Develop Bugs

[Q] Picture quality, day and night?

Hey guys/gals,
Just wondering on how the quality of the pictures are with this phone. I've seen pics taken by reviewers, but it's always better to look at it from a user's perspective. Has anybody tried playing around with the camera?
Also, can someone be kind enough to upload some sample pictures of random shots, like daylight shots, night time, and macro shots? I know the camera is supposedly very good, but it'll be nice to actually see a few real samples, especially the night time shots.

bump, anybody? hehe

Actual pics to come, but from my own experience as both a previous user of the Nexus One AND a hobby digital photographer are;
All of this is using the default Camera, default settings (except for turning OFF the shutter sound).
1. The Nitro does a rather good job in low light situations. Opting to raise the ISO more than use Flash. On more than a few occasions where I expected to see flash, it didn't. When blown-up you certainly can see the picture is grainier without the flash, but for web/facebook viewing the results are quite good and a LOT LESS harsh from not using flash.
2. LONG shot-to-shot time! I wonder what the buffer size with the camera is, IF there's even a buffer that comes with it! Because it takes me about 6 seconds between taking one picture before I'm able to take the next. Even when I try using a 3rd party app (Camera Zoom FX) I only got the time down to 3 seconds. Do NOT plan on using this phone's camera for any kid's birthday parties!!
That's all I've got for the moment, will add more when I've done more playing/testing.

Guess I can upload a bunch I took.
A note, some are taken with HDR + and others with Camera Zoom FX.
http://thewisedumbass.tumblr.com/post/14540968432 (Had to make it a post on Tumblr, pics kept messing up here)

The photos looks decent for a phone, nothing spectacular, at low light is more like "meh" - an average or slightly above, but when it comes to movies at low light I'd prefer have grain (Atrix 4G / Nitro) rather then ghosting (any other phones). On Nitro and Atrix 4G regardless of the light the picture is smooth 30fps, as opposite to Skyrocket or ANY HTC phone with 5fps and all smugged.
Here are some shots to compare:
Nitro with flash (left), no flash (right):
Atrix 4G with flash (left), no flash (right):
Also note Nitro has much lower lens focal length, which makes it capture wider surroundings. The photos were taking from 4 feet away and Nitro's photos captured much more surroundings then Atrix. Even when you hold both phones side by side the image at Nitro looks at pretty much correct distance, rather then on Atrix it looks like zoomed in. Yet, in low light Atrix's ISO captures much more light.
This is first phone camera that beat Atrix's (IMO). /me very happy with it.

Nice!! thanks guys for the details comparisons. I am liking wat i see with the Nitro. Do any of u guys find the auto focus annoying, or is there an option to do manual focus, like the atrix??

Not sure what manual focus you are talking about, but the camera does allow you to touch to pick the area to focus. Still auto-focus to the region, but better than the normal.

aquariuz23 said:
Nice!! thanks guys for the details comparisons. I am liking wat i see with the Nitro. Do any of u guys find the auto focus annoying, or is there an option to do manual focus, like the atrix??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Neither stock nor MIUI camera has manual focus on Atrix...In fact Atrix doesn't allow you pick which part on the picture you want it focus to, it's always at the center.

Very disappointed with both camera

I'm a Sensation XL user and when i switch to the One X, i expect a similar image quality if not better than the XL, i was wrong.
The only thing that amazed me is how fast the camera is.
Other than that:
-The main camera captured detail that looks very very messy, bad white balance and VERY bad compression. I tried every setting possible, set sharpness from 0 to -2 , still missing alot of details and compare to the XL's camera, also this camera has alot of noise even at ISO 100 and full bright area.
-The front camera is something that pissed me off the most, it looked very nice on screen but the actual captured image looks like it's from a 0.3 megapixel camera. I think this is mostly a problem with the compression of the front camera.
-Also another thing, why cant i turn auto focus off ??? what if i wanted to focus manualy. I was very proud of HTC since the early day because they allow us to do tons of stuff like turning off auto focus
-The camera have amazing auto focus at mid-long range but piss poor at macro shots, even at bright day light.
-The video captured from the One X is very bad, also because of compression
I love this phone to death, i love the design, the screen...etc, i dont mind all the bugs and stuff but i'm very mad at these camera issues, since they use it as a selling point of the phone and i'm a heavy camera user.
Your thoughts ?

Simply put: my camera's awesome. Sorry to hear your having issues. There's a thread where people are posting pictures...there's some amazing pictures in there. Head over there to compare your pics, maybe there's something wrong with your camera
Sent from my HTC One X using xda premium

There's a "fix" in the development section for camera compression, as far as noise goes, that might be an issue with your unit, it's not bad on mine. That said, it is noiser than most good camera phones I've used, but I'm holding out for an update to resolve that.

I'm more than happy with mine

mrhahn98 said:
I'm a Sensation XL user and when i switch to the One X, i expect a similar image quality if not better than the XL, i was wrong.
The only thing that amazed me is how fast the camera is.
Other than that:
-The main camera captured detail that looks very very messy, bad white balance and VERY bad compression. I tried every setting possible, set sharpness from 0 to -2 , still missing alot of details and compare to the XL's camera, also this camera has alot of noise even at ISO 100 and full bright area.
-The front camera is something that pissed me off the most, it looked very nice on screen but the actual captured image looks like it's from a 0.3 megapixel camera. I think this is mostly a problem with the compression of the front camera.
-Also another thing, why cant i turn auto focus off ??? what if i wanted to focus manualy. I was very proud of HTC since the early day because they allow us to do tons of stuff like turning off auto focus
-The camera have amazing auto focus at mid-long range but piss poor at macro shots, even at bright day light.
-The video captured from the One X is very bad, also because of compression
I love this phone to death, i love the design, the screen...etc, i dont mind all the bugs and stuff but i'm very mad at these camera issues, since they use it as a selling point of the phone and i'm a heavy camera user.
Your thoughts ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
mrhahn98,
Its a start for HTC. Previous attempts by HTC for taking photos was an epic fail. This is the right direction HTC is heading with the photo imaging...hope the future OTAs will correct it. I hope you are not comparing to a DSLR imaging quality or even an good P&S.

I'm happy with mine too. Way better than GNote. Mind to post some pics up for us to have a look?

i have read very different user opinions of the camera. I must agree that firstly, the focusing still has some issues (macro and touch-to-focus) and noise is still very evident. Its almost as bad as my Sensation XE so i kinda found the upgrade to be rather disappointing. But cons aside, the camera speed is really a winning edge for a mobile device.
If you tried using other camera apps (e.g camera360) to take photos, you might find that they can look really good so i believe that the camera hardware has potential.
Im hoping that HTC will, most importantly, show strong support for the One series and continue to tweak Sense 4 with updates. It does feel that way for now and I pray Im not just mistaking their immense marketing for real committed support.
Yes, im glad too that HTC is pushing for camera and music functionalities as their main selling point. Its one of the top few things on my list for a phone. Android itself pretty much brings the manufacturers to a level OS platform. Its all about differentiating now!

Hi, no i'm not comparing it to p/s or DSLR but to older phones which have the f2.2 lens like the Sensation XL and Amaze 4G.
I understand that most people come by this phone will be happy, it's a very good shooter i agree, but the quality is not as good as the XL and Amaze 4G.
I'll try to check out the mods and see if anything changes
p.s: Also the minimal focus distance for older phones, are like 5cm, One X have a very long minimal focus distance , like 10-15cm which result in less interesting Macro shots despite its awesome f2.0 camera

The One X camera can take some fantastic photo's (terrible videos though).
Here's one I took the other day; not the best photo ever taken but it's not bad
http://postimage.org/image/blnl4yapr/full/

I think the camera sw is just underdeveloped just like the rest of the phone, probably because HTC was rushing to get their product out, but I DO believe there will be updates with hopefully better camera softwares.
But my camera works fine, I feel you need to 'get to know it abit', it has a so many features and stuff and most people are used to having the camera just do things for them (as should be but to a certain extent) but if you play around and learn the settings and stuff you will be able to take some awesome images.
Cheers

your right about the noise but I think the rest is up to par compared to other phones ive used.

The camera on an HTC phone still sucks. The best they've gotten was the Sensation XE/Titan and Amaze 4G, but they ahd their drawbacks and the video was horrible no matter what. Considering I'm in no hurry to get the One X and am waiting for it to hit stateside, hopefully with many of its issues fixed, I can also look forward to the Galaxy S3. At least for that phone I am guaranteed good imaging and video, even if they re-use last year's tech. The HTC selling point is the build quality. The rumored ceramic body for the S3 sounds makes it more interesting.
Didn't HTC learn anything from their previous phones, and especially the LG G2x, the first dual-core phone rushed to market? How about instead of rushing things, they took their own advice, which they have been spouting in their tech interviews, to release higher quality phones and take their time?

The One X camera is the best point and click going, there is nothing else quite like it. You would need to actually own the phone day to day to realise how much easier and fluent it is.

Arthur Hucksake said:
The One X camera is the best point and click going, there is nothing else quite like it. You would need to actually own the phone day to day to realise how much easier and fluent it is.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree its a very good camera, but I also can understand why the people that say it sux say so, there is alot of room for improvement.
But definitaly this one of the most impressive cameras on a phone in terms of functions, but the results need to be improved alot, the 1080p recording should NEVER drop to below 24fps if you ask me and also the images could be better without having to change to specific settings, and some 'big' issues are the frequent blurry images and also the flash doesn't seem to sync with the focus moment of the camera which in result causes sometimes the images to be blurry.
But most of the time you get good images and sometimes you get those GREAT images and then you know you made a good choice

mrhahn98 said:
I'm a Sensation XL user and when i switch to the One X, i expect a similar image quality if not better than the XL, i was wrong.
The only thing that amazed me is how fast the camera is.
Other than that:
-The main camera captured detail that looks very very messy, bad white balance and VERY bad compression. I tried every setting possible, set sharpness from 0 to -2 , still missing alot of details and compare to the XL's camera, also this camera has alot of noise even at ISO 100 and full bright area.
-The front camera is something that pissed me off the most, it looked very nice on screen but the actual captured image looks like it's from a 0.3 megapixel camera. I think this is mostly a problem with the compression of the front camera.
-Also another thing, why cant i turn auto focus off ??? what if i wanted to focus manualy. I was very proud of HTC since the early day because they allow us to do tons of stuff like turning off auto focus
-The camera have amazing auto focus at mid-long range but piss poor at macro shots, even at bright day light.
-The video captured from the One X is very bad, also because of compression
I love this phone to death, i love the design, the screen...etc, i dont mind all the bugs and stuff but i'm very mad at these camera issues, since they use it as a selling point of the phone and i'm a heavy camera user.
Your thoughts ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the xl and u must have a bad x. Definitely the x takes much better pics than the xl. I have both
Sent from my HTC One X using Tapatalk 2

I'm not saying the camera SUCK, because alot of people will be happy with their purchase, coming from other phones or such.
I'm saying camera's "quality" SUCK compare to OLDER phones from HTC like the Sensation XL and the Amaze 4G
And if this is software only then i hope that HTC will fix it in time as someone said the firmware of it is still very new.
I have the xl and u must have a bad x. Definitely the x takes much better pics than the xl. I have both
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have both too , and i have my friend's One X too to compare between 2 OneX, i dont think it's "Bad" camera since i've never heard of it, it's just not as good in the details as the XL

Had this phone for a week now,coming from my samsung galaxy S2
the camera quality is superb, alot better then my SG2 and that took superb pictures..
My mates XL Pictures are no where near as good as mine, He's amazed how clear the HOX pictures are..
Think you might have some issues with your camera.
Very Low light Con: First Night pic
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Dusk low light

scott.eden said:
Had this phone for a week now,coming from my samsung galaxy S2
the camera quality is superb, alot better then my SG2 and that took superb pictures..
My mates XL Pictures are no where near as good as mine, He's amazed how clear the HOX pictures are..
Think you might have some issues with your camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Agreed something is wrong with it, I must say after 50% zoom the image does get degraded but I can almost defiantly say its software related.
Sent from my HTC One X using xda premium

it always looks very nice at that level of crop, i have no complain about that, can u give me 100% crop ? i dont believe i have problem with both my HOX and my friend's
Edit: here's some shot with the same crop level above (max 900px):
extreme low light:
Macro-ish:
Low light but ISO set to 100:
And here's some from my old XL:
extreme low light:
macro-ish:

go here and you can see how good the pictures are
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1585398&highlight=best+picture

Camera

So I took some test shots between the ZL and my iPhone 5, wow is all I can say.
And NOT a good wow either.
The ZL is pretty bad compared to the iP5.
The pic's look very washed out on the ZL, I tested the shots in Auto mode and normal mode as well as HDR.
In all cases the iP5 in just normal shooting mode blew the ZL out of the water.
Now looking at the pic's on the ZL screen they look better because of that Bravia color thing, but on my iMac side by side the iP5 kill it.
Weird.
Is there any setting's to help this??

Noticed that too... Weird. with 13 mega and so called camera wow factor in their adds, it just cant beat ip5 and note 1.
Sent from my C6502 using xda app-developers app

safuan7822 said:
Noticed that too... Weird. with 13 mega and so called camera wow factor in their adds, it just cant beat ip5 and note 1.
Sent from my C6502 using xda app-developers app
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
What's also strange is to use the 13MP you have to take a picture in 4X3 mode, all normal auto mode pic's are a 9MP shot.
I also tested the dif between a 13mp shot and a 9mp and saw no difference except that the iPhone 5 was still better in both still and video.

Meh, you guys should know camera is not the strong point of this phone and megapixel don't tell the whole story. If you wanted a phone for camera it's better to buy Nokia N8, it's cheap and still way better than most cameraphones of today. I still kept Nokia N8 as second phone so when I going places I got good camera to take pictures and videos

I think one of the main reasons to look at camera phones is the fact that you don't need to carry a second device and that you always carry it with you.
I am surprised that the ZL has such a lousy camera - thought Sony's expertise with cameras should have helped. I hope it's not a sensor issue and that maybe a firmware/software update would help with the images.

bothfly said:
So I took some test shots between the ZL and my iPhone 5, wow is all I can say.
And NOT a good wow either.
The ZL is pretty bad compared to the iP5.
The pic's look very washed out on the ZL, I tested the shots in Auto mode and normal mode as well as HDR.
In all cases the iP5 in just normal shooting mode blew the ZL out of the water.
Now looking at the pic's on the ZL screen they look better because of that Bravia color thing, but on my iMac side by side the iP5 kill it.
Weird.
Is there any setting's to help this??
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
No settings at all may be some firmware or software
upgrade might help

Didn't buy because of camera
I am travelling in Chicago, went to the Sony store, had the ZL in my hand and was going to buy it and took a picture.
I have a Galaxy SII now, a bit handicapped I think by the CM10.1 camera software, and took the same picture with it.
There was a HUGE difference. The ZL was brighter, but the detail was awful on the ZL -- there are what appear to be JPG compression artifacts or sharpening artifacts everywhere. Text in the image had pixel artifacts extending out from corners so that everything was jagged and looked like it was done with a 1-2mpx camera instead (and yes I had it set at max).
I'm a photographer, and I am not buying a phone to replace real cameras, but I also don't want to buy the latest and greatest phone and take a step 3 years back in cameras.
This all looks like software (in a very "gut reaction to a few images"). It looks and feels like poor image processing from the raw data, either over-compression or bad sharpening.
I've done a bit of searching and found a few "bad camera" comments, but has there been any reaction from Sony, any indication of improved settings coming? Are any of the mods available capable of addressing this sort of thing, or is that lost in proprietary code space?
I left without a phone, sadly. My GS2 with CM10.1 does almost everything I need, I was just looking for a fresh face. And I LOVED the form factor and feel. But the camera was a deal killer. Will lurk around here in case there may be forthcoming software fixes (as I am almost certain it is a software issue).

Nice, a thread about the camera and comparisons without pics

CLB-NL said:
Nice, a thread about the camera and comparisons without pics
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yeah, my bad in this case; I had assumed they would have it mail enabled and I could send myself a photo when I tested it, but they didn't have it set up. I may go back (it's not far) and take a microSD card with me, and see if it's set up so I can write to it and take the photo away. I'd love to have one where I could compare the two on a computer screen.
The image it rendered had good color (better than my SII) and was nicely focused. Just badly processed. I was hoping someone would say "you forgot to set the 'good image or small image'" option to "good".
I REALLY liked the feel of the back cover, they did a nice job there. Easy to hold, didn't feel like it was continually going to slide out of my hand.

CLB-NL said:
Nice, a thread about the camera and comparisons without pics
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice one,btw I jus saw a thread about this camera comparison and I didn't see that the camera to be that bad like u guys say it is
Sent from my C6506 using xda app-developers app

Linwood.Ferguson said:
The image it rendered had good color (better than my SII) and was nicely focused. Just badly processed. I was hoping someone would say "you forgot to set the 'good image or small image'" option to "good".
I REALLY liked the feel of the back cover, they did a nice job there. Easy to hold, didn't feel like it was continually going to slide out of my hand.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
See this. There is a lot of discussion going on (at xda & sony support forums) about the sony's image "post processing" used in the XZ/ZL. I've read somewhere that this matter has been acknowledged by sony support. You may have a look at the XZ general section for threads (like this) regarding camera (same camera hardware used in ZL). Btw, I think that camera on ZL is not bad at all (it bests my previous note2 camera in almost all aspects)! Some software updates might fix the existing issues (noise blur) especially in the auto mode. Do try the normal mode (13mp size) with hdr & flash off, in case you revisit the store.

Dpk1 said:
See this Do try the normal mode (13mp size) with hdr & flash off, in case you revisit the store.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thank you, will look at the other links, and I did call the store and they sold the demo and no new ones in. I'm here for a couple weeks so I may get another chance.

to look at pics on the phone it works fine (probably coz of bravia engine) .. but on a larger screen u can see the problem .. hopefully we see a fix :fingers-crossed:
does the camera mod in the apps & themes work any better than the stock one ? cybershot ....

Does this mod help?
I ran across this. It sounds like it got mixed results, so I suspect it is only touching around the edges of the camera processing and not changing how the engine does the jpg compression. But maybe it is. I offer it for reference; discussion may be better in that thread.
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=2221351&page=11
---------- Post added at 02:55 PM ---------- Previous post was at 02:54 PM ----------
demonicjas said:
does the camera mod in the apps & themes work any better than the stock one ? cybershot ....
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My apologies, I didn't see this note until I posted my last one. Thank you.

With pictures
CLB-NL said:
Nice, a thread about the camera and comparisons without pics
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
OK, I decided I could live with a less poor camera and bought one because I liked everything else. So here are some comparisons. These are done from the perspective of looking at fine detail, not overall appearance at a small size. I.e. I think a lot of what Sony has done is aimed at highly compressed JPG's suitable for facebook-like postings. I don't do that, I use it in lieu of a real camera and so would actually prefer raw images, but as a substitute I hope for good detail and suitable dynamic range despite the JPG conversion. Anyway.
So while I've seen a lot of just full images and "see how pretty" I thought i would try to see the fine detail, not how it did as a snapshot (while admitting that it's a cell phone and a "snapshot" is exactly what it's intended for, it is not a DSLR).
attached is a composite image taken with the Galaxy S2 running CM10.1, and a ZL running stock with three different modes as indicated. all were at max resolution. All were interior shots with good light (large windows beside the scene), at the same distance from a jar of jelly beans. I then extracted two components, one for fine detail (a bar code) and one for some color and detail (an edge of the plastic jar). These were all taken from about 4' away, handheld but shooting several shots and picking the best to reduce the impact of any motion blur.
First, I must say the ZL did not have the artifacts I noticed in the store; I must have had a different setting there.
The images are over-processed, whether for noise or (my theory) compression not sure, but there are a LOT of JPG artifacts in them.
But there are better than I expected. They are not better in a processing sense than the S2, but what you get is better resolution then poorer processing (look at the smoothness around high contrast borers, e.g. the top of the 9 -- there's a lot more pixel raggedness in the S2 from less resolution, but the ZL is just ragged despite having more pixels -- kind of a random jaggedness from compression artifacts). But the net result of added resolution and poor processing is a better image.
But not nearly as "better" as it should be with a lot more resolution!
Sony really owes a "leave the darn image alone" setting.
The burst mode is interesting -- I'm not sure what they are doing there, but it looks like yet even more aggressive sharpening and processing. The bar code at first looks like it is a much clearer shot -- but it is not. It's excessively sharpened and detail is lost even though it fools the eye with more contrast on edge transitions. Look especially at the colors in the jelly beans through the glare, how poor and splotchy they became).
Surprisingly the Superior vs. Normal, despite all I've read, did not have a lot of difference. Not sure if the conditions were such the difference didn't kick in, or... ?
Anyway, to the original point -- here are pictures.
On a related note, been playing with it for low light, and tried in store a HTC one, and there is a marked difference there, with the bigger pixels doing a much better job at low light, but they just didn't add QUITE enough of them for me. The ZL is much better than the older GS2 at low light, but even with the relatively faster lens and newer sensor, it's only OK. Oh... for an F1.4 lens one day. :fingers-crossed:
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Linwood.Ferguson said:
OK, I decided I could live with a less poor camera and bought one because I liked everything else. So here are some comparisons. These are done from the perspective of looking at fine detail, not overall appearance at a small size. I.e. I think a lot of what Sony has done is aimed at highly compressed JPG's suitable for facebook-like postings. I don't do that, I use it in lieu of a real camera and so would actually prefer raw images, but as a substitute I hope for good detail and suitable dynamic range despite the JPG conversion. Anyway.
So while I've seen a lot of just full images and "see how pretty" I thought i would try to see the fine detail, not how it did as a snapshot (while admitting that it's a cell phone and a "snapshot" is exactly what it's intended for, it is not a DSLR).
attached is a composite image taken with the Galaxy S2 running CM10.1, and a ZL running stock with three different modes as indicated. all were at max resolution. All were interior shots with good light (large windows beside the scene), at the same distance from a jar of jelly beans. I then extracted two components, one for fine detail (a bar code) and one for some color and detail (an edge of the plastic jar). These were all taken from about 4' away, handheld but shooting several shots and picking the best to reduce the impact of any motion blur.
First, I must say the ZL did not have the artifacts I noticed in the store; I must have had a different setting there.
The images are over-processed, whether for noise or (my theory) compression not sure, but there are a LOT of JPG artifacts in them.
But there are better than I expected. They are not better in a processing sense than the S2, but what you get is better resolution then poorer processing (look at the smoothness around high contrast borers, e.g. the top of the 9 -- there's a lot more pixel raggedness in the S2 from less resolution, but the ZL is just ragged despite having more pixels -- kind of a random jaggedness from compression artifacts). But the net result of added resolution and poor processing is a better image.
But not nearly as "better" as it should be with a lot more resolution!
Sony really owes a "leave the darn image alone" setting.
The burst mode is interesting -- I'm not sure what they are doing there, but it looks like yet even more aggressive sharpening and processing. The bar code at first looks like it is a much clearer shot -- but it is not. It's excessively sharpened and detail is lost even though it fools the eye with more contrast on edge transitions. Look especially at the colors in the jelly beans through the glare, how poor and splotchy they became).
Surprisingly the Superior vs. Normal, despite all I've read, did not have a lot of difference. Not sure if the conditions were such the difference didn't kick in, or... ?
Anyway, to the original point -- here are pictures.
On a related note, been playing with it for low light, and tried in store a HTC one, and there is a marked difference there, with the bigger pixels doing a much better job at low light, but they just didn't add QUITE enough of them for me. The ZL is much better than the older GS2 at low light, but even with the relatively faster lens and newer sensor, it's only OK. Oh... for an F1.4 lens one day. :fingers-crossed:
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi there! Congrats on your new device n welcome aboard! I appreciate your feedback regarding the camera performance on the ZL. I tend to agree with most of what you've said! I only hope sony gives us a patch for camera software soon!

Terrible camera quality occasionally

Hi all,
I've a new Nexus 5x but am having an odd issue with the camera. [I also got this camera for a family member and their unit from a separate supplier has the same issue]
I wanted to test out the hdr/+/auto function so took two pictures within seconds against a car of a scene. On the computer I cannot remember which was which (hdr on or off or auto) but which the photo focused and nothing seemed to change the quality of the first image is much worse:
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The second 5x I've check out also has these smeary photos dotted through the camera album - as though the camera opened it and went to render the fine detail but didn't.
This isn't camera shake (shutter speed high) nor a mis-focus, it's ike being back on my old Samsung occasionally!
Has anyone else experienced this or know what could be wrong?

I've never seen HDR+ whether auto or manually set to on make a photo blurry like the one on the left. You sure it wasn't an accidental "lens blur" photo taken? Although it looks like nothing is even focused at all with that left pic.
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Definitely no lens blur applied. It's not not focussed, everything in find pic is mushy and focus was on wall/fence join. I've seen this on other pics from another 5x and cannot work out why.

Bingley said:
Definitely no lens blur applied. It's not not focussed, everything in find pic is mushy and focus was on wall/fence join. I've seen this on other pics from another 5x and cannot work out why.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Now was the preview in the camera app actually in focus when taken and you're saying it's being saved out of focus?
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

It focussed yep and both acreen previews looked the same while taking the pics. It's not just oit of focus as I know what that looks like and I'm getting it testing it occasionally, same with anothers unit in every day use

Bingley said:
It focussed yep and both acreen previews looked the same while taking the pics. It's not just oit of focus as I know what that looks like and I'm getting it testing it occasionally, same with anothers unit in every day use
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Very interesting. I take photos pretty often and never had resulting out of focus when the preview was in focus.
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Hand shake maybe? Just looks out of focus or shakey to me. BTW I've not had any issues with the camera, I would suggest setting HDR+ on unless the subject is a moving target and then to use HDR+ off. Auto never seemed to work properly though that might have changed in the most recently released Camera update.
Also don't forget you can tap to focus to get the best shots, then just try and keep you hand as still as possible while HDR+ takes its multiple exposure shots and stitches them together.

Both taken around 1/1600 of a second held against something sturdy. It's *not* camera shake. I know how hdr/+ works, and I've occasionally had this my with slr shooting at 1/4000/sec. It's across two devices and I cannot understand why.
Also, if anyone knows how to tell via metadata etc which hdr on/off/auto setting was used I'd love to know!

I've attached a pic straight from cam.
Exif looks fine, it focused seeminly ok, but basically looks crappy at 100%. Am I expecting too much? Look at the trees in the distance/gravel/path, it's all pretty poor imo.
Program name is bullhead user - is that correct?
Running 7.1.1. using Google camera all on auto.
Any help would be so gratefully received!
Full size image at: https://postimg.org/image/otugcb3ub/

Ok, I think I've worked it out.
After testing three 5X's it seem to be that HDR+ Auto produces these crappy pics. It's like it's been over compressed, shrunk then stretched, over sharpened, and artefacts are abundant.
HDR On is fine. So, either Google Camera Auto hdr sucks or three cameras are crappy.

Bingley said:
Ok, I think I've worked it out.
After testing three 5X's it seem to be that HDR+ Auto produces these crappy pics. It's like it's been over compressed, shrunk then stretched, over sharpened, and artefacts are abundant.
HDR On is fine. So, either Google Camera Auto hdr sucks or three cameras are crappy.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I always shoot HDR+ on just because it's more pleasing to the eye and for this comparison as well:
https://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?p=70109469
I've never taken enough HDR+ auto pics to see what you have though.
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

Yeah its definitely The HDR Auto thats making the quality worse, heres the comparision and i am using the Camera NX aswell which is pixel camera basically, u can see the quality is bad on Auto by looking at the tree branches or the ground which is more blurry on auto.
HDR+ On
HDR+ Auto

Yeah there was a Reddit thread too about the difference when the Pixel came out:
https://amp.reddit.com/r/GooglePixe...aware_hdr_auto_hdr_on_are_two_very_different/
Sent from my Nexus 5X using Tapatalk

EeZeEpEe said:
Yeah there was a Reddit thread too about the difference when the Pixel came out:
https://amp.reddit.com/r/GooglePixe...aware_hdr_auto_hdr_on_are_two_very_different/
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That post states that the HDR+ Auto doesn't have quite the dynamic range, but produces less noise. Then it says that HDR+ On has really good dynamic range, but has a lot of noise in low-light situations.
The rest of this thread is operating on a different premise, that HDR+ Auto produces blurry details, which is present in that reddit post, but not the main point. Take a look at Pic 3-1 (HDR+ Auto) and Pic 3-2 (HDR+ On). The most obvious thing is the sun/clouds are significantly better in the HDR+ On, but look at the detail in the sidewalk as well. HDR+ Auto is kinda fuzzy/blurry on the details.
Weirdly enough, HDR+ Auto producing blurry details and HDR+ On having low light detail are actually the same thing.
Quote from TheVerge (emphasis added):
The traditional way to produce an HDR image is to bracket: you take the same image multiple times while exposing different parts of the scene, which lets you merge the shots together to create a final photograph where nothing is too blown-out or noisy. Google's method is very different — HDR+ also takes multiple images at once, but they're all underexposed. This preserves highlights, but what about the noise in the shadows? Just leave it to math.
"Mathematically speaking, take a picture of a shadowed area — it's got the right color, it's just very noisy because not many photons landed in those pixels," says Levoy. "But the way the mathematics works, if I take nine shots, the noise will go down by a factor of three — by the square root of the number of shots that I take. And so just taking more shots will make that shot look fine. Maybe it's still dark, maybe I want to boost it with tone mapping, but it won't be noisy." Why take this approach? It makes it easier to align the shots without leaving artifacts of the merge, according to Levoy. "One of the design principles we wanted to adhere to was no. ghosts. ever." he says, pausing between each word for emphasis. "Every shot looks the same except for object motion. Nothing is blown out in one shot and not in the other, nothing is noisier in one shot and not in the other. That makes alignment really robust."
Google also claims that, counterintuitively, underexposing each HDR shot actually frees the camera up to produce better low-light results. "Because we can denoise very well by taking multiple images and aligning them, we can afford to keep the colors saturated in low light," says Levoy. "Most other manufacturers don't trust their colors in low light, and so they desaturate, and you'll see that very clearly on a lot of phones — the colors will be muted in low light, and our colors will not be as muted." But the aim isn't to get rid of noise entirely at the expense of detail; Levoy says "we like preserving texture, and we're willing to accept a little bit of noise in order to preserve texture."
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Google's HDR+ Auto isn't true HDR; it's taking multiple underexposed images and blending them all together, intentionally blurring them together to reduce noise. This method is also gonna make any texture that's naturally irregular and blur it together. It's also not going to respond well to small detail shots when there's any amount of movement in the shots. This is why the rock wall in the OP, the tree branches and asphalt in LeftIron's pics right above me, and the sidewalk in that Reddit post are always gonna be blurry. It's Google's algorithm to try to reduce noise in low-light photos, which seeing as they're "HDR"-ing multiple underexposed photos, is always gonna be the case.
It's my impression that tone-mapping deals with these very differently, so this is why this isn't an issue in the HDR+ On photos.
TL;DR Use "HDR+ Auto" for low-light situations, and "HDR+ On" for everything else.

crazyates said:
-snip-
TL;DR Use "HDR+ Auto" for low-light situations, and "HDR+ On" for everything else.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This (fullsize here) is what I'm talking about. As labelled, left is HDR+ Auto, right is HDR+ On.
Aside from the On looking slightly less sharp - fine - the Auto's quality is simply terrible. The grass, the tree thing, all the detail is smudged away and way over processed, with garish edges and artifacting almost as a standard. It looks painterly, like a bad PS filter. [Focus was on branches in sky in full pic hence focus great on grass on either pic]
Anyone else got a comparison between auto and on they could share? I can't believe it's just the three I've tried it on but perhaps it is.
Leson: HDR+ On > HDR+ Auto in image quality by far.

Bingley said:
This (fullsize here) is what I'm talking about. As labelled, left is HDR+ Auto, right is HDR+ On.
Aside from the On looking slightly less sharp - fine - the Auto's quality is simply terrible. The grass, the tree thing, all the detail is smudged away and way over processed, with garish edges and artifacting almost as a standard. It looks painterly, like a bad PS filter. [Focus was on branches in sky in full pic hence focus great on grass on either pic]
Anyone else got a comparison between auto and on they could share? I can't believe it's just the three I've tried it on but perhaps it is.
Leson: HDR+ On > HDR+ Auto in image quality by far.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
That's a great example of what I was talking about. HDR+ Auto takes multiple photos and just blurs them together, making a lot of smudge and fuzz. The HDR+ On is an actual HDR, so it's going to have better quality almost unilaterally.
I say almost, because there seems to be one exception: low-light situations, which your photos weren't. If it were night time or something, the HDR+ On would probably have a lot of noise, while the HDR+ Auto would blur out the noise at the cost of detail. Hense, why I made my recommendation earlier.

crazyates said:
That's a great example of what I was talking about. HDR+ Auto takes multiple photos and just blurs them together, making a lot of smudge and fuzz. The HDR+ On is an actual HDR, so it's going to have better quality almost unilaterally.
I say almost, because there seems to be one exception: low-light situations, which your photos weren't. If it were night time or something, the HDR+ On would probably have a lot of noise, while the HDR+ Auto would blur out the noise at the cost of detail. Hense, why I made my recommendation earlier.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Great, thanks. I've yet to test low light hdr auto v on but if you're right I'll go with that. I'm surprised Auto is so cruddy, but then I've been looking at 6P/Pixel/Iphone 7 comparisons here https://www.reddit.com/r/GooglePixel/comments/5dlm0l/google_pixel_low_light_photography_nexus_6p_and/ and the 7 does surprisingly badly. Sometimes the 6p is better, others Pixel does. Great cam either way!

My iPhone X - Pixel 2 XL - LG V30 Camera Comparison

Here is an album with photos shot is FULL AUTO mode. No tweaking settings, focusing or anything. Just letting the camera shoot a photo from the same spot. I know this is not great for the pros out there but it is the way most of us shoot pics. Anyway, I did not take a ton of photos but here are the ones I did take. With the LG i did not do "portrait mode" but did include shots from both the regular and wide angle lenses in the comparison.
I was overall impressed by all cameras. Just click "info" icon at top right to see photo details which list the camera model.
For me results were
Color - iPhone X - yes, oversaturated like Samsung, but I like that.
Detail - Pixel 2 - even though colors did not pop as much the detail in textures and such were better in most of the photos for me
low light - Pixel 2 - just grabbed better detail in the photos (The one with the helicopter was VERY low light, just a crack in the door letting a little light in)
Anyway, I know everyone has different opinions so thought I'd put an album up so people could see and compare the original untouched photos.
I give the win to Pixel 2 because I can always fix colors and make the photo more vibrant. I can't add detail.
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...?key=ZUlCXzFZZm05WXpKbzNNd0JDdU95SElRNzZEM0pn

Link doesn't work for me. Maybe you have to give permission? Or maybe you're fixing something?
404. That’s an error.
The requested URL was not found on this server. That’s all we know.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse

I have watched at least a dozen youtube videos on this very subject this morning and they were pretty consistent in their findings. Google and its software ( HDR+ ) is the "high dynamic range" king. Long live the king. And this lead in this respect, over the competitors will get a very large boost when Orea 8.1 turns "on" that mystery, extra ( full soc inside the pixel ) dedicated to video processing. I'm guessing the number crunching will go down from a second to a small fraction of a second. Now LG and its hardware ( f1.6 and glass lens ) is the king of pulling detail. Go figure. The bottom line is that google cannot improve its hardware. That's fixed and static. But new LG software ( or software from other sources ) can very much improve the V30's ability to make a "auto" shot . . . Most all comparison videos did NOT put the 1K wonder at the top of anything.
.
And what do the serious photography nuts have to say ?

yeah, forgot to turn on sharing. Fixed now.

old_fart said:
I have watched at least a dozen youtube videos on this very subject this morning and they were pretty consistent in their findings. Google and its software ( HDR+ ) is the "high dynamic range" king. Long live the king. And this lead in this respect, over the competitors will get a very large boost when Orea 8.1 turns "on" that mystery, extra ( full soc inside the pixel ) dedicated to video processing. I'm guessing the number crunching will go down from a second to a small fraction of a second. Now LG and its hardware ( f1.6 and glass lens ) is the king of pulling detail. Go figure. The bottom line is that google cannot improve its hardware. That's fixed and static. But new LG software ( or software from other sources ) can very much improve the V30's ability to make a "auto" shot . . . Most all videos did NOT put the 1K wonder at the top of anything.
.
And what do the serious photography nuts have to say ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I agree with you, but the problem is the track record of LG is not that of fixing it to become the best it could be. The best hardware can suck without the proper software or a company that wants to put it as a priority to make it the best it can be. In most of the shots I took the LG had the least amount of detail (except in one low light shot where it was 2nd to Pixel in detail, look at top of soap dispensor). Now of course this is in full auto mode. I'm guessing that with manual mode the outcome might be different. However, I don't have time to mess with manual mode for 99% of my photos.
I wish LG could get the camera to be on par in auto mode with the Pixel or X because I love the phone so much. The camera and frequency of updates are the only real things lacking (for me) to make it a near perfect phone.

Link not working for me.

ern88 said:
Link not working for me.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I edited and pasted it again. should work.

I need more examples..... Would you mind a few dozen more of the beauty in pink?

steve841 said:
I need more examples..... Would you mind a few dozen more of the beauty in pink?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
lol, I'll get right on that.

wish there was a watermark stating which photo was from which camera.

keithleger said:
Here is an album with photos
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Looks like the Detroit Borg house...

20degrees said:
Looks like the Detroit Borg house...
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
not even sure what that is. But whatever, was not about subject but quality. LOL
---------- Post added at 08:33 PM ---------- Previous post was at 08:31 PM ----------
hachiroku said:
wish there was a watermark stating which photo was from which camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
no need. in photos website on PC (which is how you should look at this to really tell quality) you can have it open all the time on the right hand side by clicking info icon and see which photos were taken with which phone. Why waste so much time watermarking and then if you want to be totally unbiased and pick best one before you know just close info box.

keithleger said:
low light - Pixel 2 - just grabbed better detail in the photos (The one with the helicopter was VERY low light, just a crack in the door letting a little light in)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Bull****. Why do you do that, mate? Why do you so hate V30? Look at the picture of cat, V30 photo has tons more details than blurry smudgy stuff from P2XL. And helicopter is not relevant @ all, have you looked on what camera was it taken? Oh, yeah you took it on wide angle camera with F/1.9 but telling us that Pixel 2 XL captures more details in the dark, how funny.

Billy Madison said:
Bull****. Why do you do that, mate? Why do you so hate V30? Look at the picture of cat, V30 photo has tons more details than blurry smudgy stuff from P2XL. And helicopter is not relevant @ all, have you looked on what camera was it taken? Oh, yeah you took it on wide angle camera with F/1.9 but telling us that Pixel 2 XL captures more details in the dark, how funny.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Nice catch. I didn't see that.

Billy Madison said:
Bull****. Why do you do that, mate? Why do you so hate V30? Look at the picture of cat, V30 photo has tons more details than blurry smudgy stuff from P2XL. And helicopter is not relevant @ all, have you looked on what camera was it taken? Oh, yeah you took it on wide angle camera with F/1.9 but telling us that Pixel 2 XL captures more details in the dark, how funny.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You are all bent out of shape for nothing. No bias here. I actually use the v30 as my daily phone. Pixel 2 XL sitting on my desk with no sim card in it because I like it more. (I use the Pixel on weekends when I'll be using the camera more). I took both wide angle and normal lens with each photo.(tried to). Now the cat did move in one shot causing blur which is normal and understandable at that shutter speed. I did not notice it until I was done and it was too late to reshoot. The helicopter was an oversight. I must've missed taking with regular lens.
I'm not saying the V30 is bad. All 3 are good. I want the V30 to be as good as the Pixel, I REALLY DO! Because this phone feels awesome in my hand compared to the Pixel and has better features. I'm just telling you from the experience of using both that the Pixel is a better camera and MUCH FASTER shutter. V30 can have shutter lag at times. It did capture more detail in some photos than iPhone as well. So it would be a close tie for second with iPhone. The X and Pixel were just faster snapping (no shutter lag) the photos on a whole. Noticeably.
I'm hoping the Oreo update will improve a few things on the V30 making it my perfect phone. Fingers crossed.
---------- Post added at 11:42 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:40 AM ----------
Billy Madison said:
Bull****. Why do you do that, mate? Why do you so hate V30? Look at the picture of cat, V30 photo has tons more details than blurry smudgy stuff from P2XL. And helicopter is not relevant @ all, have you looked on what camera was it taken? Oh, yeah you took it on wide angle camera with F/1.9 but telling us that Pixel 2 XL captures more details in the dark, how funny.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
For more evidence check out this album as well. I'm sorry but the V30 is not on par with Pixel camera, especially in low light. Speaking in auto mode...not manual. Might get more even then but I rarely have time to manually adjust a scene.
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...?key=eldxSWxuRlF5b2ZvN09hVFZHVDQ3Q3VUU2RxZUxR

bitwiser said:
You are all bent out of shape for nothing. No bias here. I actually use the v30 as my daily phone. Pixel 2 XL sitting on my desk with no sim card in it because I like it more. (I use the Pixel on weekends when I'll be using the camera more). I took both wide angle and normal lens with each photo.(tried to). Now the cat did move in one shot causing blur which is normal and understandable at that shutter speed. I did not notice it until I was done and it was too late to reshoot. The helicopter was an oversight. I must've missed taking with regular lens.
I'm not saying the V30 is bad. All 3 are good. I want the V30 to be as good as the Pixel, I REALLY DO! Because this phone feels awesome in my hand compared to the Pixel and has better features. I'm just telling you from the experience of using both that the Pixel is a better camera and MUCH FASTER shutter. V30 can have shutter lag at times. It did capture more detail in some photos than iPhone as well. So it would be a close tie for second with iPhone. The X and Pixel were just faster snapping (no shutter lag) the photos on a whole. Noticeably.
I'm hoping the Oreo update will improve a few things on the V30 making it my perfect phone. Fingers crossed.
---------- Post added at 11:42 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:40 AM ----------
For more evidence check out this album as well. I'm sorry but the V30 is not on par with Pixel camera, especially in low light. Speaking in auto mode...not manual. Might get more even then but I rarely have time to manually adjust a scene.
https://photos.google.com/share/AF1...?key=eldxSWxuRlF5b2ZvN09hVFZHVDQ3Q3VUU2RxZUxR
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Shutter lag is probably my biggest gripe with this camera. One thing I've noticed with the Pixel is that in dark images, there tends to be a lot more noise (such as in the picture of your round plant) than the V30. I see this also when using the camera port. The GCam will give me very noisy images in low light.

bitwiser said:
I'm not saying the V30 is bad. All 3 are good. I want the V30 to be as good as the Pixel, I REALLY DO!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
But it is! People may think that V30 is bad based on the heli photo that's why I corrected and clarified that.
And, about shutter lag, do you use HDR in auto setting in V30 photo settings? It's well known for LG G4, V20, G6, V30 line up that when HDR is auto or ON and indoors scene it'll cause shutter to lag. Turn HDR off, that's all. It would provide even for better low light pix as well
bitwiser said:
MUCH FASTER shutter. V30 can have shutter lag at times. It did capture more detail in some photos than iPhone as well. So it would be a close tie for second with iPhone. The X and Pixel were just faster snapping (no shutter lag) the photos on a whole. Noticeably.
I'm hoping the Oreo update will improve a few things on the V30 making it my perfect phone. Fingers crossed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Oreo has nothing to do with shutter lag, it's hardware based so no updates will never improve shutter speed of V30. If shutter lag a top priority issue you may just return V30 to LG and forget it. It's video phone mostly, not point-and-snap. The Pixel 2 XL and probably iPhones have all Zero Shutter Lag based on the fact that it's sensors have
integrated RAM buffer where photos are stacked constantly. And when you press shutter camera simply fetch for already made and stored in RAM picture. It's already there. It's simple as that (of course it's more complicated but the point is that). But LG phones or Samsung phones still don't have such ram buffers hence shutter lags

hachiroku said:
wish there was a watermark stating which photo was from which camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can easily tell which photos were taken with which camera. When I open in Chrome, the information is right there.
Click on the "i" in the upper right hand corner.
{
"lightbox_close": "Close",
"lightbox_next": "Next",
"lightbox_previous": "Previous",
"lightbox_error": "The requested content cannot be loaded. Please try again later.",
"lightbox_start_slideshow": "Start slideshow",
"lightbox_stop_slideshow": "Stop slideshow",
"lightbox_full_screen": "Full screen",
"lightbox_thumbnails": "Thumbnails",
"lightbox_download": "Download",
"lightbox_share": "Share",
"lightbox_zoom": "Zoom",
"lightbox_new_window": "New window",
"lightbox_toggle_sidebar": "Toggle sidebar"
}

keithleger said:
album
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Another question, 20171104_154418 size is 2.8 Mb , 20171104_154159 size is 1.66Mb. May I ask what sizes are of them in V30 drive in reality or you just posted them to photos.google.com and deleted originals? Because 16 Mpix matrix can't produce just 2.8Mb under sunlight, it's not possible. Thing is V30 photos have Picasa named in it's programs, so when it was uploaded it simply was compressed by Picasa stripping of any details and fine lines.

Billy Madison said:
Another question, 20171104_154418 size is 2.8 Mb , 20171104_154159 size is 1.66Mb. May I ask what sizes are of them in V30 drive in reality or you just posted them to photos.google.com and deleted originals? Because 16 Mpix matrix can't produce just 2.8Mb under sunlight, it's not possible. Thing is V30 photos have Picasa named in it's programs, so when it was uploaded it simply was compressed by Picasa stripping of any details and fine lines.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've not altered them. That is the size backed up directly to google photos from the V30 (auto backup) unless Google must be doing some sort of compression. Size on the phone is 6.34mb. It would do that to all of them though, wouldn't it? iphone x too.