What phones can you install Google camera on? Experience and impressions from the updated Google Camera application. Key Features and Functions

As written in a review article on the 4PDA forum, maestro B-S-G did something outstanding in two evenings. He made changes, or rather modified the well-known application and, in a sense, defeated the homeliness of the photographs taken by the 2APi camera. Google Installation The camera on Xiaomi immediately became a top priority.

Pros and cons of the application

The first and biggest advantage of the application is its work with HDR+ mode. This means that the phone’s camera will be able to take better pictures in the dark. It will add aperture to the frame and illuminate what was previously a dark spot. This is relevant for budget versions, where the stock camera does not work the best, and that’s putting it mildly.

The next point is related to video shooting. The application has built-in EIS, electronic stabilization. Now moving objects will be captured in sufficient detail and not blurry, since many people forget to keep manual focus constantly. Irrelevant for flagships that sport this option, especially in the optical version. But those who have fairly average cameras in their smartphones will be surprised. The quality of photos and videos will skyrocket. It won’t reach the leaders, but it will please the eye, that’s for sure. In addition to stabilization, the video will be affected by improved contrast and sharpness; this algorithm is also built into the application.

Bokeh effect, a new feature that everyone is running around with. This portrait shot with background blur. It looks impressive if you need to emphasize the main thing. Typically implemented on smartphones with dual rear cameras, but our application will cope with this task.

Panoramic photos are of better quality, although in a 360-degree panorama the photo stitching is a little rough.

Summing up the positive results:

1. Works quickly and stably. The photo is taken even without pre-processing, instantly.
2. The video turns out to be more detailed, with fewer blurred objects in the frame.
3. There are more options for customization than in the cellular application; there are additional options, such as the Bokeh effect.
4. Overall, there is a noticeable overall improvement in photo and video quality.

But in every barrel of honey there is also a fly in the ointment.

Flaws:

1. Requires Android 7.0 and higher. It is not known whether it will work on your device, you need to check. The reason why Google camera HDR + is not installed may lie in the firmware on the phone. It will definitely work on the global version.
2. Does not work on smartphones with dual cameras.
3. Installation is fraught with certain difficulties, which will be discussed below. Moreover, the first method, without root rights, generally puts the application next to the stock one, and does not replace it. This is inconvenient and fraught with errors in use. In addition, any system update removes it completely. It needs to be restored. Alternatively, you can switch to a stable system; you won’t have to return so often.
4. You'll have to download a lot of additional patches, mods, programs, drivers and other stuff. But maybe all this is interesting to you?

Installing Google camera without root rights

Cheerful boys cheerfully explain to people how to install an application on a Xiaomi phone without root rights. YouTube is full of carbon-copy videos. But they all sin the same.

They repeat each other and look at one single phone - Xiaomi Mi A1. Moreover, it is argued that this procedure possible only for this model and more (!) for no other.

And all because some advanced Spaniard posted his video and showed how to act on A1. We are Russians after all and will not trust the Spaniard, as well as the cheerful, advanced boys, but we will try to cover the entire range of Xiaomi phones.

The actual installation must be on a device with an unlocked bootloader and from custom recovery. I found the simplest (relatively) method that solves everything at once.

It's all over. No further action is required. The difference in this instruction is that you launched TWRP once, without installation. The end result is the same - the appearance of a new camera application, it will stand next to the drain.

How to install with root rights

Basic installation method. In this case, the stock application disappears, and there are no conflicts between the old and the new. Basically this method recommended to everyone, without exception. The limitations in it are significant; the following problems must be resolved before starting installation:

• unlocking the bootloader. This was written about earlier in the article;
• obtaining root rights by installing custom recovery.

If you already have all this, then go ahead:

As you can see, installation is not difficult. Someone installs a camera by changing the system file manually, someone installs a special patch, it will do everything for the owner. But I think the difference is small.

It is recommended to install a modified Google camera on Xiaomi for those who have a smartphone that is not quite advanced in terms of optics. You won’t regret it, a comparison of this camera and the stock one will clearly not be in favor of the latter. The variety of functionality that Google's updated camera will offer you is impressive. Not to mention the quality of new photos and videos.

Google Camera - proprietary graphics editor from Google, characterized by simplicity and the presence of all the functions necessary for everyday use. By using this application you can take pictures, create panoramas, apply color filters to photos, use graphic effects like blur, fisheye, mirror reflection picture vertically or horizontally and so on. Google Camera also allows you to crop a photo, focus on objects, includes convenient selection tools, and gives you the ability to “stretch” photos, artificially increasing their resolution. The process of importing, “processing” an image and saving it to the device’s memory is extremely simple and straightforward. By the way, instead of just saving the received photo on your smartphone or tablet, you can send it to your page directly from the program interface in social networks. It’s true that to do this, you will initially need to link your account in the desired social network to the application.

In fact, we have before us a rather convenient, free, but at the same time completely standard editor without any special "tricks" or unusual functions. It's perfect for those who want a very practical, no-frills photo editor with a simple, pleasant interface.

Key Features and Functions

• has all the functions necessary for a mobile graphic editor;
• allows you to create panoramas from photographs;
• supports wide-angle shooting;
• has an extremely simple minimalistic interface;
• includes a large library of color filters and various effects;
• is completely free.

What's new in this version?

2.5.052 (21.06.2015)

It's no secret that standard application The camera that comes with pure Android doesn't work very well, frankly. Therefore, smartphone manufacturers are forced to independently develop software that would cope with this task at least a little better. As we know, the result of such work is far from ideal. This is understandable, because programmers already have something to work on: implementing new functions, fixing errors in the proprietary shell, optimizing firmware, implementing security updates, preparing updates to the latest versions of Android for all their devices, etc. And since the camera, by and large, works without errors, improving the quality of its work is far from the highest priority task compared to other real problems.

Or the huge and richest corporation Google, which is professionally engaged precisely in honing the existing functions of its products to perfection. After this, most of the changes made are distributed free of charge to all devices along with the new version of Android, but the good corporation reserves the most successful developments exclusively for itself and its line Pixel smartphones. This happened with the Google Camera application, which is able to fully unleash the full potential of almost any camera. mobile camera, but Google doesn't allow other manufacturers to pre-install it on their devices.

Thanks to the craftsmen of the popular developer forum “XDA Developers”, the Google Camera application (in the future - Gcam) was successfully ported to OnePlus smartphones, and a little later the rest of the world joined the process of adapting it to other devices, thanks to which we now have special Gcam versions for almost all smartphones.

But there are many nuances and pitfalls that you should know about before you get involved in this adventure. No one can guarantee you that the installation procedure will go “smoothly”. Moreover, in the process quite often you have to, as they say, “dance with a tambourine,” and for this you need to be a fairly experienced PC user.

Possible problems

List of possible side effects:

there is a certain risk that the camera will stop working altogether.

In rare cases, you will no longer be able to receive official updates over the air.

if you do get it Android update by air, perhaps after this Gcam will stop working. You will need to repeat the entire installation procedure again.

There is a possibility that your Google Pay app may stop working.

Some Gcam features may be unstable or not work at all. The most common problems are caused by the slow motion and portrait mode functions on front camera.

If you have Android Oreo installed, be prepared for the fact that slow motion will almost certainly not work.

and finally: your phone may stop turning on altogether. Yes, this also happens.

If you are determined and all of the above does not scare you, then go into battle! On my own behalf, I would like to note that if you are attentive and careful enough, then even in case of failure, you will almost certainly be able to return everything to its original state. However, we remind you that the Andro-News resource is not responsible for any possible damage to your device. You perform any actions with your smartphone solely at your own peril and risk. We are simply sharing with you a method that we have already used dozens of times ourselves, installing Gcam on a variety of devices of almost any brand and price segment.

useful links

Where to begin?

So, to begin with, upload several installation files in apk format from different versions of Gсam into the memory of your smartphone. Try installing and checking the functionality of each of them one by one. An important nuance: you do not need to install all versions of the application at once. Before installing each new version applications, be sure to delete the old one. Sometimes it happens that already at this stage Gcam is installed and works fine. In this case, no further “dancing with a tambourine” will be required, and you are lucky.

However, it's more likely that your camera app will either not launch or will take photos exactly the same as the standard camera app. Most often this means that the smartphone does not support the Camera 2 API, but you can try to fix this. For example, if you have already obtained ROOT rights, you can simply install the “Camera 2 API Enabler” application (link above). Otherwise, you won't be able to do without a computer.

Algorithm of actions

We will assume that Windows is installed on your PC.

1). Download the “ADB and Fastboot” installation file to your PC (link above).
2). Run it as Administrator, then confirm the installation of drivers several times by entering command line Latin letter“Y” and then pressing the “Enter” button.
3). Download the latest version of TWRP for your smartphone (link above) to the “C:\adb” folder on your PC (created automatically after step 2). Rename the downloaded iso file to “twrp” (twrp.iso). Please note: the downloaded TWRP must be for your smartphone model. Options like “similar”, “almost the same”, and even “the same, but without the letter i/g/x...” are not suitable. If there is no official TWRP for your smartphone yet, you can try to find an amateur build, but we recommend just abandoning this whole idea.
4). Charge your smartphone at least 50%, and preferably completely.
5). Install the latest official update firmware.
6). Go to the “Settings” - “About phone” menu. Click on the “Build number” line about 10 times in a row until a message appears stating that you have opened the developer menu

7). Go to the “Settings” - “For Developers” menu. Enable the “USB Debugging” and “Factory Unlock” items.
8). Go to the “Settings” - “Security” menu. Disable any screen lock.
9). Turn off your smartphone. After turning off completely, press the “On” buttons. and “Volume -”. Keep them pressed until the picture appears on the smartphone display. “Bootloader” should appear.
10). We connect the smartphone to the PC using a high-quality USB cable.
eleven). On your computer, go to the “C:\adb” folder, hold down the Shift key and right-click on a free area. Select “Open PowerShell window here” from the drop-down menu.

12). In the window that opens, run the command:

fastboot devices
If after executing this command you see some strange device with the word fastboot in front of it, then everything is fine, your smartphone is connected. Otherwise, you need to figure out what went wrong and only then proceed to the next steps.
13). Run the commands one by one:
fastboot oem unlock
fastboot boot twrp.img
14). Wait for TWRP to load on your smartphone. If any question appears when starting it, select “Keep read only”. In case you have not yet created a backup copy of your working firmware (ROM), be sure to do it now using the TWRP menu in order to roll back all changes in case something goes wrong.
Attention: Do not disconnect the cable from the PC, so as not to cause an ADB connection error.
15). After the process is completed Reserve copy ROM on your smartphone, return to the PC and execute the following commands:
adb shell
setprop persist.camera.HAL3.enabled 1
exit
adb reboot bootloader
16). We wait until Bootloader starts again on the smartphone, after which we execute the last command:
fastboot reboot
17). After rebooting your smartphone, disconnect the cable and try installing Gcam via apk again.

Problem solving

If you see errors, uninstall the application and try installing a different version. If errors are observed with any version of Gcam, you should repeat steps 9 to 17, but in step No. 15, instead of the second command, run this one: setprop persist.camera.eis.enable 1

If the smartphone stops turning on, follow steps 9 to 13, wait for TWRP to load and restore your backup.

On many smartphones (Huawei, Xiaomi, etc.) to unlock the bootloader, you must submit a corresponding application on the official website.

If you can't open photos from the camera app, go to the “Debugging and tools” menu, uncheck “camera.use_photos” and restart the app.

If you get a black screen when you turn on the front camera, try installing one of the latest builds from our friend “Arnova8G2”. After that, in the settings you can select “Disable Front Camera HDR” (may also be called “Fix Black Screen”).

If yours is fresh Android version, older versions of Gcam may cause errors, and vice versa: if you have a slightly outdated version of Android, new versions of Gcam may cause errors.

Gcam only works on Android 7+. If you have Android 6 or older, Gcam will not work.

If you are the owner Xiaomi smartphone Mi A1, you can also use our instructions at this link: https://goo.gl/isZLTp

And do not forget that all of the above manipulations can potentially brick your smartphone. You perform any actions with your device solely at your own peril and risk. If you are not sure that you are ready to risk your device, the editors of Andro-News recommend that you refrain from any actions described here.

Many people have heard about the Google camera and how good it is at taking photos and videos. The whole secret of the Google camera lies in its modes, namely the HDR+ mode, which makes the photos clearer and brighter. Blur mode which allows you to blur the background, as well as the Google Camera app takes better video! Today we have a unique opportunity to install Google camera on redmi 4x. As always, for installation we will need an unlocked bootloader, installed twrp and as far as I know are necessary root rights, if you are missing any of this, then we have all the necessary materials on our blog.

What works

Since it's not official application for our phone, and ported by a 4pda forum user under the nickname oganyan-arthur, then on this moment Not all the functionality is working yet, for me personally, but I think everything will be fixed soon.

1. The most important mode for me is hdr+, both on the front camera and on the rear
2. Panorama mode works
3. Photosphere mode is working
4. Blur mode works
5. Portrait mode works
6. Video recording works at 30 frames per second

What does not work

1. Slow motion doesn't work
2. 60 frames per second video recording does not work

Installing Google Camera

First of all, we need to activate Camera 2API. For MIUI 9 you need to flash the following archive Camera 2API MIUI9 via twrp, and for MIUI 10 we flash the archive via twrp. Don't forget to do backups systems! Perhaps after installing Camera 2API MIUI9, your stock camera will not work; for it to work, you will need to install, which allows you to work with both the stock camera and the Google camera.

Now let's install the Google camera application for redmi 4x which is available at the Google camera link

At the moment this is the version of ModGoogleCamera_5.1.018_R4X_v.4.1.apk and ModGoogleCamera_5.1.018_R4X_v.4.1_m.focus.apk - with manual autofocus.

For the camera to work correctly, the author advises immediately after installation to go to Settings -> All applications, find and select a camera there that takes up approximately 90-100 MB (this is Google camera) and click on the clear button. Now we can all go into the camera and use it.

Bottom line

Are you unhappy with your stock camera photos? And if they did, they will become even better after doing all the above steps! As a result, we get on the Xiaomi Redmi 4x device good camera from Google with many interesting modes and with best quality images both during the day and in low light conditions. You can ask me any questions that arise as a result of installing or using the camera in the comments.

What are photography and videography used for in the 21st century? Of course, on smartphones and tablets, because they are always at hand and already have good cameras. Therefore, with the proper skills and “direct” hands, the footage turns out to be at least quite good.

But it happens that sometimes developers poorly optimize their applications for specific camera modules and forget about key functions and as soon as they don’t mock users by placing the main parameters somewhere in the depths of the settings. Therefore, we decided to test for Android devices and note the most interesting of them.

Today’s material will involve only two applications, but which ones. First, this is the well-known Google Camera, designed to simplify the photography process and bring something new to it. And the second is an almost professional camera, only in the guise of a mobile gadget – Camera FV-5. Two diametrically opposed approaches, it will be interesting.

The following devices were used as test equipment:

• Smartphone Xiaomi Redmi Note 3 Pro (OC Android 8.1.0, Nitrogen OS, Snapdragon processor 650 64 bit, 6 x 1800 MHz, Adreno 510 video coprocessor, 2 GB RAM);
• Smartphone Jinga Basco M500 3G (OC Android 5.1.1, MediaTek processor MT6580, 4 x 1300 MHz, Mali-400 MP2 video coprocessor, 1 GB RAM).

Google Camera

Acquaintance

Do you want to take cool photos with your smartphone? Then install the Google Camera application on it and enjoy the results. This is Google, they tried to please users.

Key Features Google apps Camera:

• HDR+. Take quality photos in low light or when shooting against a light source.
• Video stabilization. Capture smooth videos even if you can't hold your device tightly.
• Smartburst. Hold the shutter button to automatically take a series of photos and create a GIF animation.
• Photo Sphere. Create 360-degree panoramas.
• Blur. Apply a blur effect (bokeh) to the background when shooting close-up.
• Slow motion video. Capture spectacular moments in slow motion (up to 240fps on some devices).

Beginning of work

Google Camera is absolutely nothing like third party application, since we won’t see any introductory screens or notifications when we first launch it. The only thing is that the application will ask us for permission to access the camera, microphone, and so on. Personally, I got the feeling that the developers decided to make this program the main one “out of the box”. This is exactly the case on Google devices, but don’t forget about other devices.

The camera interface is as simple as possible: in addition there is access to operating modes and four quick settings, and at the bottom is the shooting key, go to video recording, change the camera and go to the last created photos/videos. In landscape orientation, the structure of the Google Camera interface does not change in any way, only the icons are rotated.

In general, if you don’t pick on the nuances and some features, the program looks very good. It certainly won’t put off novice users, but will those who are at least more or less versed in photography like it? This is unlikely, since the application is completely devoid of deep settings. It would be logical to see an advanced shooting mode here, like in old smartphones from Nokia or Sony, who but Google could create it? But no.

When taking photographs, the program automatically focuses on the main objects or prompts us to point to the subject of focus, while at the same time exposure settings are made. For more precise adjustments, you can use the switch on the right side of the screen.

If necessary, you can lock autofocus and auto exposure. This will allow the author to convey the captured moment exactly as it seems right to him.

A timer, grid display, white balance adjustment and flash will help you simplify your workflow. Each of these features has options. All of the above will be relevant for both photography and video recording.

Finished photos are saved in internal memory devices in JPEG format, storage change regular means not provided, but some possibilities have been discussed on the forums. Also for some flagship devices, support for creating RAW photos has been implemented. I have no information about electronic video stabilization in Google Camera.

By the way, one of the features is that when switching to the front camera and vice versa, we will have to spend about 3 seconds. The result is as close as possible to the performance of a standard camera, and that’s good. In reviews of the following applications, we will only be glad to see such indicators.

Google Camera also has other interesting features, such as panoramas, photospheres, and subject photography with background blur. Let's take a closer look at each of them.