Google’s first ad for Pixel Night Sight reminds users why LED flash is terrible for photos [Video]

Ben Schoon | Nov 27 2018 - 8:21 am PT

Google’s Pixel smartphones may not be perfect, but they bring some truly great features to the table. Most recently, that’s included Pixel Night Sight which, well, is simply magic. Now, the company is advertising that feature in a new commercial which reminds everyone why LED flashes are terrible.

Posted early this week, Google’s new Pixel 3 ad focuses solely on the new Night Sight feature. The new feature is available on all Pixel models, but is actually optimized for the Pixel 3’s hardware. Cleverly, Google pitches Night Sight as a way of taking low-light photos without needing to use the flash.

In the brief ad, Google shows how the flash is annoying to the subject of a photo, as well as how it can ruin the results. In many of the results, the subject is left out of focus, overly bright, and the only thing visible while the background gets left in darkness. By comparison, Google shows how Night Sight treats these photos with far better, sharper results. The company says “Lose the flash, not the moment.”

When I watched this ad, the first thing that popped into my mind was the Google Photos ad from a few years back which got attention from users because of its storage promises. Google is sometimes pretty bad at advertising, but this Night Sight ad for Pixel is a winner simply because it shows users that there is a better way. It’s probably the best ad Google has put out since that Photos ad from 2016.