquire strong static shooting capabilities, differentiation achieved through single hardware upgrades may be difficult to sustain in the long term. For vivo, continuing to upgrade along the existing path can still improve product experience but may not necessarily establish new user perceptions continuously.

Dynamic imaging offers another possibility: it extends the application scope of traditional imaging technologies and shifts the competition to broader scenarios such as video creation, dynamic recording, and professional workflows.

This is also the difference between a company-level strategy and a selling point of a single product. The former implies that relevant investments should not be limited to a single generation of flagship products but should span technological research and development, product planning, software experience, and user services. Upgrading sensors and chips takes time, algorithm optimization in complex scenarios requires continuous accumulation, and professional creation functions need constant adjustment based on user feedback. If these efforts can be sustained across multiple product generations, dynamic imaging can gradually transform from a technological highlight at product launches into a brand capability recognizable to consumers.

Another accumulation of vivo is its established connections with imaging creators.

In September 2026, vivo announced the strategic upgrade of its Blueprint Imaging at a creator event, proposing to further integrate imaging technology with imaging culture and continue promoting mobile imaging creation through imaging competitions, creator exchanges, and other means. The value of such layout (Note: " layout " is translated as "initiatives" in this context) should not be understood solely from a brand communication perspective. For mobile phone manufacturers, professional creators can bring more complex shooting demands and more specific product feedback; real creation cases can also help manufacturers test the actual performance of technologies in complex environments.

More importantly, imaging itself possesses dual attributes of technology and expression. What users ultimately care about is often not what technology the sensor employs but whether they can capture important moments and convey the emotions they wish to express. If manufacturers only focus on hardware parameters, it is difficult to fully explain the significance of imaging capabilities to users; however, if they can establish connections between technology, products, and creation scenarios, they have the opportunity to build more sustainable brand recognition.

Of course, an imaging ecosystem cannot be established simply by hosting a few events or introducing several creation functions. It requires creators to be willing to continuously use the products, software and hardware to iterate constantly, and these investments to genuinely improve user experience. Whether the ecosystem can become a competitive advantage ultimately depends on whether it can feed back into product research and development and foster long-term, sustainable user participation.

This brings us back to the business level: What can vivo gain by choosing dynamic imaging?

From a product perspective, dynamic imaging can provide a new dimension of differentiation for flagship smartphones. For high-end users and professional creators, professional video capabilities have the potential to become a plus in purchasing decisions; for ordinary users, simpler shooting operations and more stable filming experiences may enhance the product's daily usability. Only when both aspects work together can technological investments be transformed into broader market competitiveness.

However, this path also has practical constraints. Professional video capabilities require stronger hardware and computing power support, necessitating trade-offs between research and development costs, product costs, and power consumption management; whether high-specification functions can be widely used cannot be judged solely by technical indicators. Even if a product can shoot high-specification videos, whether users are willing to pay a higher price for these capabilities and whether they would choose vivo over other brands as a result still need to be validated by market performance.

Therefore, the true test of dynamic imaging for vivo is not whether it can achieve several industry-leading specifications in a single product generation but whether it can continuously improve the experience in subsequent products and ensure that these improvements are perceived, used, and recognized by users. If professional creation capabilities can continuously trickle down and ordinary users can genuinely feel the convenience brought by dynamic imaging, then this strategy has the opportunity to transform from technological investment into product advantages and further into brand competitiveness.

The next phase of mobile phone imaging may not be determined by a single parameter. The real competition may occur at the intersection of technological accumulation, product experience, and user needs.

vivo's elevation of dynamic imaging to a company-level strategy indicates its attempt to find a new breakthrough in this competition. However, the strategic direction is only the starting point; ultimately, what determines how far this path can go is whether technology can continuously translate into experience and whether experience can further translate into commercial value.