Google Camera VS Stock Camera on GrapheneOS (Google Pixel 6) - UPDATED

Do you use the stock GrapheneOS camera app for Google Camera? Does the GrapheneOS camera app have any privacy advantages?
Google Camera is a camera phone application for the Android operating system developed by Google. The application was started in 2011 at the Google X research incubator, which was working on picture fusion technology for Google Glass and was led by Marc Levoy. It was initially compatible with all Android 4.4 KitKat and above smartphones, however it is currently only officially supported on Google Pixel devices. On April 16, 2014, it was publicly launched on the Google Play Store for Android 4.4 and up.
While the Google Camera app has more features and does take slightly better photos, the GrapheneOS camera app has come a long way since my first comparision video.
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//CHAPTERS:
TLDR - 00:00
Camera setting changes - 00:57
Overlays explained - 01:24
Photo comparison water - 03:29
Video comparison water - 06:15
Video audio comparison - 07:04
Photo comparison building - 08:09
Video comparison building - 09:05
Photo comparison dusk - 09:21
Photo comparison night - 09:38
Privacy comparison - 09:55
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This video is for educational purposes only.
#grapheneos #digitalprivacy #android12

[@DanielMicay]

There's a small issue with the metadata comparison at the end of the video. It appears you sent the photos in a way which runs them through Android's image handling library such as sending them via a messaging app. This has added a bit of metadata to both the GrapheneOS Camera and Google Camera examples. GrapheneOS Camera strips all the EXIF metadata other than the Orientation field by default. The metadata shown by exiftool also includes the local filesystem metadata on the computer where you're running it and information about the image content and bundled thumbnail. Normally, that would be all that's shown in addition to Orientation. I'd suggest doing the test again but transferring the photos another way like a flash drive. I think you must have sent them via a messaging app which tries to strip certain EXIF metadata like location and accidentally ends up adding more metadata about the method they used to remove it.

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks for the feedback on this. To make sure they were as unaltered as possible I transferred them via. USB flash drive to my desktop. The output in the video is from photos transferred using a flash drive. I also wasn't aware exiftool would show that additional data, so thanks for pointing that out as well. Transfer Process: Take photo -> plug in flash drive using USB-C to A adapter -> using "Files" app, select the photo then "copy to..." flash drive. I've been testing different methods to see where they extra data could have been added, but I think my mistake is reading the output incorrectly. Adding `-g` to the exiftool command groups the output, and the only EXIF metadata on the photo with GrapheneOS Camera is: ``` ---- EXIF ---- Orientation : Rotate 90 CW ``` Which is what should be expected from what you mentioned. The "Google" related output is related to the "ICC_Profile" which looks to be added to any photos taken on the device for the color profile (the exact same "ICC_Profile" is on the GCAM photos).

[@henrysosa8565]

@@sideofburritos you mentioned there are apps that remove the picture data before you send them. Which apps are you referring to?

[@ClaudioParraGonzalez]

@@henrysosa8565 imagepipe

[@manishorsonu]

Bro I have one question? Can I install GCAM on graphene os? Will the quality of GCAM decreases?

[@statickilla89]

I really appreciate all the privacy based OS information you consistently put out. I was just wondering about the camera differences.

[@sideofburritos]

Glad to hear :). Sounds like this video was well timed.

[@tuxforce]

Really great video! Please keep up with all such good work! I really appreciate such content. I have to say that on my pixel 6 I have been trying for some months the GOS camera and for me the main drawback was that it was not focusing correctly so all my pictures were ending blurred in the main focus point. I reverted back to GCAM but I am for sure planning to give GOS another shot somewhere in the future.

[@sideofburritos]

Hmm, you might want to mess with some of the GOS camera settings and see if that helps. Specifically the "optimize for", try swinging that and also try some of the other options under "Focus Timeout". Hopefully those help improve the experience a bit.

[@unknownsoldier5309]

keep up the great work Josh!

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks! Will do!

[@stelioeffrena1571]

Thank you for the video, it was very helpful! The issue with the GOS app taking pics with lower detail is something I noticed when I did my own comparison between my Graphene Pixel 4a and my old iPhone X (different phone but still 12mp sensor). Interestingly in the video section the effect is reversed and the GOS video has seemingly more detail when zoomed in than the Gcam video... I hope the GOS app can keep improving and eliminate the difference in details captured compared to Gcam, in the meanwhile I'll stick to my 4a since the main reason I wanted to upgrade to the 6 pro was the camera, and I'm not willing to install Gcam.

[@sideofburritos]

You're welcome! Yes, the video comparison part was interesting and a bit unexpected, honestly. The overall improvements in general were unexpected, I didn't expect to see much of a difference from my first video. Yea, if that was your main reason then stick with the 4a. The 6a is coming out soon and while it won't have the pro camera, it will be some solid hardware at a reduced price point.

[@d0nj03]

I wanna say that's from the stabilization, but we'd really have to see both with or both without stabilization to really tell.

[@peterlustig5606]

Thank you so much for your work!!

[@sideofburritos]

My pleasure!

[@jsminipro]

Great video :)

[@sideofburritos]

Thank you!

[@andrewdavis5830]

Question and maybe a video idea... What do you use for a photos app for storing, syncing, end-2-end encryption, and viewing your photos? BTW - Thank you for the great info on how to setup and use GOS!

[@ozzlss]

Haha it was worth it!! Thank you!

[@sideofburritos]

Ha! Thanks, $1 well spent then!

[@majun26]

I use the MWP gcam mod, it has a cool black and white mode built in, and also lets you adjust most image processing paramaters including the tone curve, contrast, shadows/highlights, hdr chatacteristics, saturation, etc etc, it helps mitigate gcams aggro approach to hdr. While I use gcam, I'm suprised how good the graphene os camera app is, and they're making some bold claims that they'll be as good as gcam on most ways in the future, which is cool. I'm addicted to the MWP mod's black and white mode for now though.

[@WickedMuis]

I hope the folks that did the cam app for GOS are taking notes.

[@darikzen]

is it possible to set and use full featured gcam on graphene though?

[@redw0lf848]

with one of latest Graphene releases, they added a gservices install option, have you covered this and what latest method for gcam is?

[@sideofburritos]

I did, this video has the details on installing Google Play services using the updated method - kzbin.info/www/bejne/iYuTgX6qnr2HidU For gcam you can use gcam services provider or the sandboxed google play services on grapheneos

[@andersontubebless]

HELP! I bought a pixel 7 pro and I couldn't find videos about releasing 5g for countries that don't officially sell google cell phones, as is the case in Brazil, DO YOU HAVE ANY VIDEO ON HOW TO DO IT WITH OR WITHOUT ROOT?

[@spekulatius1337]

What makes the Google Cam better is post processing. Therefore I guess you could have a software turn the GOS pictures into something more like what the GCAM puts out.

[@RydATube]

I like your Videos.

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks!

[@phantazzor]

Good video, I had my first travel experience with graphene, and will probably change to another one, faire mail, has stopped working with my gmail recently and no fixing which to hard, in the browser emails don’t get sent, it’s getting too painful to change profile all the time and google map isn’t working properly

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks! Hmm, before you switch I would suggest just installing Sandbox play services on your main profile and see how things works. The sandboxed play services are still a much better approach than the alternates out there. As far as google maps, that's off. You could also try Magic Earth, that's been working really well for me. I'm surprised Gmaps didn't work well with the sandboxed play services. For mail, I haven't used this personally, but I've heard good things about K-9 mail. Hope that helps!

[@RavenRock88]

Good content

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks!

[@UsaraDark]

It's been a year since you made this video. What do you think of this topic now?

[@sideofburritos]

GrapheneOS camera has improved quite a bit, and it's what I use day to day.

[@JimJones-qy3oy]

Great video! Does the gcam app support the “top shot” or burst mode feature on graphene?

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks! Yes, that's all done through software, so it will work.

[@JimJones-qy3oy]

@@sideofburritos nice. I’m really just asking if you’ve actually tried it. I’ve got calyx running which is similar in a lot of ways, but obviously not identical. I can’t seem to get it to work. The setting exists. I would really love to know if you actually managed to get this work as intended. I know in theory it should work.

[@sideofburritos]

@@JimJones-qy3oy Ah, got ya. So with top shot once I set flash to off I was then able to enable it. Tested it, worked as expected. For burst, held the camera button down while on the "camera" option. It looked like it was taking a video but then in gallery I was able to see a video, but it also had the option to pick still frames. If it helps, I had to install the Google Photos app to see these "features" on the actual photos. If you're using a different "gallery" you probably won't see the effects. Hope that helps!

[@JimJones-qy3oy]

@@sideofburritos great!! Thanks so much!

[@mastermjc653]

Hi Josh, thanks for motivating me to install Graphene OS, but I am struggling a bit. I have been trying for 2 days to install GCAM via Aurora to no avail. It comes up with "download failed app not purchased". I tried all advice from reddit force quitting, clearing app data starting insecure session in networking settings. Nothing. It is getting very frustrating as I really need GCAM due to upcoming trip. Can you help with any advice ?

[@sideofburritos]

Hi there, that's an error I haven't seen before. Have you tried removing it and reinstalling it from auroraoss.com? You could also try creating a new user profile, installing aurora, and then downloading gcam again. This will help eliminate if it's aurora store, or something on that profile specifically. Another option would be to install Google Play store/services and download it from there. You can do that from another profile as well if you don't want it on your main, owner profile.

[@DavidJacksonphunman1]

Thanks

[@sideofburritos]

Welcome!

[@toothacheforever8437]

This is driving me a bit crazy - Gcam just applies sharpening, GOS doesn't. GOS isnt smoothing out anything.

[@sexycowman]

Exactly this. It's all a bunch of post processing and compression giving the illusion of a better image.

[@christoph2862]

@@sexycowman In the end, it the better picture.

[@freq_upkick]

This is quite actually the purpose of the developer , especially a developer of both hard n software. To make their chosen hardware shine. Their take on optimization. In some instances I foresee those preset filters , apertures ,etc rendering more to my liking. And perhaps in other instances GOS CAM may render my vantage point more concisely. I just dl’d GOS, but I intend to sandbox n utilize both. Cheers Burritos ✌🏾

[@philrose7716]

Thanks Josh great demo. So I just got my Pixel 6 with GrapheneOs installed. Now what! I did follow your videos and they have been invaluable. I just have a question or two on a few apps I like to use but am having some trouble with. 1. Protonmail I'm not getting the notification that email came in. 2. Ebay can open app 3. Ring the app is a bit buggy Any help .....

[@sideofburritos]

Thanks! 1. For that you'll need to install Google services for notifications to work. Protonmail uses Google's notification system instead of local notifications which is why they don't work. This video will have the details for that - kzbin.info/www/bejne/iYuTgX6qnr2HidU 2. I think that'll be the same fix where it needs Google services 3. Same as 1 and 2. I would start with the separate use profile method in the video I linked above and see how they work with those installed.

[@ngozumpa]

Does Google Camera on GrapheneOS perform exactly the same as Google Camera on Android? Same functions, including astrophotography, and produces pictures of the same quality? Cheers.

[@jcools310]

If you wanted to, could you run Gcam while running GOS? If you can, I’m sold

[@sideofburritos]

You can! You can either use gcam services provider or install the included sandboxed google play services. Here's a vide I made on using gcam services provider - kzbin.info/www/bejne/hpqbg6qso6-ciNk And here's one on sandboxed play services - kzbin.info/www/bejne/iYuTgX6qnr2HidU

[@anonazerty165]

What tool did you use to get EXIF data :) ?

[@sideofburritos]

exiftool - exiftool.org/ it also works well for erasing exif data from an image.

[@jampskan5690]

I wonder why the GOS photos took up so much more data? Especially since the GCam ones seemed sharper, more photo realistic, and had more EXIF data attached to them.

[@sideofburritos]

That's a good question. If I didn't change the quality to 100% it probably would have taken up the same about of space. I don't know if the quality would have been noticeably different. Sometimes with those settings while it is "technically" higher quality, you can't really tell just from looking at it. If I do another one in the future I'll probably leave it default.

[@teliph3U]

I wonder what the quality setting actually does. But it may be just the JPEG compression quality setting, and that may have a huge effect on file size.

[@rufon5562]

The graph cam is ratchet, took a photo of the tv screen and it put a weird blue tint on the tv feed.

[@donif]

recording sound on gos mono and on gcam stereo.. obviously I choose gcam

[@Tjk918]

I stopped using Google Camera after noticing that it would produce horrible color banding in many pictures I would take. Not sure if it was a compression artifact or what, but I had it set to "fine" meaning higher quality. I am not surprised by the difference in file size. I also could not stand the contrast filter that GCam applies, it looks gaudy. Outdoor pics look nice with GCam, but indoor ones especially are awful. Graphene's camera seems much more consistent to me, and after doing my own comparison I decided Graphenes camera was much better and have been using it for approx. 6 months over GCam. I use a Pixel 6 too

[@sideofburritos]

That's interesting, I wonder why that was occurring with GCam. I know what you mean, the GCam photos almost look a bit artificial with the corrections it does. GrapheneOS camera does a great job just capturing the actual scene without much distortion/color change. Glad it's been working well for you, I use it 99.9% of the time now. Once in a while I'll try GCam with an outdoor photo just to see how it looks.

[@Tjk918]

@@sideofburritos Yeah the only other thing I miss about it is the night sight feature. Night sky pictures look great with that

[@venjsystems]

I really want to de-Google my Pixel but the GrapheneOS camera app doesn’t even come close to Google’s. Also I rely on Google Maps for real-time public transport a LOT. I’m not a huge photo taker but there is an obvious difference here.

[@sideofburritos]

If that's the case I would install sandboxed Google Play services on a separate user profile and install Maps + GCAM on that profile. Then you can use them just like any other Android OS and keep it separate from your main profile. The other option is to install the sandboxed play services on your main profile which means you won't need to switch profiles and it'll function just like your current setup - kzbin.info/www/bejne/iYuTgX6qnr2HidU

[@anhonestdaysworkincrypto]

What would you recommend on Pixel 6a, GCAM or GOS?

[@sideofburritos]

Personally, I use GOS camera for 99% of my photos. The best thing it to try them both out and see which works well for you.

[@anhonestdaysworkincrypto]

@@sideofburritos Yeah that makes sense will give both a try when I have the phone. Great channel

[@sideofburritos]

@@anhonestdaysworkincrypto Thank you!

[@davudsimons8947]

Thanks for Video :) Can you make a manual installation guide for Grapheneos?

[@unknownsoldier5309]

Look at his previous videos. He makes it easy.

[@apocaloptigon9988]

simply download and execute

[@sideofburritos]

You're welcome! I have this video on how to install it - kzbin.info/www/bejne/qKCYgKaMoJ2CnKc but the online web guide makes it very straight forward to follow as well - grapheneos.org/install/web

[@davudsimons8947]

@@sideofburritos The online web guide is nice but it doesn't work for me. I'm using ubuntu linux. I want to do it from terminal.

[@mikeanderson4668]

how do I turn on the camera from the lock screen on graphene OS?

[@sideofburritos]

I don't believe that's supported. You can tap the power button on any screen (except lock screen) to quickly open it.

[@teliph3U]

Tapping the power button twice in any screen opens the camera app for me, including the lock screen.

[@WitchMedusa]

GCAM certainly has more detail & dynamic range, Google has invested a lot of time into their cameras. Though in surprised with how good GOS is. I know on the Galaxy S7 the difference between the stock camera app & an random unoptimized app is massive, so it's nice to see that GOS has fine tuned their cameras so well. I'm sure it helps that google uses the same few camera modules across various phones.

[@sideofburritos]

I agree, I would expect Google's camera to be exceptional because they need it to be to compete with Apple. I was surprised how far the GOS camera app has come. I've been using only the GOS camera app solely since I made that video and I have no complaints about the quality (even if it's not *as* good).

[@StayTrueToMyLies]

Seems like your pixel survived this deep dive. I mean the deep dive in the first few seconds

[@EBAmbience]

Refreshing to see a proper camera app without all the ugly edge mode algorithms and fake HDR.

[@sideofburritos]

It's funny you mention that. We're so used to seeing altered photos that when we see a real photo, it doesn't look correct.

[@stanlaurel672]

Check out the gcam service provider

[@sideofburritos]

I've been using that for ~6 months, works great. I've been meaning to get away from gcam, even though it's a very “comfortable” app to use.

[@stanlaurel672]

@@sideofburritos The pictures are better so I use it but I check out the improvements of the native grapheneOS Kamera APP after updates.

[@einfacharthur]

gcam exif fix: f-droid.org/en/packages/de.kaffeemitkoffein.imagepipe/ best gcam for pixel: www.celsoazevedo.com/files/android/google-camera/dev-MWP/

[@sideofburritos]

I'll have to check these both out, thank you!

[@harryshuman9637]

Sorry, camera is priority for me.

[@sideofburritos]

You can use Google Camera on GrapheneOS just like the stock OS :)

[@calvinspiff4348]

"Most of us take photos on our phones and never look at them again." That is the realistic statement I've heard all year. I don't understand the obsession with phone cameras? If it's such a big deal to that customer, buy a nice camera 🤷🏻‍♂️

[@sideofburritos]

The number of photos I have that I haven't looked at is astounding 😂. Yea, for me, it's never been a deciding factor on a phone. Is it a nice benefit, definitely, but not a requirement.