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I have the XDA Exec (for 1 day), seems like a good bit of kit, but I haven't been out of the house with it yet, so it will be interesting what living with the beast, in an inside jacket pocket will be like!!
I need to find out if the problem I'm having with the front camera brightness is just my unit or a common problem, I can adjust the brightness for the back 1.3 mega pixel camera jus fine, but the adjusting the brightness for the front camera has absolutely no effect, and all the images are very dark?
Is this normal, or should I be hot footing to my nearest o2 shop for a replacement?
Nope, its normal. I have handled quite alot of 3G phones (as you can see from my sig) and currently have about 10 atm (althought they are all really really bad, but still classics). Nearly all of the 3G phones with second cameras are really dark. The phone makers like nokia, sony ericsson or HTC in this case, dont acually put alot of consideration into the front cameras. As the network only runs video calls at 64kbps (on most 3G networks) then there isnt any need for more than a VGA camera really. They concentrate mostly on the back camera, as this is what people will use most.
Besides, the front camera has to be really small (otherwise it would look stupid sticking out of the front of the phone) so they dont really bother with it. Video calling hasnt really taken off properly yet and for most people, its an extra gimmick that they wont use. But your not alone. Nearly all phones with a internal camera are terible quality, excluding rotating cameras, as they would be the same as the back (as its the same camera).
Hope this answers all of your questions.
Front camera, brightness controls don't work.
Thanks for the reply. Just to clarify, if I select the front camera for a video call, there is a brightness control on the screen. But sliding the control up and down actually makes no effect on the image whatsoever, I guess I would aspect to see some sort of change, no matter how small, but this doesn't appear to work.
If I select the back camera, then there are a range of controls, including contrast and brightness. The brightness control does work here.
Just need to find out if anyone is able to get some sort of brightness improvement on their front camera, i.e mine is faulty, or if this slider has no effect on the xda exec.
Also side point, the front camera on the Nokia n70 3g phone is very good, for any one that is interested.
Hm dont acually have any experience with the N70 as its a fairly new phone, but on my 6680, the front camera is reasonable, but nothing to shout about.
Yes its the same on mine, it does nothing. Maybe it changes on the peoples you are calling screen?
Well, I think there's something wrong with your devices. The brightness setting on the video-calling camera definitely makes a difference to the picture on my JasJar.
It isn't the biggest change in the world, but there's definitely a visible difference in the brightness.
(By the way, I don't have a "slider", just five buttons to tap on to vary the brightness, that's not where the confusion is, is it??)
Front camera brightness
I just changed my handset for another xda exec, as I tested the new unit in the store, on the general camera mode, which does indeed have brightness levels 1-5 as sub69 says, and this does have a small but noticable difference.
However, on getting the phone home and actally trying a video call, which has a different brightness contol on screen (showing 5 values from black to white) on a vertical slding scale... I notice this control makes little or no difference to the picture.. which leaves me back where I started, plus I think my signal is weaker than on the last unit!!!
Oh well, I'll see how I get on
Hhm yes I have also got a slider. I think it might be somthing to do with the Exec, as you are on e jasjar. It will probably be rectified in the next ROM update, whenever that may be!
I just bought a new Logitech mouse with tons of customizable buttons on it, and it got me thinking...what if you could use your PPC as a mouse for your PC? That would be the ultimate in customizability!! Think of it...not only would you have a bunch of hard buttons to play with, but you could also have a customized screen for whichever app has the focus on your PC!
I am nowhere near advanced enough to do this, nor do I know if it's even possible...just throwing it out there as an idea for whoever wants to take up the challenge. I figure it could work on most devices because the camera and flash LED are on the opposite side from the screen and buttons, and BT could be the wireless link. Heck, for that amount of customizability in a mouse I'd even settle for a wired USB version :wink:.
Well enough fantasizing for today...
you're talking about using the camera as the optical sensor?
you'd need it on a special mouse mat that emits light of some kind, and I doubt the feedback would be quick enough.
and i wouldn't fancy pushing my expensive xda around on the desk like a mouse.
Right, I was thinking of the camera as the optical sensor, and the flash LED as the light source. I have a XV6700/Apache, and when I turn on the camera and the flash and set it down on my desk, the screen isn't completely dark because the camera isn't flush against the surface...there's still enough space for light from the LED to reach the lens. Obviously this would vary from device to device...but even in cases where it's completely dark, you could put the "mouse" on top of a few mm of clear plastic or plexiglas to give the LED enough room to bounce the light over. Actually, this option might be desirable as it would address your concern about pushing your device around and getting scratches on it.
In fact, now that I'm thinking about it, using plastic/plexiglas might be better for battery life too. Instead of having the flash stay on all the time, the "mouse" could use the ambient room light to detect initial movement, which in turn would trigger a "wake event" for the flash, and then obviously the flash could be timed to turn off after so many seconds of being idle.
I know speed would likely be an issue as far as feedback goes. Sure, it wouldn't be as quick as my new Logitech laser mouse, but in video mode the camera (at least on the Apache) can go up to 19 fps...so perhaps it would be doable. Obviously you're not going to use Photoshop or play Quake with the thing . I was just thinking added convenience for everyday usage.
well all optical mice i've used have gon crazy on shiny surfaces
their cams are even made directly for this purpos
so i would think using the pda as a mouse would mean it would go even more crazy on a shiny surface
try search i recall posts about this in the past
Issues
light souce: prolong usage of you flash is bad. The life span of the flash may be different for different devices, but I'm pretty sure HTC doesn't give you a nice LED flash to be used for more than 30 seconds per usage. There are reports of 'dying' flash after using it as flashlight.
camera (major issue): phone camera is a fix lense camera (there are a few new Nokia/Sony model that arent). Such camera is not able to take clear picture of close distance object. Try taking a picture of something at a range of 3 inches , at best possible light condition. You won't get a decent picture. Even high tech digital camera is not able to take any picture of any object that is in range of less than 3 inches (even with Macro e.g. the flower, mode on). You can't do much 'mous-ing' with blur images.
It is a good idea though.
just an idea, but what about just using it as a touch pad??
dahquim
Very expensive mouse :lol:
Just get an optical RF mouse.. so much cheaper..
Come to think of it, better get a bluetooth mouse that you can use with both your PC and PPC!
Hmm, I don't know. I just imagined a Universal used as a mouse. Not a pretty picture.
Any way, as for the touch pad idea, it's fairly easy to implement, but it doesn't have the resolution to handle even blow average PC screen which is 800x600 pixels.
hanmin said:
Even high tech digital camera is not able to take any picture of any object that is in range of less than 3 inches (even with Macro e.g. the flower, mode on). You can't do much 'mous-ing' with blur images.
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OK, so let's say you have a clear glass desk and you attach a board underneath it at a distance of 3 inches so it can focus... j/k
levenum said:
as for the touch pad idea, it's fairly easy to implement, but it doesn't have the resolution to handle even blow average PC screen which is 800x600 pixels.
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Click to collapse
I don't think dahquim meant "touch pad" to mean "tablet PC" or a remote touch-screen clone of your PC monitor (you can do that with LogMeIn). I think he meant simply losing the "mouse" functionality and keeping the ability to have the device's screen display "soft buttons" that could execute commands and that would change depending on whichever app has the focus on your PC. That would somewhat relieve one of having to remember different keyboard shortcuts for each different PC app you use. Same idea as the Optimus Keyboard but on a smaller scale.
touchpad.. ?
Touchpad idea is nice - it could work just like touchpads on laptop; ie. moving finger on mobile device screen causes mouse cursor to move on PC screen, tapping mobile device screen causes mouse click.... who'll implement this ? ;-)
hanmin said:
Issues
light souce: prolong usage of you flash is bad. The life span of the flash may be different for different devices, but I'm pretty sure HTC doesn't give you a nice LED flash to be used for more than 30 seconds per usage. There are reports of 'dying' flash after using it as flashlight.
camera (major issue): phone camera is a fix lense camera (there are a few new Nokia/Sony model that arent). Such camera is not able to take clear picture of close distance object. Try taking a picture of something at a range of 3 inches , at best possible light condition. You won't get a decent picture. Even high tech digital camera is not able to take any picture of any object that is in range of less than 3 inches (even with Macro e.g. the flower, mode on). You can't do much 'mous-ing' with blur images.
It is a good idea though.
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Click to collapse
hanmin was right pointing these issues. i'll add some more, from a developer's point of view:
-so you want to have this as a wireless device: think of the power consumption: on one hand you need the camera to be on, with the led, and also a wireless connection for transmitting the data like BT or WiFi.. The baterry wont last long
-even if we cant get the camera to focus at nearly 1-2mm, we could still detect movement of some kind (so the idea would work..in a way or another :roll: ). but please note: there are tens of types of devices, you cant get to make the trick for all.
-it wouldnt be very precise: did you even tried to create an icon? you need to tap over the right pixel, do you think it will work with this?
-ok so you're a fanatic gamer : poor device and poor you, on one hand you'll ruing the device, on the other you'll go nuts because... : slow reaction times, low accuracy...
I see that you've thought about the idea of creating a touchpad out of the pocketpcs. I worked on such a project once. It was indeed interesting. The only problem was that: (issues again)
-the screen is not so sensitive to finger pressure as a touchpad is
-you'll mostly have to use the stilus
But at least this approach is functional.
Regards,
Radu
Yes was thinking more the "set of buttons on [email protected] that let you do quick and easy thinkgs to whatever program your using.
For example, how about being able to switch virtual desktops or having a list of programs on the ppc screen that you switch between... a la Alt-Tab??
just ideas, but of course would be completely customisable (macro buttons)
dahquim
Looks like this guy got the concept up and running on his Nokia...
http://www.pyrofersprojects.com/nokiamouse.php
I have googled this issue many times but i seem to be the only person having this problem.
I have an LG E900 and i think its a great phone. Has great apps etc etc and i like to wp7 os.
However, i regularly need to take close up images of small parts for work and it seems i can never get the photo right or the camera seems to have a mind of its own.
I had an iphone 3gs before this - i checked the specs and the LG camera is technically superior - but i never had any issues like this.
Whenever i go to take a photo the camera focuses in on the part, so it looks perfect on screen and then does one of the following.
1 - Flashes and i get a nice white screen
2 - Takes the picture with no flash and i get a black screen
3 - Goes to take the photo and then doesn't.??
4 - Perfectly focused image on screen and then sits there, i go to re-take and it takes the picture quick, giving me a blur.
Sometimes it may take me up to 25 tries before i get a usable image.
Really starting to piss me off, such a pity as when it gets it right, its perfect.
Then some joker walks up behind me with a nokia 5110 and takes a pic, no problem..Grrr - what am i doing wrong??
It doesnt save your settings either - another gripe for another thread
I don't have any issue taking close up pictures, if it's too dark it will use the flash, if it's light enough, it won't.
Works fine for me
The LG camera IS poor!!!
Here are a few hints to get a better image. Due to WP7 not keeping your camera settings, you need to set them every time you start the Camera app.
1- Use the the Intelligent Shot options (Smart Scene does a fairly good job) to adjust to your environment,
2- Do not use Beauty Shot unless you are taking photos of people, it doesn't make the photos pretty.
3- There is an Anti Shake option at the end of the camera settings menu...It is basically a software image stabilizer, and works very well.
4- Don't let the phone decide whether to use the flash or not, and set it yourself for sensitive photographs. Brightness settings also help when played around with ( you have to figure out which settings work best in what conditions on your own)
5- Always, ALWAYS semi-press the camera button to let the phone focus and get the white balance...otherwise your photos will look like crap...then take a picture...you need to do this every time.
I sometimes have to "scan" documents and writings on the spot, so with these things kept in mind, you can take fairly decent photographs.
Also, I have done a bit of modification to make the flash better...In my opinion, it is too white. I took a very transparent yellow plastic, and cut it to exact size...it fits in well on the top of the flash (since it is slightly in the phone, rather than flat), and my photos now seem a lot warmer...
I do wish the camera was a bit sharper and had better lowlight performance of course...
PS: And obviously nothing compares to Nokia phones' cameras...well, except the iPhone in some cases...
Hi,
is there a way to open the case of the Vega, take out the screen and reattach it the other way round (180° turned)?
The reason for asking is that the Vega screen has a "much better" viewing angle when holding it the way that the webcam is at the bottom. Especially noticable when watching some movie.
Don't know what made them build it this way.
Guess it won't be that easy because the lcd screen has to be seperated from the glass front first and there might be the need for a longer display cable!?
Maybe you can rotate it but I don´t believe if the software will let you rotate it 180°. Sometimes in many apps you can not do this rotation only 90°.
probably possible but you have to edit accelerometer settings
Hello. I am new owner of S8. As they claim front camera now has autofocus so selfies will be now "sharper" .
I dont know if I just have wrong model but when I am doing selfies really close to front camera they are really sharp.
However if I move camera little bit further it start re-focusing almost all the time. If I touch on the object sometimes it helps a little bit but it still not good.
The best result I could achive, you can see on the photo (and I tried many times and others were even worse). The text is totally unreadble. It is same with faces, but you can see it better on text.
I compared it to much cheaper phone Honor 8, which does much sharper photo without any autofocus.
Does any of you have the problem, or it is just me?
I tried restore camera setting but it didnt help.
Thanks for feedback. (cause I have no feedback from samsung )
I got the s8 plus and for me the front camera is beast! I know back on the s7 the camera was eh and the keyboard lag was real so I got the edge. It could be the camera or you could be snapping the camera too fast. Takes a sec to grab the image.
Do you have selective focus on? This mode will blur background to simulate portrait mode with telephoto lens on DSLR. I find it useless, but stupid iphone has it so why not galaxy?
Mine is not 100% sharp either (however much better than yours), but I have low light now and get shutter speed of 1/24sec, it's hard to hand held photo at 1/24sec without some shake. Need to retest this in full sun tomorrow.
pete4k said:
Do you have selective focus on? This mode will blur background to simulate portrait mode with telephoto lens on DSLR. I find it useless, but stupid iphone has it so why not galaxy?
Mine is not 100% sharp either (however much better than yours), but I have low light now and get shutter speed of 1/24sec, it's hard to hand held photo at 1/24sec without some shake. Need to retest this in full sun tomorrow.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Hi, no I dont. And this is another problem. When I try to do picture in this mode it always say me something like "Picture was taken but the effect of contrast cannot be used because no object was reckognized" . So there must be something defenetly wrong.
And when I was doing photo I was waiting more than 5 secs to focus but the result was still same. And I put phone on the table so I didnt move with it at all.
dominik01k said:
Hi, no I dont. And this is another problem. When I try to do picture in this mode it always say me something like "Picture was taken but the effect of contrast cannot be used because no object was reckognized" . So there must be something defenetly wrong.
And when I was doing photo I was waiting more than 5 secs to focus but the result was still same. And I put phone on the table so I didnt move with it at all.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thats sounds similar to message I got when using selective focus. It tells you that it couldn't recognize your face so the effect wasn't fully applied (in selective focus that effect is to keep sharp focus on face and blur everything else). Seems like you have some effect enabled and that could be your problem. I never got any msg, except for selective focus, but didn't have much time to play a lot.
pete4k said:
Thats sounds similar to message I got when using selective focus. It tells you that it couldn't recognize your face so the effect wasn't fully applied (in selective focus that effect is to keep sharp focus on face and blur everything else). Seems like you have some effect enabled and that could be your problem. I never got any msg, except for selective focus, but didn't have much time to play a lot.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I tried factory reset as a last option and it still didnt helped. I reviewed lot of videos and pictures of S8 online and for sure mine is behaving different. Probably I will have to take my S8 to the nearest service..
Sounds like you do have a problem. I used my S8 and stood back and the picture was focused. Closer ones have always been focused.
I had the same issue, but really don't know If what I did was the fix, because this issue was happening every time I open the camera app after a while (like half an hour) and I had to knock my phone just to wake up my focusing sensor or what ever it called, but after I:
- re-enabled all the disabled bixby apps.
- stopped using my car magnet holder - so it never gets too cold because of the car's AC and never gets attached to a magnet.
after that, camera never miss-focusing anymore, now more than 3 hours.
So please, if anyone had this issue and:
- not using any magnet holder.
- not disabling bixby apps.
- not having the phone too cold.
please tell us to be aware.
I know it's not logic, as long as I can use the camera normally after I knock the phone, so it might be a hardware problem, but I'm sharing my experience with you just to find out the fix.
Thanks
Update: Nothing from the above was the issue, still; miss focusing, even after a factory reset... waiting for July update and see if they will fix it.
Hey there, I too have an issue in front camera of my galaxy s8 when I put it too far then it shows blurry image but when the camera is nearby the object then it shows some good quality, but not showing as much good as it was showing before .
i have the same issue. But the camera works when it wants to work... but sometimes is blury (most of times)