24 Hours Series

24 Hours in Los Cabos, Mexico

Drinking margaritas with the Samsung Galaxy Note 9

Published

October 2, 2018

Isa Rodriguez

From the busy urban jungle that is Manila, I hopped on a plane to California for some quality time with the boyfriend (the #LDR life). From Los Angeles, we flew to Mexico for a much-needed vacation and some bonding time with the boyfriend’s family. My first time in Mexico was filled with fun times by the beach, a lot of margaritas, and as many tacos as I could eat! Here’s a day in Cabo, Mexico, as seen through the Samsung Galaxy Note 9’s cameras.

Touchdown, Mexico!

Cabo San Lucas is a mere four-hour flight from Los Angeles. Finally arriving in Mexico was exciting and familiar for me — it had the same hot and humid climate! The first thing we did when we touched down? Local beers!

Cheers! The boyfriend Joshua got himself an amber ale and I ordered the raspberry ale which was sweet and fruity — I loved it! The beers were from Baja Brewery, a local craft brewery from Los Cabos. It was the perfect start to our vacation.

After leaving the airport and picking up the rental car, our first Mexican meal was in order. A short drive from the airport and on the way to the resort, we stopped for some snacks. Ordered seafood ceviche from a random Mexican restaurant and got to eating.

Served with a side of chips, salsa, and some guacamole, it was the first of many great meals we were to have in Mexico. Enjoyed best with more local beer or some margaritas.

Checking in

Next stop was San Jose Del Cabo which is one of Mexico’s resort cities. We were staying at Cabo Azul and let me tell you: It was beautiful. Our two-bedroom villa offered a beautiful view of the pool area.

There are a number of connected pools and even whirlpool bathtubs here — perfect for lazy afternoons in the sun.

The beachfront is right beside the pool area. Lounging chairs and umbrellas are set up here so you could actually choose to spend your day here relaxing, listening to the waves crash in. You can also get a massage by the beach or even go horseback riding to through this scene.

Unfortunately, there’s no swimming in the ocean because the waves are just too dangerous, but that didn’t stop me from enjoying the beach. Time for some IG photos!

Yep, nailed it. 😂

The hotel bar is also right by the pool area and it offers a stunning view. They serve refreshing cocktails and even have a BOGO cocktail promo every afternoon — we definitely took advantage of that!

Visiting El Arco

We drove to Cabo San Lucas which is another city destination in Baja California. Together with San Jose del Cabo, this whole area is known as Los Cabos. More busy and bustling than the laid-back San Jose del Cabo, Cabo San Lucas offers tourists a number of bars, restaurants, and souvenir shops.

The port is the jump-off point for a lot of water activities here, including snorkeling, scuba diving, and even parasailing which we wanted to do but couldn’t because of the windy weather.

Instead, we ended up doing a 45-minute boat ride to see Cabo’s famous arch formation, locally known as El Arco. Bright skies and amazing views made up a great afternoon adventure.

What’s any vacation without a trip to a souvenir store? Like I said earlier, there are countless shops here and some even offer tequila-tasting activities!

All smiles after an afternoon in a boat. Selfie with the Note 9’s S Pen remote!

Unfortunately, we saved the shots for another day. But, that doesn’t mean we didn’t get our tequila fix…

Back to San Jose del Cabo

A ten-minute drive from Cabo Azul is a plaza filled with restaurants and shops that we wanted to explore. Coincidentally, we were there on Mexican Independence Day and though we weren’t there for the festivities the night before, the party that happened was apparent from the decors.

Walking around this colorful area is fun — if you can stand the heat! The area is also home to a number of art galleries and interesting establishments.

Of course, our walking around made us thirsty, and you know what that means: margaritas! We drove to Las Guacamayas which is a taqueria that serves giant strawberry margaritas. Just what I needed!

Of course, the great salsa selection, guacamole, and tacos aren’t to be outdone. It was a hearty Mexican meal after a long day of exploring.

The evening was spent back at the resort, by the pool as the sun set on Mexico.

It was a great first day in Cabo. I spent four more glorious days living on tacos, margaritas, and this view. It was a good life.

24 Hours is a series on GadgetMatch.com where we showcase our travels through a smartphone camera’s perspective. It’s also a documented guide on things to see and do in a city in case you happen to plan a trip there.

24 Hours Series

vivo V27: Studio lights in your pocket

Meet the new Aura Light Portrait System

Published

April 14, 2023

Chay Lazaro

It’s spring 2023 and vivo is back with the V series. The vivo V27 comes with a new feature called Aura Light Portrait System, which takes its main camera to another level. Like its predecessor it’s got a color-changing back, making it a fashionable choice for different users.

Stylish color-changing design

We have the V27 in Emerald Green, which starts off with a lighter tint that looks like jade. When exposed to UV light, it changes into a darker shade of green. This is achieved thanks to the Emerald Glass processing technique. The phone also comes in Magic Blue, Flowing Gold, and Noble Black.

Chay is wearing light colors so the Emerald Green model matches her outfit better. It makes a nice, subtle pop of color, and goes with her pastel-y mint green purse and boots.

It’s also worth pointing out the 3D curved screen and this curved back on the V27 make it feel extremely thin and light.

Studio lights in your pocket

As mentioned earlier, the vivo V27 features the Aura Light Portrait System for great portraits even in low light. It’s a combination of the IMX677V sensor, which Sony designed with vivo specifically for this phone, algorithm optimizations, and the Aura Light. Its outer ring is matte and sandblasted, softening the light coming out of it.

The Aura Light, combined with the large sensor, and algorithm optimizations work together to take great portraits even in low light.

Lunch and coffee

The day before was a very long day so we figured we should get food and coffee. We found this dimly lit restaurant in Soho called Cafe Select. I think it’s a German restaurant because we had some schnitzel and there’s German decor everywhere.

We also specifically asked for the corner booth to test out the V27’s low light capabilities. Despite the lack of light sources, it’s impressive that the V27 managed to produce an accurate cutout of me even when I kept moving with the Bokeh Portrait video mode on.

There’s no natural light in this restaurant so it’s also the perfect place to take portraits and test out the Aura Light Portrait System. It’s like a portable ring light that you can use to take clearer portraits. Take a look at some examples.

On video mode, you can also use LUTs. We had fun using the Nostalgia filter to film a short video in the restaurant, which perfectly matches the vintage vibe of its interiors.

High definition selfies

The vivo V27 would not be a V-series smartphone if it didn’t have an amazing selfie camera. On the V27, we got a 50MP HD selfie camera with autofocus.

It’s worth noting that the phone feels so light in the hand. It’s so easy to take one-handed selfies. I also love how subtle the color change is on the Emerald Green model.

The V27 offers three levels of selfie filters that help hide blemishes and enhance your features — None, Natural, and Classic.

The 50MP front camera means clear selfie details. Most other smartphones have inferior selfie cameras compared to its rear counterparts, but not the V27. As you can see in the example below, zooming in on my eyes show that you can clearly see the strands of my eyebrows.

Walking the High Line & shopping

To test its video stabilization and macro camera, we continued to walk the High Line. Both features produced very impressive results.

Another feature we tried is MicroMovie. It’s perfect for creators like me. It comes with a whole bunch of templates that you can use for TikTok or Instagram Reels. I filmed a daily vlog with it and had so much fun.

While we were shopping, I noticed too that the V27 changed colors after being indoors for a bit. It turned into a beautiful white marble-like finish that fades into mint green at the bottom.

After the sun has set, it’s time to take more low-light portraits and OOTD. Our friends Alex and Leslie even joined us for a quick photo shoot. New York City comes to life at night, and with a 1/1.56-inch sensor and Super Night Mode, the vivo V27 can easily capture the hustle and bustle of the city streets.

More than just a camera smartphone

The vivo V27 is powered by the MediaTek Dimensity 7200 and comes with either an 8GB or 12GB of RAM.

With Extended RAM the phone borrows memory from your internal storage and gives you an additional 8GB RAM. This way you get either 16GB or 20GB available RAM.