I just did a quick test of how well the stock Asus camera, GCam and Open Camera handle shots taken at night: I downloaded the GCam APK from XDA: GCam_8.1.101_Wichaya_V1.1 and the Open Camera from F-Droid onto my Zenfone 8. I took the same shot of the exterior of my apartment block, including trees and greenery, with all three cameras.
I used normal and night modes with the Asus and GCam and Normal and DRO modes with the open camera and then compiled all the shots into a layered Photoshop file so that I could easily compare them.
The Asus night mode gave a much better result than the normal mode. The shadows had slightly more detail and much more color information than the normal mode. But they are aggressively sharpened and have a somewhat processed look.
The GCam normal and night modes had more color and slightly more detail in the shadows than the Asus night mode. They have much less sharpening than the Asus picture and so don't show as much detail, but they have a more natural appearance.
I wish I could turn down the sharpening of the Asus pictures, and turn up the sharpening of the GCam pictures. Unfortunately the Asus camera does not have a way to turn down the sharpening in either the Photo or Pro modes.
There is a setting in GCam to increase sharpening but it's not intuitive and I haven't messed with it yet.
The Open Camera gave really poor results in night and DRO modes, so soft and grainy that it's not something I'd ever use.
I've attached a detail from the Asus and GCam night mode shots and the DRO OpenCamera shot.
This was just a quick and simple test entirely for my own satisfaction, and the results of course are subjective. I'm now going to experiment with the GCam > Advanced > Ram Patcher >Sharpness setting and see If I can increase the sharpening and get a result somewhere between the the softer GCam default and the Asus overprocessed look...
Thread closed.
I downloaded the Wichaya_V1.4 GCam on my Zenphone 8 and found that it can record 64MP jpegs as well as the normal 16MP and Raw file options.
I did a quick test to compare the quality and usability of each version: I took a simple shot that included highlight, shadow, fine detail and strong/subtle colours. The attached screen-grabs are from a small central area of the picture.
The storage size of the shots are 1.8MB. 6.2MB and 13.7MB respectively, so the Raw file is over 7x the size of the smaller jpeg. All details are shown at the same size so the quality and sharpness can be compared.
I found that the 64MP jpeg was both softer and grainier than the normal 16MP file. I sharpened it a little but I don’t think it offers any advantage over the smaller file because of the graininess. If you want a more retro film grain look this could be an advantage.
Straight from the camera the Raw/Dng file is very flat and requires post processing to get it into shape. It’s a 16MP file that contains far more information than the jpeg that’s recorded with it. I opened it in a Capture One (Lightroom or Affinity Photo, etc could be used) and spent time adjusting parameters to get what I considered to be the best version of the shot. There may be smartphone apps that could be used, but I prefer to do this on my laptop.
The outcome is that I will continue to shoot most pictures as normal 16MP jpegs but whenever there is something very special that I wish to capture I’ll switch to Raw + Jpeg mode. This gives me the regular Jpeg for reference and a Raw file to process later when I want to create the best quality of picture from the GCam.
Thank you for your review. Can you add 64MP RAW and process it? It should give some extra details.
Dave.a said:
Thank you for your review. Can you add 64MP RAW and process it? It should give some extra details.
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A 64MP Raw option would be interesting and theoretically lead to higher quality results after post processing. Best to make a request to the developer, Wichaya.
I'm interested in getting the Zenfone 8. Does OpenCamera shoot in 64mp? I'd love to see some examples!
ActiveWave said:
I'm interested in getting the Zenfone 8. Does OpenCamera shoot in 64mp? I'd love to see some examples!
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I don't know if Open camera can record 64MP images as this is not mentioned on its website, but it's free to download and worth trying out. In a previous post I compared the GCam, Asus camera and Open camera night shots. The Open camera gave poor results so I personally would not use it as the quality of low light shots is important to me.
Tom100% said:
I downloaded the Wichaya_V1.4 GCam on my Zenphone 8 and found that it can record 64MP jpegs as well as the normal 16MP and Raw file options.
I did a quick test to compare the quality and usability of each version: I took a simple shot that included highlight, shadow, fine detail and strong/subtle colours. The attached screen-grabs are from a small central area of the picture.
The storage size of the shots are 1.8MB. 6.2MB and 13.7MB respectively, so the Raw file is over 7x the size of the smaller jpeg. All details are shown at the same size so the quality and sharpness can be compared.
I found that the 64MP jpeg was both softer and grainier than the normal 16MP file. I sharpened it a little but I don’t think it offers any advantage over the smaller file because of the graininess. If you want a more retro film grain look this could be an advantage.
Straight from the camera the Raw/Dng file is very flat and requires post processing to get it into shape. It’s a 16MP file that contains far more information than the jpeg that’s recorded with it. I opened it in a Capture One (Lightroom or Affinity Photo, etc could be used) and spent time adjusting parameters to get what I considered to be the best version of the shot. There may be smartphone apps that could be used, but I prefer to do this on my laptop.
The outcome is that I will continue to shoot most pictures as normal 16MP jpegs but whenever there is something very special that I wish to capture I’ll switch to Raw + Jpeg mode. This gives me the regular Jpeg for reference and a Raw file to process later when I want to create the best quality of picture from the GCam.
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Click to collapse
How were u able to change the resolution ,I can't seem to find it in the (wichaya) settings
xXeqiunoxXx said:
How were u able to change the resolution ,I can't seem to find it in the (wichaya) settings
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Switch to 64MP mode in the GCam interface, not in the Wichaya settings. See Screenshot,
The recent Asus system update includes improvements to the stock camera’s picture quality, so I did a quick test to see if I could spot any obvious difference when compared to the GCam (Wichita 1.4) that’s also on my Zenfone 8.
In my previous tests I found pictures from the Asus camera to be over sharpened. This makes foliage look good on a small screen but when viewed large the pictures have an overall processed look. This is something I’m aware of since I’ve made largish prints (50 x 70cm) from some of my previous smartphone shots.
Unfortunately I didn’t spot any improvement that the latest update has made as they are still aggressively sharpened.
GCam pictures have the opposite problem and look too soft when enlarged. So in this test I’ve altered the sharpness: Settings > Advanced > Ram Patcher > Sharpness > 1.500.
The GCam Jpegs are also consistently too dark. I tried to alter the brightness using Settings > Advanced > Ram Patcher > HDR Overall Lightness, but this just blew out the highlights and negated the HDR effect. I’ll have to experiment with some of the other HDR settings to see if I can lighten just the shadows and midtones. I lightened the Jpeg in Photoshop for this comparison.
It’s also possible to shoot a Raw+Jpeg with the GCam. Raw files look flat and greyish straight from the camera but when post processed they give a slightly cleaner and sharper result. They are only16MP rather than the full 64MP the camera is capable of, so hopefully Wichaya will alter this in future mods.
The GCam still gives better picture quality compared with the Asus, but the bright and punchy look of the Asus shots is very good too. If you are into photography and want to get the most from the Zenfone 8 then it’s worth trying the GCam and fine tuning it to suit your needs. The examples below are cropped from the central area of the picture.
If a developer brings out a mod of the Asus camera that allows adjustments to sharpness and brightness, etc, I’d certainly be interested, especially if it could also shoot 64MP Raw.
Have you tried toggling the model settings on GCam to see if that improves the detail?
On my Find X3 Pro the 50 megapixel mode will generate JPGs with two wildly different outputs:
Real 50mp output from the sensor. It's not amazing but has some more detail than 12mp. And importantly no over-sharpening!
Fake 50mp, it's upscaled 12mp output, which is terrible (I suspect some reviewers like gsmarena got this, and this is why they said 50mp is a waste of time).
Sometimes I get #1, and sometimes I get #2. There isn't any warning in the UI.
I'm wondering how best to control this.
Here's my findings:
PHOTO > 50mp setting enabledOther settingOutputYesPHOTO > HDR Auto50mp JPG from upscaled 12mp source YesPHOTO > HDR Off50mp JPG from real 50mp source
Is HDR Off the only way to control if you get the full 50mp?
Does it depend on anything else like AI On/Off or how much light there is?
I wish there was a warning in the camera app that you were getting the fake vs real 50mp, or some way to lock it in Expert mode. (Don't get me started on how annoying it is that Expert mode flicks back to JPG instead of RAW after some time has passed).
Btw I'm using ColorOS12 (C47).
Good find, tks
In a previous post I compared the stock Asus Zenfone 8 camera with the latest Wichaya GCam + config xml. I much prefer the look of the Asus shots which are brighter and have more shadow detail than the GCam pictures.
Unfortunately I have not found any info of how to adjust most of the GCam Ram Patcher settings to make the pictures brighter and show more shadow detail. Blindly playing about with combinations of the Ram Patcher settings made the pictures look worse.
Then I came across a YouTube video in a foreign language showing how to adjust Ram Patcher settings and copied what was shown - my GCam shots are much improved.
The custom settings I now use are:
In the GCam’s drop down menu:
HDR+Enhanced is selected.
In the GCams Settings menu:
Shasta Factor set to 5; Multiframe HDR+Enhanced set to High.
In the Settings > Advanced menu > Ram Patcher:
Sharpness 1,250; Denoise 1.250; HDR Range Plus 12; HDR Range Minus -2.
I still prefer the slightly more punchy look of the Asus Camera, but GCam shots have a more natural look. The Asus Camera over-sharpens fine detail, and in flatter areas smoothes and reduces the detail. Unfortunately here’s no possibility to alter these aspects of the Asus camera.
The attached examples show a picture taken with the Asus Camera.
Then with Wichaya’s GCam and the above custom settings.
I’ve included a GCams DNG (RAW) picture that I’ve edited.
And for fun the same picture taken with a DSLR RAW file I’ve edited.
I now use the Asus camera for general photography, and the GCam (Jpejs + RAW) for more important shots that I may wish to process and improve later.
Mod Edit
Thread closed per [OP] request.
jackeagle
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