Database Develop

[Q] How do you turn off auto-focus

As a "proper" camera, the unit seems to be missing some things I'd expect by default. How do you turn off auto-focus an focus manually... taking pictures at night - the stars etc - invariably the images are out of focus.
Also auto-exposure control - you can turn that off easily for images but for videos there seems to be no way to turn off the auto exposure - which makes the end product look very amateurish.
Finally whenever I go out at night, the LCD dims, I can't seem to stop that and it dims WAY too much?
Any ideas chaps?

scargill said:
As a "proper" camera, the unit seems to be missing some things I'd expect by default. How do you turn off auto-focus an focus manually... taking pictures at night - the stars etc - invariably the images are out of focus.
Also auto-exposure control - you can turn that off easily for images but for videos there seems to be no way to turn off the auto exposure - which makes the end product look very amateurish.
Finally whenever I go out at night, the LCD dims, I can't seem to stop that and it dims WAY too much?
Any ideas chaps?
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It appears that you cannot turn Auto Focus off but you might be able to find a third party camera app in the Play Store that allows this
Settings for video are sparse it's true and again there is no control over the exposure etc.
I didn't notice the LCD dimming, The camera doesn't have an auto brightness LCD so I am not sure what's causing that. Turning the brightness up from the drop down notification bar is easy enough though.
Sorry these are not the answers you are looking for but we have to remind ourselves that this is a premium camera not a pro camera however.

apprentice said:
It appears that you cannot turn Auto Focus off but you might be able to find a third party camera app in the Play Store that allows this
Settings for video are sparse it's true and again there is no control over the exposure etc.
I didn't notice the LCD dimming, The camera doesn't have an auto brightness LCD so I am not sure what's causing that. Turning the brightness up from the drop down notification bar is easy enough though.
Sorry these are not the answers you are looking for but we have to remind ourselves that this is a premium camera not a pro camera however.
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Thanks for that. I will indeed look out for such an app. Agree with you that it's not a "pro" camera - but for example - on the iPhone who's video handling is equally dire, there's an app that completely compensates by letting you shoot 16:9 with auto exposure, auto focus and auto-white all turned off at the touch of a button. This camera really does need such controls to make it useful for anything other than "party" videos. Its a big disappointment that Samsung would miss off such obvious controls having taken the effort to make a special camera app in the first place.

there are only 2 focus modes as far as I can tell, auto and macro.
night sky shots have worked fine for me using auto focus though.
I made some nice pictures of a crescent moon without a tripod or manual focus, and it was sharp enough to see the craters on the moon.
using manual camcorder under expert you can set the brightness, and white balance for video recording manually(wb is under the settings gear)
lcd dimming: settings gear - general - display brightness
the settings gear is hidden under the > and the expert mode can be accessed through the mode button.
don't be so afraid to dig a bit through settings.
I often see complaints about missing/misbehaving features in apps when it's all available through a settings screen.
EDIT: apprentice: auto brightness works using the camera sensor, so it only works while in the camera app.

Thanks for that - so solved the LCD brightness, but I've gone through all the settings and cannot figure out how to turn off the auto-focus or the auto-brightness. Put your hand in front of the lens - and both kick in whether you want them or not... any ideas anyone?

thedicemaster said:
there are only 2 focus modes as far as I can tell, auto and macro.
night sky shots have worked fine for me using auto focus though.
I made some nice pictures of a crescent moon without a tripod or manual focus, and it was sharp enough to see the craters on the moon.
using manual camcorder under expert you can set the brightness, and white balance for video recording manually(wb is under the settings gear)
lcd dimming: settings gear - general - display brightness
the settings gear is hidden under the > and the expert mode can be accessed through the mode button.
don't be so afraid to dig a bit through settings.
I often see complaints about missing/misbehaving features in apps when it's all available through a settings screen.
EDIT: apprentice: auto brightness works using the camera sensor, so it only works while in the camera app.
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
As far as I can tell in camcorder mode, the one thing you can set - brilliance- is only relative brilliance - the exposure still bobs up and down like a YoYo.... making the movies look terrible - surely guys there has to be a way to turn this off?

Camera freezes taking HDR+ photo

It seems like if the google camera is left on HDR+, occasionally when you go back to the camera app after not using it and taking a picture the photo freezes in the middle of the app. You have to switch to a regular photo them back for HDR+ to work again. Anyone else getting this issue?
nexus 6

P30 pro video zoom question

Hi everyone
I'm on the 10.1 update.
And Huawei's made it so once you start video recording you have to pinch to zoom in and out in gradual increments. Which I hate, because you get that pixelated ugliness just before you hit 5x zoom. Is there anyway to jump straight to wide, 1x, 5x and 10x zoom after you have started filming? Have they removed the option or am I missing something?

There is zoom slider in right side of the screen and by tapping those "bolded" dots will jump you straight to wide, 1x, 5x etc.

n0zzz01 said:
There is zoom slider in right side of the screen and by tapping those "bolded" dots will jump you straight to wide, 1x, 5x etc.
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No you don't. You can't jump while recording. That's what he asks

Front camera, group photo, out of focus issue.

Hey everyone!
So for the longest of time, I already have this problem when I am using the front camera to take a group photo, and the camera always focus on the person closest (holding) the camera. Even with the face detection option ON, it won't capture the rest of my friends. Even if I manually tap on the center of the screen (to focus behind).
Do you guys face this issue too?
Any solutions?
I tried Open Camera app but it doesn't have the wide angle feature (like the default S10 camera) have for front camera. (Unless I am not seeing the option).
Thanks!

Bump Hoping for reply still.

Question Couple of camera questions

In the camera app under settings there is an option to enable "Lens Package". Do you know what this is or does?
Sometimes while in Photo mode or Portrait mode, no matter what lens I choose (1x, 2x, 5x) it uses the 1x lens and I guess digitally zooms. I know this because when I tap on the info button inside Albums or directly from the camera app, the data shows 23mm aperture 1.57, 46mm aperture 1.57, 115mm aperture 1.57 for 1x, 2x, 5x. But if I switch to Pro and shoot the same 1x, 2x, 5x I get 23mm/f1.57, 50mm/f2.02 I think and 125mm/f3.4. But sometimes when using Photo/Portrait and selecting 1x, 2x, 5x it uses the proper lens. I'm just trying to understand why? Maybe with AI enabled for scene optimization it chooses the faster aperture lens and digitally zooms to allow for more light??
Any ideas or comments. Thanks!

Lens package is a shortcut to launch your camera with the selected filter/settings (e.g. Astro mode) straight from your app drawer/homescreen. You can turn it off, it will not remove those features from the camera app.
In pro mode, I believe the actual physical lens used is determined by the 4 icons used (telephoto, standard, medium telephoto, telephoto). From there you'll dial in your tweaks like aperture, shutter speed etc. Pinch zooming them in and out will digitally zoom your shot while using the selected lens. I verified this by physically covering each lens with my finger to see what lens it was using but I didn't take a shot to check the album details. Let me know if this helps

dab117 said:
Lens package is a shortcut to launch your camera with the selected filter/settings (e.g. Astro mode) straight from your app drawer/homescreen. You can turn it off, it will not remove those features from the camera app.
In pro mode, I believe the actual physical lens used is determined by the 4 icons used (telephoto, standard, medium telephoto, telephoto). From there you'll dial in your tweaks like aperture, shutter speed etc. Pinch zooming them in and out will digitally zoom your shot while using the selected lens. I verified this by physically covering each lens with my finger to see what lens it was using but I didn't take a shot to check the album details. Let me know if this helps
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Thanks for the explanation. Really enjoying the camera.