The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra under the Louvre Pyramid in Paris, 2024, Ph. Moctar KANE/ZDnet France.
Louvre Museum (Paris) – It is noon, at the Louvre, around the famous Pyramid of Ieoh Ming Pei, and the queue of tourists stretches for several hundred meters. But be brave, we want to test Samsung’s latest high-end smartphone in this global temple of culture (plus 7.7 million visitors from around the world in 2022).
Powered by Galaxy AI, the in-house version of artificial intelligence, the device includes the Interpreter (or Instant Translation) which allows natural dialogue between people speaking different languages. There would be “90% Samsung” in terms of development in Instant Translation, according to Samsung.
The great test of the Interpreter and the Circle to search
Before arriving at the Louvre, we downloaded several languages onto our Galaxy S24 Ultra: German, English, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese, but also and above all Asian languages: Japanese, Chinese. , Hindi and Korean. Curiously, there is no trace of Arabic among the available languages.
The other AI feature we plan to test is the new visual search (a sort of improved Lens) called “Circle to search”. After long-pressing the Home button (the small circle at the bottom of the screen), simply circle the object or subject to search with your finger on the screen so that the associated results are displayed. And this function uses the viewfinder screen of the camera.
The S24 Ultra Interpreter under the microscope of three pairs of languages
The French – Japanese test
In the queue we meet a Japanese visitor, Taka Aki, accompanied by a compatriot. The instant French-Japanese translation test is ours!
We ask a question in French, and our guinea pig must repeat exactly in his language the translation made by the Interpreter. This double translation allows us to compare the accuracy of the final result with the initial words in French!
First simple question: “Is this your first time in France?” » The round trip works well. Especially since the Japanese and French voices used by the Interpreter are dynamic and fluid. Probably thanks to the local AI used by the machine. We continue the conversation…
And there, the Interpreter stumbles upon a most unexpected error: the AI had difficulty with the place names! When Taka Aki explains having visited “Mont St Michel”, the Interpreter makes a terrible misunderstanding: “I came to Michel from Japan”. A second attempt puts him back on the right path. But then we are treated to the “Essel Tower”. Any child would have corrected “Tour Essel” with “Tour Eiffel”, right?
The French – Chinese test
Okay, let’s move on to the French-Chinese translation test. A small group of young Chinese women wait in line. The Interpreter is efficient in bidirectional translation of simple and short sentences (“When did you arrive in Paris?”).
The Interpreter function of the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, at the Louvre, 2024, Ph. Moctar KANE/ZDnet France
The French – Spanish test
Finally we meet Roberto, from Mexico. And there the translation of the S24 Ultra is super fluid. What is impressive is that Roberto, despite his rapid delivery of Spanish, did not panic the Interpreter. “I really liked the Eiffel Tower”, “I didn’t like the number of people [l’affluence] in tourist places,” he tells us, via the Interpreter.
Visual search that sees the big picture
The Circle to Search function allows you to identify the statue La Seine by Antoine Coysevox, screenshots ZDnet France.
After the long queue, head towards the statues of the Cour Marly. With the telephoto lens of the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra we aim at one of the marble works located several dozen meters below. The goal ? Identify the statue. The Circle to Search function has no trouble finding a name for the statue whose upper body we circled with a circle. This is La Seine, by the sculptor Antoine Coysevox, created at the beginning of the 18th century. And among the suggested links, there is the link to… the Louvre site, in first position in fact, ahead of Wikipedia.
From a detail of the painting by Théodore Géricault, the Circle to Search function suggests other paintings including the Crucifixion of Saint Peter by Caravaggio. Then, starting from a larger area, he identifies the Raft of the Medusa, screenshots ZDnet France and photo Moctar KANE/ZDnet France.
In various places in this gigantic Louvre, we play with the Circle to Search function of the Galaxy S24. The goal ? Check if she can identify a work. In fact, she doesn’t always find the answer. This depends, among other things, on the surface of the work surrounded on the screen. The larger the surface, the more details are given to the AI, and the easier it is to identify.
But what’s really interesting is precisely when the details are tenuous. There, the Circle to Search function does not give the correct table but suggests close results. Enough to discover works made in a similar or identical style to the one we are examining.
Thus, in front of the dark painting of The Raft of the Medusa painted by Théodore Géricault, we isolated pale arms and legs around a wooden beam in the lower part of the painting. The first response given by the AI is another tragic painting, the Crucifixion of Saint Peter by the painter Caravaggio (17th century). Another search focused on a higher and wider part of the painting, showing the face of a man who extends his hand in the distance, this time allows us to correctly identify Géricault’s painting.
Part of the painting Five Masters of the Florentine Renaissance (Anonymous) taken with the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra reveals many details, Ph. Moctar KANE/ZDnet France.
The painting Five Masters of the Florentine Renaissance (anonymous author) shows us the quality of the Galaxy S24 Ultra’s camera. The details, the tiny cracks of this painting on wood from the second half of the 16th century, as well as the liveliness of the colors (ah the orange of Giotto’s outfit!) are brilliantly reproduced.
Ditto with several sculptures including the famous winged statue of the Victory of Samothrace placed on the bow of a boat. In this place, the light is very beautiful. On the surrounding walls and on the statue itself, the texture is finely reproduced by the different zooms of the Galaxy S24 Ultra. Gorgeous ! Even the X5 periscopic optical zoom manages to finely reproduce details. And better, the X10 hybrid zoom has generally satisfactory results.
The Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra’s different telephoto lenses reveal details of the Victory of Samothrace, PH. Moctar KANE/ZDnet France.
However, Samsung still needs to make progress in the consistency of automatic white balance measurement. The transition between the different optics (X0.6, X1, X3, Apart from this weakness, and this remains to be confirmed by comparing it with the latest high-end smartphones (including the Honor Magic 6 Pro), the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is at the top in terms of photo quality.
A point to improve on the camera of the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra, the homogeneity of the white balance between the zooms, captures ZDnet France.
Conclusion on the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra
Nothing beats field testing! During these hours spent at the Louvre with the smartphone, certain errors in the Interpreter function triggered laughter among the foreign visitors with whom we spoke.
The AI still has progress to make and must in particular learn to contextualize certain comments in order to better decode words that are either misheard or mispronounced by the interlocutor. Still, being able to chat with foreigners, in Chinese, Japanese or even Spanish, was a great experience. The naturalness and fluidity of the translations is impressive!
The Circle to Search function is also something to impress. The approximations noted in the responses are not unacceptable.
And congratulations for the general quality of the photos, even with the X10 hybrid zoom. This is very high level! It remains to standardize the white balance between the different optical/sensor pairs.
A final word, on a tool whose function can have a lot of meaning in a place such as the Louvre Museum, namely the stylus! We used it several times to take handwritten notes. We would have preferred an easy-to-use option that could automatically classify all the notes taken at the Louvre that day in a single folder. But above all, this stylus allows you to draw. What could be more natural when faced with so many works in a museum!
With its sleek titanium design, its AI functions, its high-performance camera and photo lenses and its built-in stylus, this Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra is certainly, currently, the most complete and efficient mobile. Enough to undoubtedly guarantee its future place in the smartphone museum.