Many users of smartphones running on the Android operating system are often disappointed in the quality of photographs taken with the camera of their device, because in online reviews and other owners of similar devices the photos turned out much better. What could be the reasons for this problem and how to improve the camera on Android?
Some of the possible reasons:
- Camera defect;
- Errors in the operation of the Camera program;
- Incorrect camera settings.
Let's take a closer look at each of them.
1 Camera defect. Multi-colored stripes in the photo, spots, severe blurriness - this is most likely a defect in the camera itself. That happens. And if your smartphone is still under warranty, you should take it to the store for exchange or return it to a service center.
2 Errors in the operation of the Camera program. Firmware manufacturers sometimes make mistakes by releasing unfinished software for sale. Typical symptoms of such “hackwork” are: inverted colors in the photo, an inverted image, or the camera simply refuses to start.
What to do in this case? Fortunately, there are many programs that are analogous to a standard camera, and if you wish, you can install any of them, or even all at once, on your smartphone.
Applications - replacement for the standard “Camera”
HD Camera
An excellent application, with a huge number of manual settings, thanks to which you can adjust the image size (number of megapixels) and the quality of photo compression, as well as white balance and select different shooting scenes. As a bonus, there is a tilt position for the smartphone, which will allow you to take photos without blocking the horizon and the QR code scanner.
Download the HD Camera app on your smartphone: link
DSLR Camera
An excellent application with many settings that will make you feel like a real photographer. Among the useful functions, it is worth noting the choice of ISO, a visual histogram, a grid for convenient framing, tracking focus, white balance and much more.
Download the DSLR Camera app on your smartphone: link
3 Incorrect camera settings. It would seem a trifle, but many do not know that despite the stated presence in the cell of five, eight, thirteen, etc. megapixels, this parameter can be set arbitrarily. And when purchasing a device, it is not always set to maximum. Therefore, first of all, you should go into the settings of your camera and see what mode is set.
The higher the resolution of the photo, the greater the likelihood that the photo will look better on a computer or TV screen. Also try adjusting the white balance (WB), it may be that it gives unrealistic colors.
It is very important to set up the camera on your smartphone and enjoy high-quality photos. And by the way, an important detail is the ability to turn off the sound when shooting. This greatly simplifies life in rooms where silence is required (for example: a library, lecture room, etc.). To learn how to mute your camera, check out this article:
Have a nice photo!
- The “White Balance” function allows you to improve the quality of your photographs, providing color correction depending on the type of lighting (incandescent or daylight, natural light, sunny or cloudy weather). Automatic adjustment of light balance is possible.
- “Location recording” via GPS (with or without a photo).
- Flash mode. If you don't know when to use it, set the mode to "Auto" and the device will turn it on when needed.
- Image stabilization. This feature will prevent you from ruining the photo if you move the phone due to uneven breathing or shaking hands during shooting.
- Digital zoom (zoom in from 1x to 2x).
Setting up a camera for communicating on Skype
Setting up a camera for communicating on Skype is not difficult. To do this, you need to go to the “Advanced settings” section of video recording and check the “Forced calls” checkbox for both the rear and front cameras. Then reboot the device and choose which one to use to communicate.
Camera problems and how to fix them
During operation, the quality of the camera may deteriorate. This can be caused by various reasons: contamination of the sensor; clogged cache or mechanical damage to the module responsible for settings; infection by viruses. There are several ways to improve the performance of your device.
When automatically updating the firmware, the basic settings are often lost, leading to incorrect operation of applications. To fix this problem, just do the following:
- go to the gadget settings;
- go to “Backup”;
- enable the "Reset to factory settings" function.
- The problem with viruses will be solved by cleaning the system and installing an antivirus program.
- To clear the module cache, you need to go to “Settings”, select the “Applications” section. In its menu, find the “Camera” subsection and enable the “Clear cache” option.
- Download and set up an application alternative to a standard camera, for example, HD or DSLRCamera, ShotControl, etc.
- By wiping the lens before each use, you will eliminate the risk of dots and subtle spots on your images.
- Try not to use Zoom. Any photo can be corrected in a graphic editor. With digital zoom, the likelihood that it will be irrevocably damaged increases dramatically.
After watching enough reviews and buying a new smartphone, we don’t always get what we expect. The video from the camera is not of such quality, and the photographs, especially at night, are very noisy. How to set up the camera on Xiaomi Redmi and improve the results?
First, you should set the quality of the camera itself to the maximum (or to the proper level).
To do this, in the system settings, go to the “System applications” section and click on the “Camera” item.
The camera settings menu opens, where you can set parameters for both photos and videos.
Setting photo quality on Xiaomi
First of all, click on the “Photo Quality” button and select “High”. This will reduce compression when saving photos, which means the images will be of higher quality and more detailed.
No less important is the “Frame format” item. There are two options to choose from:
- Standard 4:3;
- Widescreen 16:9.
There is no universal advice here on which format to choose and everyone sets it at their own discretion. Standard allows you to use the entire area of the matrix to create a picture. Thus, having a 16 MP camera you will get a photo with an honest resolution of 16 MP, but the widescreen mode simply does not use the upper and lower parts of the matrix, which leads to a reduction in size, but at the same time the photos fit perfectly into the resolution of modern smartphones and laptop displays without the need for additional framing.
At the very bottom of the settings menu there are 4 more items: exposure mode, contrast, saturation and sharpness.
Exposure metering settings can be average, center-weighted, or spot.
With average metering, the brightness of all parts of the frame is taken into account equally.
Center-weighted mode involves calculating brightness based on data at the focus point with smooth attenuation towards the edges of the image.
Spot mode – measures the frame brightness at the rate of 1-5% of the matrix size.
The most popular are the last two options – center-weighted and spot.
As for contrast, saturation and sharpness, you need to try different options and settle on the one that suits you personally.
You can also switch shooting from automatic to manual mode. This will allow you to independently set the white balance, ISO and shutter speed of the camera.
This method is good when shooting in low light; it can significantly improve the quality of photographs, but it also has several disadvantages:
- By lowering the ISO, you can get less noise in the photo, but the shutter speed will increase, which will lead to blurry images if you use the camera without any support, such as a tripod.
- For each photo in different conditions, you will have to change the settings, which significantly slows down the shooting process. At the same time, so that there are no blurred objects in the photograph, they must be static during shooting, unless, of course, this is the artistic intent of the photographer.
Blur the background
The bokeh effect, or more simply put, blurring the background, is an opportunity to place emphasis on a specific subject, highlighting it from the mass of other elements of the photograph.
If your smartphone has a dual camera module (such as the Xiaomi Mi6, Xiaomi Mi 5x, Xiaomi Mi A1 smartphones), you can use a special portrait mode, which you can learn about from the article:
For all other mobile devices, you can use the proprietary application from Google and get an equally high-quality blur effect even when using one camera. This is described in more detail in the material:
Setting video quality on Xiaomi
Setting the video quality depends on the resolution in which the video will be recorded. To configure it, go to the “Video Quality” item and select the most optimal one. For most Xiaomi cameras, this is Full HD, since 4k is capable of recording at a low frame rate, and regular HD already looks pretty poor. With all this, do not forget that the higher the quality of the shooting, the larger the video file takes up on the smartphone.
Also, to improve the quality of the video, you should go to the “Focus Mode” item and select “Touch”. As practice has shown, the continuous focusing mode (CAF) on Xiaomi smartphones mostly misses jumping from one object to another, which significantly worsens the result obtained.
Tips for shooting video
To make video shooting better and not make watching videos disgusting, you should use a few simple rules:
- the video must be horizontal so that it can be viewed comfortably on a large computer, laptop or TV screen;
- when shooting video, you should not sharply turn the camera from one object to another, the recording should be smooth;
- The smartphone must be held with both hands, this will eliminate the jitter of the picture.
Good afternoon, dear readers!
A year ago, I consulted with my daughter about the advisability of buying a smartphone for me personally - although almost all my friends had already replaced them for several generations, I continued to use the phone. And they decided that, apparently, it was worth it - at least for the sake of the audio player. The fact is that I like to listen to relatively long audio stories, and when listening to them on the phone, one terribly inconvenient incident often happens. If they call me in the middle of a story (and more often this happens towards the end), then at the end of the conversation I will have to manually rewind the entire story to the point of the last pause, periodically checking whether I have already heard this part or not. In a smartphone, it will be possible to use the player of my choice, and not the choice of the phone manufacturer. In my opinion, a smartphone is not suitable for more than that - at least for me. Well, really, shouldn’t you take pictures with your phone?
And so the purchase was made, which was facilitated by the successful drowning of my phone in Lake Zyuratkul - I became the owner of a real smartphone. As it unexpectedly turned out, a small computer is capable, to put it mildly, of a little more than just a convenient audio player.
Step one. Acquaintance.
In addition to photography itself, the program allows you to apply various effects even before saving the image to a memory card, use ready-made images to overlay the subject you are shooting, share freshly captured images on social networks, there is even a special application that makes photographing with documents very easy.
However, I personally believe that all these manipulations are much more convenient to carry out on a much smarter computer, therefore, with your permission, I will omit the descriptions of the magical manipulations, but I promise that if even one request comes in, I will definitely describe the missed points.
Step two. Setup.
The application greets us with a rather ascetic and at the same time self-sufficient interface.
The top left “button” brings up your account settings menu if you need to publish images online, change cloud albums and other online activities.
The second “button” switches between the rear and front cameras.
- Auto - the camera itself will decide whether to turn on the flash;
- Always on—the flash turns on immediately before the shutter opens;
- Always off - there will be no flash in any case, but the device will still try to take a picture with the best quality due to other parameters, most likely sensitivity;
- Backlight mode - the flash is constantly on and is also used to illuminate the subject being photographed.
The rightmost button is responsible for this (from top to bottom):
- The shooting will be done by clicking on the place of the screen where we need maximum sharpness. For example, if this is a portrait, then you need to touch the screen in the place where the subject’s face is located;
- The sound of the shutter clicking and pressing the “buttons” (it depends on everyone, but it annoys me);
- Timer - shutter delay;
- Stabilization. Try it, you might like it. The trick is this: in the advanced mode (see below), you need to show the device what peace is, and then turn on the stabilizer. The camera will try to stop the shaking of your hands. Stabilization quite significantly lengthens the shooting process;
- Switching focus modes: Macro, Infinity and Auto (the lens does not have smooth focusing, but two-stage focusing - far - close);
- In advanced mode, you can configure more subtle parameters.
Step three. Advanced mode.
- Login Accounts allows the current user to connect to their online capabilities;
- Camera settings and photo settings are a little lower;
- SNS sites are social networks. You can choose from a fairly extensive list, or add your own;
- Tracking updates - if the “trigger” is cocked, the program will automatically report found updates;
- Well, “About the program”, I think it’s clear.
Step four. Photo settings.
- Photo size (in megapixels) (second picture) - you can select a partial size. It is advisable to reduce it if you know for sure that you need a small file and you do not intend to process it, for example, to send by mail; in other cases, I strongly recommend setting the maximum value;
- Quality (third picture): normal, good and very good. I always recommend choosing the best (you can’t get good from bad), but it’s up to you;
- Path to save files;
- You can select an album to block from deletion;
- Autosave;
- Preserving the original photo when applying effects and frames;
- Determines whether to imprint the date on the photo;
- GPS data.
Step five. Camera settings.
- What functions to put on the volume buttons. Options: Volume, Capture and Zoom (digital, so this option is not about us);
- Enabling effects (I don’t like it, so I didn’t really consider it). If someone asks, I will dedicate a separate article;
- The inclusion of golden ratio lines in the frame - whoever chooses what for themselves;
- Front camera mirror;
- Vibration protection;
- But this is the very training in stability that I spoke about at the beginning. You need to put the phone on the table and press OK. The phone will begin to “get acquainted with peace.” It remembers how a mechanical system behaves at rest. It’s not clear why not train him in the factory?
So you know the basic camera settings on your smartphone.
Articles and Lifehacks
It would seem that everything has already been studied in modern phones, but, nevertheless, someone has little understanding of how to set up the camera on Android.
When you first buy a phone, the camera on it is already configured automatically, so you can take a photo or shoot a video right away, without setting anything up.
But in order for the pictures or video clips to turn out not standard, but according to your taste, then you need to configure the camera yourself. Settings may vary depending on the phone brand.
How to change camera settings
You need to start by turning on the camera, and find the image of the settings wheel. When clicked, a window will open with different categories, and by selecting them one by one, you can change each one.
To exit this menu, press the back button. The settings themselves can be seen on the screen.
How to set the photo mode
- Depending on the intended shooting, select a focus mode from the suggested options: “Auto” (automatic), “Infinity” (when shooting distant objects) or “Macro” (for close-up shooting).
- Select your desired exposure. When choosing a shooting mode, check the user manual to see what types of mode are available for your phone (beach, fireworks, etc.), and click the appropriate ones.
- If you don’t understand what dimensions to choose for shooting, indicate 640 by 480, this is in pixels.
- Next comes the image quality and color effects you'll want to use in your shoot. The location of an object can be recorded using GPS.
- White balance is an item that allows you to adjust the amount of white in photographs to obtain a natural tint of the image.
- Then turn on or off the flash mode, select the magnification if necessary (1x-2x) and the camera you will use to shoot (if you have several of them on your phone).
How to set the video camera mode
The video camera is configured in the same way as a photo camera, up to the “video quality” point.
Here you need to select the recording duration that is suitable for viewing the video file without losing its quality on a computer, on YouTube, or when transferring to another device via MMS. All you have to do is choose a camera and shoot a video.
