I think, as you say, the color balance is off. Prolly because there is so much white (snow) in the picture. White photography is very hard to do - it requires at least two F-stops of what would normally be considered over-exposure, from an automatic setting. One has to basically override the setting. Automatic cell-phone cameras don't do extreme stuff..
So the spots of color can look washed out, as the colors register too low, because the camera is busy looking at 'all that light'.
I think, as you say, the color balance is off. Prolly because there is so much white (snow) in the picture. White photography is very hard to do - it requires at least two F-stops of what would normally be considered over-exposure, from an automatic setting. One has to basically override the setting. Automatic cell-phone cameras don't do extreme stuff..
So the spots of color can look washed out, as the colors register too low, because the camera is busy looking at 'all that light'.
I mean seems too convenient that it has a flag
Everybody has a flag over there.