[Mod][How to][Updated Camera 3.3.20.8]Unlock Advanced Camera Settings | Non-Root/Root

[GodOfPsychos]

Finally! The moment all of you have been waiting for. This is the Tutorial on "How to unlock the advanced camera settings in the motorola camera app" (ladybug icon) :victory:
first of all, this could be the most useful tutorial for stock rom users, since most of the custom rom already have this.

This mod should also work with:
MOTO DEVICES
-Moto E ------------------Confirmed working by @AshuGite and @spiked_mistborn
-Moto G 4G (LTE)--------Confirmed working by many users
-Moto X (2013)-----------Not confirmed, yet. But it should work
-Moto G 2 Gen. (2014)---Confirmed working by @prateek.khurana31
-Moto X 2 Gen. (2014)---Confirmed working by @neh4pres

OTHER DEVICES:
-Xperia Z2----------------Confirmed working except for recording Videos(missing libs) by @ogunja

If you owned one of the Devices mentioned above and the Mod is working for you, pls let me know for which specific Device it worked, hit the thanks Button below and feel free to open a new Thread in one of the above mentioned Devices' Forums, mentioning this Thread. Thank you

EASY METHOD
For NON-ROOT and ROOT users:
DON'T WORRY, this camera app will install as a seperate app so you will still have the original Motorola Camera app
Here is the camera app with unlocked hidden menu for non-root and root users: Motorola Camera v3.3.20.8 (unlocked hidden menu). Just install as normal apk. Thanks to @jefish for making this awesome Mod

How to access the hidden settings: After you swipe out the settings wheel you will have a "Ladybug" icon in the lower right corner (Screenshots below at the end of this post). just press it enjoy the advanced settings for your Camera

Recommended Settings based on @juanchotazo99 tests: Turn off Wavelet Noise, as it screws up your image quality. Morpho VNR seems to reduce noise in the cameras live view (not on the final image). QC Tintless seems to reduce the reddish tint on final images. So it is up to you if you want to set the last 2 options to on or off

ATTENTION: The Methods below are only necessary if you have ROOT and don't want to install the modded apk.

If you have the Play Store Version of the camera app, pls uninstall and flash one of these flashable zips through CWM Recovery. Thanks to @lost101 for making these.

Moto G (2013) 4.4.4 Stock Camera app: (Wavelet noise, Morpho VNR and QC Tintless settings available)
or
Moto G 2nd Gen. (2014) 4.4.4 Stock Camera app

If you don't want to manually edit your build.prop, you can have a look at this Xposed Module which unlocks the hidden settings without editing anything. Thanks to @S0bes for his Xposed Module


Also, check out @juanchotazo99 's awesome camera test with this new settings in this post. this is also really helpful to understand where the photos get better quality.

Completely Manual Method
Here is the tutorial for those who want to get the hidden settings by manually editing the build.prop
Step 1
Make sure you device is rooted and download or use any File Explorer that has root access.

Step 2
navigate to: Root>System>build.prop

edit the build.prop file (MAKE A BACKUP FIRST) and search for this line:

ro.build.tags=release-keys

and change it to

ro.build.tags=test-keys

and save the file.

Step 3
Finally reboot your Device and you're done.

Now after you swipe out the settings wheel you will have a "Ladybug" icon in the lower right corner (pictures below). just press it enjoy the advanced settings for your Camera :victory:

Screenshots

Don't forget to hit Thanks i would be really happy if you do that

 

[juanchotazo99]

Post process noise reduction, morpho VNR (NR, what else could that be, than noise reduction?). Let's disable these two settings and test. I'll give the camera a try tomorrow in daylight with these changes. I mean, scenes with foliage and plants, that suffer greatly from the noise reduction and become painting-like in pictures. Before, and after.

Thanks a lot for this!!

Hidden above is the original. Let's make a better use of this post.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Bringing all of this to Moto's attention:

In my camera testing post quoted above I had added the following at its end:

Based on all the previous testing done by people in Motorola's official thread on Moto G's camera quality, BEFORE what @GodOfPsychos has discovered, a Motorola representative stated the following:

https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?page=1
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=801623#801623

We’ve been exploring several options to improve the camera. Some items are already on the list – we will fix the intermittent split-flash problem that produces a picture split into light and dark halves. We are working on the intermittent red-tint issue. Other areas are more difficult because any change to improve one area will create other artifacts -- and someone will object to those.

That being said, we have a plan to improve, and much of it is based on the feedback gathered from this thread and others. Thank you. It won’t be fast because it requires changes beyond what we can do through updates to the Camera app itself. But we’re going to make changes that in addition to the items above, should improve sharpness and detail.

I cannot comment on the timing of updates, so I can only ask for patience as we work through this. And again, thanks for the feedback; the photos and observations posted and sent via email were instrumental in helping us get to this point.

Image quality improvements have been promised for the next update, that would be Android L.

Android L is itself a big deal for imaging because it exposes the entire picture/video taking pipeline to camera apps... that means someone can write a camera app with their own picture processing algorithms which in our case can definitely help us with the quality issue.

Meanwhile, we can enjoy better pictures thanks to OP's findings on the camera app's hidden settings. Anyway, if you read what I've bolded in the quoted comment from that official thread... What the hell, Motorola? I mean, he's probably meaning that the stuff that has to be changed is regarding the sensor itself (it presumably does in-sensor noise reduction, outside the scope of what the camera app does by itself) but when the camera app is doing useless noise reduction and you tell people that it can't be solved that way, then @GodOfPsychos finds out about the app's hidden settings being some simple on/off toggles for that useless noise reduction... just... what the hell. This defies logic.


I've made a user in the Motorola forum and have been posting all our findings in that thread. This can't go unnoticed there because their representatives are able to communicate with the camera team. All my posts so far, under the name JohnRambo:

https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=808803#808803
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=809381#809381
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=809421#809421
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=809547#809547
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=810521#810521
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=812005#812005
https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=812831#812831


Silence so far, and people are starting to get upset about the matter. You would be, if the representatives all along said that the camera was fine, and the required tweaks are beyond what they can do with the camera app.. yeah, you get the idea. People shouldn't have to root their phone to fix its camera. EDIT: well, there's the modded camera APK now which is just great! Everyone can now enjoy their moto G's camera as it should be.

They updated the Moto X 2013's software to improve its camera quality, we've proven they can do the same with the Moto G 2013...


01/10/14, 9 days later

https://forums.motorola.com/posts/e2f2722bfc?commentId=813675#813675

I went back and marked my previous post as "best answer" to keep it a little more in sight. We're continuing to evaluate improvements, balancing how changes in one area might impact other aspects of the photos. As I wrote before, it will take a firmware update to implement some of the changes; not something we can do via a faster Play Store update.

Finally, an answer. So, no mention of the camera app doing this useless NR. Okay. Well, it seems we'll have to wait for the L update.

This actually made it to the XDA front page.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Added 28/09/14
Old camera app, before the update:

So, we have three settings to tweak, what do they do?

• Wavelet NR is the offender, if you want to improve your pictures then disable that one.
• Morpho VNR reduces color noise in the camera live view, I've been taking pictures with it on and off, and there's no difference in the final picture, nor in its file size. Its effect is especially noticeable in low light conditions, try it out. This one is up to you, if you prefer a cleaner live view.
• QC Tintless affects color rendering, in particular the amount of red in the final picture. It is presumably the 4.4.4 fix for people who had too much red in their pictures in 4.4.2, so this one is up to you to tweak. Keep it enabled if you want more neutral colors, disabled if you want a little more red in your pictures out of the camera.

Just disable Wavelet NR. The other two are beneficial either to the live view's quality, or to the final picture through better color rendering.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Added 12/10/14
There has been an update to the camera app.

• Wavelet NR is now QC denoise, still enabled by default. Do the right thing and disable it to improve picture quality.
• Morpho VNR has been renamed to Morpho denoise and is no longer selectable. It doesn't affect you, don't mind this change. It is enabled by default and it should be, otherwise the viewfinder becomes a color noise mess under low light conditions, unlike the pictures taken with QC denoise off.
• QC Tintless is unaffected. Keep it enabled.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Added 03/10/15

Go here for the latest camera app, with hidden settings enabled. Thanks @S0bes for all your hard work on this.

The camera app's hidden settings have changed a bit since the last update to this post, some other interesting settings have appeared (which I haven't tested by the way), but the recommendation that's been on this post for a year so far stays the same. Disable QC denoise, leave the rest as it is, enjoy!

As always your mileage may vary, the app can be installed on most Motorola phones so far (all of them?), and the improvements depend on how bad your phone's sensor is. The 1st gen Moto G has a particularly bad 5MP sensor that its output suffers too much by the noise removal done by the app. On phones with better cameras, well, you'll have to test for yourself to see if it's worth it.

 

[GodOfPsychos]

Post process noise reduction, morpho VNR (NR, what else could that be, than noise reduction?). Let's disable these two settings and test.


Will give the camera a try tomorrow in daylight with these changes. I mean, scenes with foliage and plants, that suffer greatly from the noise reduction and become painting-like in pictures. Before, and after.


Thanks a lot for this!!

im gonna do a test tomorrow, too.

 

[2hipso]

Will give the camera a try tomorrow in daylight with these changes. I mean, scenes with foliage and plants, that suffer greatly from the noise reduction and become painting-like in pictures. Before, and after.


Thanks a lot for this!!

im gonna do a test tomorrow, too.

but guys, pls upload it on imgur.com (imgur does not compressing images, so it's in it's full quality) and post links, thx

 

[KDB223]

Didn't work for me
I'm on Stock 4.4.4 (XT1033) and the Camera app version is 3.2.54.1.
Any suggestions?

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

 

[GodOfPsychos]

Didn't work for me
I'm on Stock 4.4.4 (XT1033) and the Camera app version is 3.2.54.1.
Any suggestions?

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

i don't know either. im a noob at stuff like this. i just found this out at midnight after hours of looking for the cause, that made those settings visible (never thought it would be just an easy build.prop entry).

which file explorer did you use for editing the build.prop?

if it is root explorer, then it could be that the build.prop didn't really saved. in this case the easy solution for that is, before editing the build.prop file, press the "Mount R/W" button in the upper right corner. after that you can edit the build.prop and save it

 

[Elessar76]

Working fine on xt1032 4.4.4.:good:
Testing...

 

[2hipso]

Didn't work for me
I'm on Stock 4.4.4 (XT1033) and the Camera app version is 3.2.54.1.
Any suggestions?

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

make sure changes were saved then reboot and check again

 

[Bleak3993]

Working fine here, I can tell these pictures have much more fine detail, but a little bit of noise in low light conditions.

For the people that is not working, I had the same problem, just change the line, save and delete the .bak of the build prop.

 

[KDB223]

make sure changes were saved then reboot and check again

i don't know either. im a noob at stuff like this. i just found this out at midnight after hours of looking for the cause, that made those settings visible (never thought it would be just an easy build.prop entry).

which file explorer did you use for editing the build.prop?

if it is root explorer, then it could be that the build.prop didn't really saved. in this case the easy solution for that is, before editing the build.prop file, press the "Mount R/W" button in the upper right corner. after that you can edit the build.prop and save it

I'm more than sure that my changes have stuck. I used Turbo Editor to the edit and then checked with ES File Explorer.

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

 

[KDB223]

i don't know either. im a noob at stuff like this. i just found this out at midnight after hours of looking for the cause, that made those settings visible (never thought it would be just an easy build.prop entry).

which file explorer did you use for editing the build.prop?

if it is root explorer, then it could be that the build.prop didn't really saved. in this case the easy solution for that is, before editing the build.prop file, press the "Mount R/W" button in the upper right corner. after that you can edit the build.prop and save it

I'm more than sure that my changes have stuck. I used Turbo Editor to the edit and then checked with ES File Explorer.

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

 

[KDB223]

Please delete this post. (Sorry)

 

[GodOfPsychos]

I still don't know what "Morpho VNR" and "QC Tintless" are.

btw. I recognized that the pre-installed motorola camera app is different to the motorola camera app installed through play store.

in the play store version are a few other options available like:
"Image Stabilization" (somehow unavailable on the pre-installed version), "Video Stabilization" (not greyed out like on pre-installed version),
"Dual Video Encode"(somehow unavailable on the pre-installed version), "Preview history" (not greyed out like on pre-installed version),
"HDR save EV0" (not greyed out like on pre-installed version), "Log AEC; AF; AWB" (not greyed out like on pre-installed version)

But the play store version is also missing some options that appear to be only available on pre-installed version like:
"Morpho VNR" (somehow unavailable in play store version), "QC Tintless" (somehow unavailable on play store version), "Video Size" (somehow unavailable on play store version),
"ALTM" (somehow unavailable in play store version), "Exposure compensation" (somehow unavailable in play store version), "White Balance" (somhow unavailable in play store version)

If someone has all these options available and not greyed out, i would really appreciate it, if you share your "MotCamera.apk" with us. i would attach it to the thread and of course give credit to you.

PS: sorry for my bad english.

 

[rocalino]

Working FIne!!
xt1032 4.4.3

 

[Ja_som]

Thank you @GodOfPsychos
I will be grateful if someone tells me what is Morpho VNR and QC Tintless. And if it somehow improves the quality of photos, maybe also with Wavelet noise.
I can't test it because is night

Sent from my tablet./Odoslané z môjho tabletu.

 

[alexkta]

been using the moto camera on a custom ROM & can't believe I just noticed that little ladybug lol, thanks op!

 

[sonygoup]

Does this affect OTA update in anyway also do I need to root to edit?

 

[GodOfPsychos]

Does this affect OTA update in anyway also do I need to root to edit?

about the ota update i am not sure. but i think it will work. and yes you need root access

 

[GodOfPsychos]

I'm more than sure that my changes have stuck. I used Turbo Editor to the edit and then checked with ES File Explorer.

Sent from my XT1033 using XDA Premium 4 mobile app

then i am out of ideas.

 

[sonygoup]

Damn could a modded apk work? If so can someone do it?