Guys,
I've started a multi-part article series discussing how the Note4's camera should be used (and how it compares to other high-end phones, cameraphones or even standalone cameras).
The first two parts in the series have already been published:
Part I: http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3781966
Part II: http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3782300
This series will be of particular interest to Snapdragon 805 users. Exynos users, at the moment, will find the series less interesting, as third-party apps, currently, can't access the (almost) non-processed image stream and they, consequently, can't export non-overprocessed images.
EDIT (2015/01/17): Part III is published on HDR: http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3782850
EDIT (2015/01/24): a brand new writeup is here at XDA; you should start with it instead of the previous ones: http://forum.xda-developers.com/note-4/general/shooting-light-best-image-quality-note-4-t3012008
Great. Thank you
Skickat från min iPhone 6 Plus med Tapatalk
So which app we must use for normal photos ?
How to manually change shutter speed to 1/8s in Snap Camera HDR app? Thx
masterchif92 said:
So which app we must use for normal photos ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Basically, if you have an Exynos device, the stock Camera app unless
- you're absolutely sure you don't need shutter speeds under 1/30s (the restriction of many apps, incl. FV-5) and
- you do need the on-screen controls of that app.
Otherwise, the image quality will be the same so there's no advantage in using any third-party app for shooting, as opposed to the Snapdragon case.
If you have a Snapdragon device, you can get far-far better image quality out of your camera in both still and video shooting mode because of the lack of noise reduction and oversharpening. Then, using third-party apps like Snap camera HDR is preferable, assuming, of course, you don't need features like dual camera.
Menneisyys said:
Basically, if you have an Exynos device, the stock Camera app unless
- you're absolutely sure you don't need shutter speeds under 1/30s (the restriction of many apps, incl. FV-5) and
- you do need the on-screen controls of that app.
Otherwise, the image quality will be the same so there's no advantage in using any third-party app for shooting, as opposed to the Snapdragon case.
If you have a Snapdragon device, you can get far-far better image quality out of your camera in both still and video shooting mode because of the lack of noise reduction and oversharpening. Then, using third-party apps like Snap camera HDR is preferable, assuming, of course, you don't need features like dual camera.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I have the s805 model....there are some settings with this camera to set? Or it will be good with the stock one ?
cornelito said:
How to manually change shutter speed to 1/8s in Snap Camera HDR app? Thx
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
You can't - the pre-Lollipop API doesn't let for directly setting the shutter speed. The device will automatically use 1/8s when there's little light.
You'll need to make sure you do enable the Photo > “Samsung Camera Mode” checkbox; otherwise, it will NOT be able to go under 1/15s, resulting in a complete loss of no less than 1EV. At least on Snapdragons; I couldn't test this on Exynos devices.
masterchif92 said:
I have the s805 model....there are some settings with this camera to set? Or it will be good with the stock one ?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Then, if you really want to see in which cases third-party apps can produce significantly better images, you really want to compare my example shots of the stock app to those of, say, Snap camera HDR - see the crops in my article.
Basically, the stock Camera app applies far too much noise reduction and oversharpening, pretty much ruining fine detail and introducing ugly oversharpening halos. Photos produced by third-party apps, incl. Snap camera HDR, are far more natural.
Just writing my HDR article. The first two parts of the new article is already published: http://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/3782850
Very nice articles. Thanks for doing them.
Is there any way to get rid of the cruddy yellowish look I get on low light photos on my phone? My wife's phone doesn't have this at all, and both of the Note 4s that I have had do. I've been very unimpressed with the low light abilities of this phone, so far. I'd love a solution that doesn't involve sending the phone in to maybe be fixed.
usmaak said:
Is there any way to get rid of the cruddy yellowish look I get on low light photos on my phone? My wife's phone doesn't have this at all, and both of the Note 4s that I have had do. I've been very unimpressed with the low light abilities of this phone, so far. I'd love a solution that doesn't involve sending the phone in to maybe be fixed.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Have you tried setting "White balance" to "Incandescent" in Settings?
Muyfa666 said:
Very nice articles. Thanks for doing them.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Thanks! Today, I've continued working on the HDR article.
Thanks for your work. I don't know if I understand correctly but the play store version is 6.2.0. Can this version take pictures under 1/15s? Or we still need a test version for this?
Thanks
zabumba said:
Thanks for your work. I don't know if I understand correctly but the play store version is 6.2.0. Can this version take pictures under 1/15s? Or we still need a test version for this?
Thanks
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Yup, 6.2.0 has just been released. I've tested it; it works flawlessly, at least on Snapdragon:
1/8s is supported
almost-RAW output is supported
Hi there. It's a nice report! However i do have some input
1. The stock camera does do 1/4s in rare occasions , happens for me when I do shots in not-well lit conditions and yet insufficient for camera to engage in night mode.
2. I have no idea if its just me, but night mode does not downsize my photos to 6mpix no matter how dark the scene is. It still stays at 5312x2998. N910G here. Details of photos on poorly lit scenes do not have significantly worse detail for me as compared to well lit ones and file size is in fact larger by a bit. (the room is still not too dark though).
IMO the stock camera does some sort of multi frame noise averaging technique (similar to canon's and sony's "Hand-held Twilight") to reduce noice.
andalism said:
Hi there. It's a nice report! However i do have some input
1. The stock camera does do 1/4s in rare occasions , happens for me when I do shots in not-well lit conditions and yet insufficient for camera to engage in night mode.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Wow! Haven't ever seen such an image from my European Snap 805 (F) model. Could you post the original to, say, flickr, or, here as an attachment? (Of course, feel free to remove the location info first from the EXIF data.)
IMO the stock camera does some sort of multi frame noise averaging technique (similar to canon's and sony's "Hand-held Twilight") to reduce noice.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
It'd, then, exhibit a much higher probability of camera shake / stitching errors. The relative noiseless-ness is because of the very-very strong noise reduction. (Or, maybe, because of the "G" model you have is somewhat different from the European one? I wouldn't think so - after all, both are Snapdragon-based.)
Menneisyys said:
Have you tried setting "White balance" to "Incandescent" in Settings?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I've tried all of the settings in the phone. Nothing makes the problem go away. Using the same settings as my wife's phone, and there's a huge difference in the quality of indoor pictures between the three phones.
It does take quite nice outdoor pictures.
usmaak said:
I've tried all of the settings in the phone. Nothing makes the problem go away. Using the same settings as my wife's phone, and there's a huge difference in the quality of indoor pictures between the three phones.
It does take quite nice outdoor pictures.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Could you take low-light images with an LCD computer screen displaying white
- without(!) using f.lux or other tools to decrease the white balance (this is equal to about 7000K) and
- at both a very low brightness level (to "kick in" night mode) and a high one (to avoid night mode)
with both phones? Preferably in "auto" and "incandescent" WB modes on both phones.
Menneisyys said:
Wow! Haven't ever seen such an image from my European Snap 805 (F) model. Could you post the original to, say, flickr, or, here as an attachment? (Of course, feel free to remove the location info first from the EXIF data.)
It'd, then, exhibit a much higher probability of camera shake / stitching errors. The relative noiseless-ness is because of the very-very strong noise reduction. (Or, maybe, because of the "G" model you have is somewhat different from the European one? I wouldn't think so - after all, both are Snapdragon-based.)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Unfortunately, I deleted those photos as it was blurry due to the unexpectedly low shutter speeds or that the picture sucked. I will post if I can reproduce that setting again.
As for the noise averaging mode...
1. It will not cause camera shake/stitching errors even if you hold still. Why? If you were to shake your phone violently, the software is smart enough to abandon image stacking altogether & the final image produced is the result of just 1 picture that has a little fine bit of extra noise reduction maybe.
2.Samsung's night mode is not well documented, unfortunately, despite them having this mode since Galaxy SIII.
However, the answer lies hidden in one of their support page for galaxy S4
http://www.samsung.com/us/support/howtoguide/N0000003/10094/120418/SGH-I337ZBMATT
"Night: Take photos by combining them to get a brighter, clearer photo in low light, without flash."
Now, you may think that perhaps this mode only applies to the S4's night mode, so I did a mini test.
(click on photos to zoom in)
(1)
Image taken with night mode
(2)
Image taken WITHOUT night mode under same conditions (This is done by tricking the camera to first take a photo in bright light,continue holding down the shutter button to engage burst shot, quickly direct phone to subject and wait for phone to adjust to the right exposure)
(3)
Same image from (2), but edited in Lightroom by dragging the luminance noise slider to like 40.(there is little or no chroma noise, so I did not touch that slider)
As you can see, despite their photos taken under the same conditions, (1) is the best as it as less noisy compared to (2) and sharper than (3).If Samsung really did engage in strong noise reduction at night mode, much fine detail would be lost and the photo will look like an oil painting when you pixel-peep. Thus , night mode photos you take will look more like (3) than (1), when (1) is the actual night mode photo in reality.
3. Another good guess that Night mode is actually a multi frame mode is that, all night mode's photos have their EXIF data eroded.
(Fun fact, dpreview says iphone 6+ does this too)
"the built-in, stock Camera app may have too strong noise reduction and oversharpening"
IMO, Im sorry but I disagree, too strong noise reduction would mean that photos from the note 4 would be too smooth and would lack any fine detail at all, which from my observations isnt true. Samsung excels in that area. Also, oversharpening is also not the case, oversharpened photos often result in false detail and look contrasty/frosty which is again, not the case to me.
EDIT: oversharpening and noise reduction could be a matter of taste so it could be true for some
So you want to record more natural looking videos on your Redmi 2? Maybe so you get more headroom when video editing? Or does recording in low light look too choppy? Then this might be for you!
After reading Redmi 2 on XDA and checking out FreeDCam, I can say that it’s the best looking video recorder I’ve tried on my phone.
Of course you want to see some samples (Sorry if the samples aren’t that great but there weren’t any colourful flowers around. )
YouTube samples
Outside and sunny...
CM Snap
FreeDCam
Outside...
CyanogenMod Snap
FreeDCam
FreeDCam with some adjustments
Low light with workaround
CyanogenMod Snap
FreeDCam
This camera app will give you more manual controls than any other video recording app plus, you can even change them while recording! Here’s some specific settings that you should change…
Exposure: Adjust so nothing looks too dark or too bright (find the balance).
Contrast: Change to 0 (or something slightly higher). I guess the problem with other apps is that the contrast is set too high and makes shadows look too dark and highlights look too bright.
Sharpness: Set to 0 as the video will look more soft and natural. Sharpening after recording (i.e. using a program) seems to look better…
Denoise: Turn off as colours get washed out and we start to lose some of that detail. (Or keep it on if you really hate noise.)
There’s some issues regarding focussing, manual focus doesn’t seem to work. If you want to set your focus to infinity, after launching the app, set the focus to auto, tap to focus once and then set your focus to infinity.
Ok great now I can record better videos! But at night the video looks blurry, choppy…
The reason why this happens is so that more light can enter the camera for longer, causing the video to look blurry, choppy and noisy. Here is a workaround where you can now record at a constant 30fps even in the dark! This idea came from some OnePlus thread where you could rename a front camera video binary file to the rear camera video binary as the front camera records at a constant 30fps. Be aware there is a trade-off and it is that dark places won’t be as bright at 30fps compared to 15fps!
If you don’t do this, then 15fps could actually be helpful as you can see more with less light! FreeDCam will help a lot with a low light situation with the increased exposure and decreased contrast. You’ll get more noise though. You can either activate the denoiser and/or run a denoiser plugin after you have recorded your video.
(Note: I’m not responsible for anything that might happen on your phone. I’ve only tested this on cm13 so the files might be different across different roms.)
Note that this mod will affect all apps that record video and dark places will look very dark.
Go to /vendor/lib/
Copy the name libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so and then back it up (rename it to something like libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1
Create a copy of libchromatix_ov2680_5987fhq_default_video.so and rename it to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
To revert change libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1 back to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
Increase bitrate…
You can increase the video bitrate with FreeDCam (or any other video recording app if you mess with media_profile.xml) so you can record all that fine detail (including especially the noise). Here, we’ll change the bitrate to 40Mbps.
Just head to /system/etc/media_profiles.xml and look for: (tip: near the end)
<VideoEncoderCap name="h264" enabled="true"
minBitRate="64000" maxBitRate="20000000"
minFrameWidth="176" maxFrameWidth="1920"
minFrameHeight="144" maxFrameHeight="1088"
minFrameRate="15" maxFrameRate="30"
maxHFRFrameWidth="1920" maxHFRFrameHeight="1080"
maxHFRMode="120" />
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Change maxBitRate to 40000000 and save. This edit only tells the phone the maximum bitrate it can encode at.
In FreeDCam, make sure you’re in 1080p! Change video bitrate to 40000000 and audio bitrate 320000. Be aware that the video size will now be around 300MB/min so make sure you have plenty of storage. (I tried using an USB OTG Drive. It works! But the USB device interfered with the microphones and created noise. )
So yeah. The difference might not be that noticeable to some, but to me, it looks a lot better to me. While recording, the viewfinder might lag a bit but in the actual recorded video, it’ll be fine. I might put more samples up or maybe you try this out and get some samples for me! Hopefully there are some people here who are interested in video. :good:
My first thread
Awesome!! Works flawlessly with this app!
why dont you just give the edited file
gamernayeem said:
why dont you just give the edited file
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Of what?
magmar452 said:
Of what?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
media_profiles.xml
gamernayeem said:
media_profiles.xml
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I'll make a flashable zip for both the mods
magmar452 said:
I'll make a flashable zip for both the mods
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
thanks
If you can you post guide for better picture quality in general,I am overwhelmed by amount of options it provides can you post screenshots of balanced set of options to choose specifically for our device. Thanks for this thread anyway .
rohitsonone said:
If you can you post guide for better picture quality in general,I am overwhelmed by amount of options it provides can you post screenshots of balanced set of options to choose specifically for our device. Thanks for this thread anyway .
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry, this is a video specific guide. I'm making some flashable zips and I'll put some screenshots when I have time. Perhaps @shanx_verma can make a picture guide? If I have lots of time then maybe I'll make one.
Prioritizing FPS Over Exposure
Hi magmar452.
Thank you very much for this. This is some juicy detail you uncovered here!
magmar452 said:
Go to /vendor/lib/
Copy the name libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so and then back it up (rename it to something like libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1
Create a copy of libchromatix_ov2680_5987fhq_default_video.so and rename it to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
To revert change libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1 back to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
My front-facing camera also goes into "Slideshow Mode" in low light, so following your exact steps above didn't work for me. However, I fiddled a bit and found what does work for me:
Trade exposure for fps priority:
1. Go to /vender/lib/
2. Rename "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so" to "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1"
3. Create a copy of "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_hfr_60fps.so" and rename it to "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so"
EDIT1: Getting decent night time results using "libchromatix_ov8865_q8v18a_default_video.so" as the source. It actually allows me proper exposure/fps control. "libchromatix_ov8865_q8v18a_hfr_60fps.so" handles similarly, but prioritizes fps.
EDIT2: Various vendor libs from github/TheMuppets/xiaomi/cancro also work. However, results are all over the place.
This isn't a proper fix, but it's really good to be Slideshow-free.
Samples:
ov8865_sunny (default): youtu.be/pS544qW35ZM
ov8865_q8v18a: youtu.be/PcCC95EIceg
imx226_video_hdr: youtu.be/E79zcYlq7pU
pexxie said:
Hi magmar452.
Thank you very much for this. This is some juicy detail you uncovered here!
My front-facing camera also goes into "Slideshow Mode" in low light, so following your exact steps above didn't work for me. However, I fiddled a bit and found what does work for me:
1. Go to /vender/lib/
2. Rename "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so" to "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so.org"
3. Create a copy of "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_hfr_60fps.so" and rename it to "libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so"
EDIT: I'm getting decent night time results using "libchromatix_ov8865_q8v18a_default_video.so" as the source. It actually allows me proper exposure/fps control.
Not sure why it works, but it works. Maybe it's coincidence. I still get the occasional brief dips to 20-odd fps, but they're too infrequent to be a nuisance. It's not a proper fix, but it's really good to be Slideshow-free.
Short Samples: Original & Hack Job
Original: youtu.be/3VHuGj33vp4
Hack Job: youtu.be/oEH2E7t_5EI
P.S. I'm running CyanogenMod Nightly 6.0.1 (wt88047) on my Redmi 2 Pro (2014817)
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I think most roms have switch to the lollipop canera blobs and that's why the front camera is choppy now to fix the 'dark video' problem. I've switched to Resurrection Remix, there are some few changes that had to be made to the instructions (getting the old front camera file) so I can still get 30fps.I'll check it out renaming to the 60fps file. Currently I'm quite busy
magmar452 said:
So you want to record more natural looking videos on your Redmi 2? Maybe so you get more headroom when video editing? Or does recording in low light look too choppy? Then this might be for you!
Afterreading Redmi 2 on XDA and checking out FreeDCam, I can say that it’s the best looking video recorder I’ve tried on my phone.
Of course you want to see some samples (Sorry if the samples aren’t that great but there weren’t any colourful flowers around. )
YouTube samples
Outside and sunny...
CM Snap
FreeDCam
Outside...
CyanogenMod Snap
FreeDCam
FreeDCam with some adjustments
Low light with workaround
CyanogenMod Snap
FreeDCam
This camera app will give you more manual controls than any other video recording app plus, you can even change them while recording! Here’s some specific settings that you should change…
Exposure: Adjust so nothing looks too dark or too bright (find the balance).
Contrast: Change to 0 (or something slightly higher). I guess the problem with other apps is that the contrast is set too high and makes shadows look too dark and highlights look too bright.
Sharpness: Set to 0 as the video will look more soft and natural. Sharpening after recording (i.e. using a program) seems to look better…
Denoise: Turn off as colours get washed out and we start to lose some of that detail. (Or keep it on if you really hate noise.)
There’s some issues regarding focussing, manual focus doesn’t seem to work. If you want to set your focus to infinity, after launching the app, set the focus to auto, tap to focus once and then set your focus to infinity.
Ok great now I can record better videos! But at night the video looks blurry, choppy…
The reason why this happens is so that more light can enter the camera for longer, causing the video to look blurry, choppy and noisy. Here is a workaround where you can now record at a constant 30fps even in the dark! This idea came from some OnePlus thread where you could rename a front camera video binary file to the rear camera video binary as the front camera records at a constant 30fps. Be aware there is a trade-off and it is that dark places won’t be as bright at 30fps compared to 15fps!
If you don’t do this, then 15fps could actually be helpful as you can see more with less light! FreeDCam will help a lot with a low light situation with the increased exposure and decreased contrast. You’ll get more noise though. You can either activate the denoiser and/or run a denoiser plugin after you have recorded your video.
(Note: I’m not responsible for anything that might happen on your phone. I’ve only tested this on cm13 so the files might be different across different roms.)
Note that this mod will affect all apps that record video and dark places will look very dark.
Go to /vendor/lib/
Copy the name libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so and then back it up (rename it to something like libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1
Create a copy of libchromatix_ov2680_5987fhq_default_video.so and rename it to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
To revert change libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so1 back to libchromatix_ov8865_sunny_default_video.so
Increase bitrate…
You can increase the video bitrate with FreeDCam (or any other video recording app if you mess with media_profile.xml) so you can record all that fine detail (including especially the noise). Here, we’ll change the bitrate to 40Mbps.
Just head to /system/etc/media_profiles.xml and look for: (tip: near the end)
Change maxBitRate to 40000000 and save. This edit only tells the phone the maximum bitrate it can encode at.
In FreeDCam, make sure you’re in 1080p! Change video bitrate to 40000000 and audio bitrate 320000. Be aware that the video size will now be around 300MB/min so make sure you have plenty of storage. (I tried using an USB OTG Drive. It works! But the USB device interfered with the microphones and created noise. )
So yeah. The difference might not be that noticeable to some, but to me, it looks a lot better to me. While recording, the viewfinder might lag a bit but in the actual recorded video, it’ll be fine. I might put more samples up or maybe you try this out and get some samples for me! Hopefully there are some people here who are interested in video. :good:
My first thread
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Can you make a guide for MI 5? I'm trying to record guitar videos but it's choppy
luigi0824 said:
Can you make a guide for MI 5? I'm trying to record guitar videos but it's choppy
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Sorry I don't have an Mi 5. See if lowering resolution helps or not having enough light causes this issue.
flashable zip is there?
It will be easy then
I have been noticing significant motion smearing on my S21 Ultra. I did a side by side comparison to a OP7tpro to make sure that it was not my eyes playing tricks on me. I also tried with a friend's S21 Ultra and it yielded the same result so I know it's not a random defective unit on my side. I notice the issue prevalent on videos that are rendered with the HEVC codec. I really hope Samsung has an update that fixes the issue. The whole point of getting an Ultra phone was for a no compromises phone and this hasn't been the case. Do any of you guys also face the same problem or have a solution. I tried lowering the screen resolution, the refresh rate, turning on and off video enhancer, blue light filter, and even factory reset my phone once.
Source of the file to verify?
Disney+
ione2380 said:
Source of the file to verify?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
I used Amazon prime's invincible and Disney+'s falcon and the winter soldier.
Can you recommend a YouTube video or a link to video file to see this effect on?
nixnixnixnix4 said:
Can you recommend a YouTube video or a link to video file to see this effect on?
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
Maybe you can focus on the character outlines when they are in contrast with the white background
agesarchus said:
Maybe you can focus on the character outlines when they are in contrast with the white background
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
This is a 30fps video. I watched it in 720p.
My screen resolution was set to 720p and I couldn't notice any blurring.
I'll check again, try different resolutions, and report back.