Camera Tips

[Vihzel]

Here are a few tips with the Fascinate camera:

1. You can access Panorama mode from the Scene menu in the top left. With Panorama mode... you will be guided by a green box, when you get close to take the next snapshot, move very slowly... especially when the green box is almost centered on your screen. This will produce better pictures with less blur.

2. Turn on Anti-shake and Auto-contrast in the settings menu. Turn on Grid if you'd like extra help with taking better photos.

3. Long press the shutter button to auto focus before taking the photo. It's a two-stage button that will take a little bit to auto focus, but it's better than not doing it before taking a photo.

 

[burningembers]

Thank you! Didn't even know about anti-shake and auto-contrast.

The press-to-hold-focus is exactly what I was looking for. I love it.

 

[howdy]

thanks for sharing that, made a big difference in photo quality.. the continuous function looks like it will be great for taking pictures of kids and sports.. it snaps off photos quick one after another as long as you keep the button down.. It's never easy to get a good picture of kids that don't seem to ever sit still very long.. snapping a bunch of photos and going back and picking the best ones is the best way I've found to get pics anyway.. storage is free, I always take a lot more photos than I will use. great feature and super fast..

 

[Rimzy]

My camera keeps saying insert memory card, even though the phone comes with one. help?

 

[Vihzel]

My camera keeps saying insert memory card, even though the phone comes with one. help?

Hmm... I assume that you've tried taking out and reinserting the memory card? Is your phone able to recognize other things from the memory card... like music?

 

[substring]

Thanks for the tips.

While I was adjusting the settings, I noticed on the video recorder side, it is set at 720 X 480 as default. I immediately changed it to 1280 X 720.

 

[burningembers]

If you go to SD Card & Phone Storage in the Settings, can you re-mount it?

I'd pop off the back and make sure you actually got one with the phone, too...would suck if you didn't but I guess that's a slim possibility.

 

[Lodingi]

Thanks for the tips. I noticed there is a shutter delay on the Fascinate. My daughter's DInc does a much better job of focusing and taking the shot.

Also, what resolution settings is everyone using?

 

[burningembers]

Thanks for the tips. I noticed there is a shutter delay on the Fascinate. My daughter's DInc does a much better job of focusing and taking the shot.

Also, what resolution settings is everyone using?

Shutter delay? The fast shutter is half the reason I'm liking my Fascinate camera better than my Incredible one. I'm seeing noticeably clearer photos in the same conditions versus my Incredible as well. How much of a delay are you experiencing?

I'm using 2560x1920, auto white balance, normal effects, auto iso, centre-weighted metering, anti-shake, auto contrast, superfine, auto focus. I am taking most of my pictures by holding the camera button down until the box turns green, then letting go.

 

[irish]

I agree. My wife still has the Inc (for now). We took a lot of pictures, in doors and out. My Fascinate took better pictures in all conditions. Much quicker pictures as well. The only thing the Inc had over my Fascinate is when you zoom in on pictures. The Inc had better resolution when zooming in on the pics.

 

[II Kings 9:20]

I played a lot with the camera and video- Both superb compared to my D1. I really dislike the D1 camera- very slow to take the next pic and low quality. The SF is as fast as the iPhone (or very close) and great quality. The real test is not looking at the screen which is spectaculr. After emailing, what is the quality on the computer. My Buddy's iphone blows away my D1 taking an identical simultaneous pic and viewing both on the computer. His iphone G4 screen is so much better than the D1 that it is an unrealistic comparison much like using the SF screen- nothing else will look as good even the 960 res iphone seems slightly less crisp- it is the only thing that compares to the SF screen based on resolution alone- it is not superAmoled.

 

[Lodingi]

After playing around some more, I am going to retract my statement. The camera takes the picture instantly as others have stated. The delay I experience has to do with displaying the pic after it is taken.

On my daughter's DInc, the camera snaps the shot & displays it instantly. Now she's on Froyo so maybe that plays into it?

 

[burningembers]

Oh, yeah, there is a weird delay in displaying the pictures that were just taken - not sure what that is about.

I'm not really sure of the technical intricacies of Froyo, but its possible the lag we're experiencing here is just another Samsung Fascinate lag issue similar to the delay in adding Application shortcuts.

Maybe it will be remedied in the future...

 

[saps]

Awesome thread guys thanks

 

[Vihzel]

Something I find peculiar is that if you turn on anti-shake, the exposure control disappears. Hmm... I don't understand why.

 

[burningembers]

I would imagine its because exposure is self-regulated to avoid the least amount of shaking.

I highly doubt this phone has gyroscope stabilization, so I'd guess it is basically anti-shaking by using a fast exposure. If you had anti-shake on, but set your exposure really long, you'd still have issues with shaking.

 

[sean76]

It's as if you can only take pics in Landscape ? Am I missing something?

 

[Rimzy]

It's as if you can only take pics in Landscape ? Am I missing something?

You can just that the button will be under rather than on the side..

 

[sean76]

You can just that the button will be under rather than on the side..

Nope , here's what happens on mine. I snap a pic in portrait mode, and the review will bring this pic up a quarter of the size in portrait, but showing it in landscape? It doesn't take up the whole screen like you think a pic takin in portrait mode would? Now if I go into gallery, the pics are there in portrait? WTF...I shouldn't have to go in gallery to view a pic I took in portrait. A simple way of explaining it is while in camera mode auto rotate, or just rotating the pic doesn't work? I just stays put.

 

[Vihzel]

I'm going to do some test pictures with how the different exposures work with the camera. I know that it has too much, like the EVO and Inc, so it MUST be toned down. The Droid X does an excellent job with exposure. I'm going to try to take it to the X's level.

 

[GetOnMahLevel]

thanks for these tips..

never really messed around with the Panoramic shot.. but it looks pretty slick!

 

[corduroytrees]

New to the forums, but I just got my Fascinate yesterday. Loving it so far, but I do have a question about the camera. Whenever I'm below 20% battery level, the camera gives me a warning and forces me to shut down the application. Anyone else experience this or know how to stop that from happening?

 

[Veez]

Shutter delay? The fast shutter is half the reason I'm liking my Fascinate camera better than my Incredible one. I'm seeing noticeably clearer photos in the same conditions versus my Incredible as well. How much of a delay are you experiencing?

I'm using 2560x1920, auto white balance, normal effects, auto iso, centre-weighted metering, anti-shake, auto contrast, superfine, auto focus. I am taking most of my pictures by holding the camera button down until the box turns green, then letting go.

what picture mode are you using? with panorama a lot of options get disabled..such as resolution, anti shake and others...

 

[saps]

So I took about 1 minute of video yesterday and I could not find it today. It was not in my gallery 'camera' folder. So I was going to ask where vids are stored but I made a few more vids and sure enough they did show up in that camera folder. I guess I just lost the one I made yesterday. Oddly, I had the camcorder just stop recording and give me an error about 8 seconds into a 720p vid. It only happened once but I've heard of others have this intermittent problem from time to time. Methinks it might be sdcard related

 

[Cuda52774]

Just another quick tip for us newbies who don't know, the volumer rocker is your digital zoom in camera mode. I'm sure most of you know this but I was surprised when my wife found this accidentally.

Cuda