#204 Missing focus on spot feature

[Marcin Mielniczuk]

The default CyanogenMod camera, org.cyanogenmod.snap, has a feature to specify manual "focus" not on the center of the camera, but a spot given by the tap of the finger.

From my experiments it alters the exposure, but I'm not sure. A similar feature is available in CameraPlus for MeeGo Harmattan.

OpenCamera is missing that feature. If my description is not clear, please ask for more details.

[Mark]

Touching to focus in Open Camera does affect focus and exposure. If it isn't working, then maybe this is a device specific issue - maybe try to see if it works in other 3rd party camera apps?

[Marcin Mielniczuk]

Hmmm... Took one more try.

First of all, the only UI reaction on the tap is refocusing. The "focus rectangle" (the one that turns to green) appear always in the center of the screen, no matter where I tap.

On OnePlus3 the org.cyanogenmod.snap (further referred to as Snap) camera is only adjusting exposure. The camera can't really focus on an element on the edge of the viewfinder (this may be limitation of Snap, I'll try stock OxygenOS with MultiROM). Tested with two elements, one ~5cm from the camera, the other one ~50cm. (*)

I held the camera directly to the window from some distance. Then Snap overexposes the window (is very bright). After tapping the window, the result is more or less the same as OpenCamera, which doesn't overexpose anything

But later on, I rotated myself, so that the window was on the right side. Snap's result was more or less the same, but tapping on the window fixed the exposure.
OpenCamera, on the other hand permanently overexposes the window. Tapping on the window produces no visible change: the camera does refocus but still overexposes. Rotating back so that the window is in the center of the viewfinder alleviates the issue (cf. the last paragraph)

It may be of importance that OnePlus 3 uses phase detection focus. I'll make an analogical experiment with the Samsung Galaxy J7 2016, which probably uses laser autofocus. (can focus in the (*) experiment.

[Marcin Mielniczuk]

Further reports: on Samsung Galaxy J7 2016 the focus on spot feature started to work only once Camera2 API has been enabled. The feature stayed even after Camera2 API has been disabled in the OpenCamera settings.

[Anonymous]

The "focus rectangle" (the one that turns to green) appear always in the center of the screen, no matter where I tap.

Same problem on Wileyfox Swift (Android 6.0.1, Cyanogen OS-Version 13.1.5 ) and Open Camera 1.36.2 from fdroid