yashsingh1/xdaforums huggingface dataset:
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] Zeromus2003:
Not to sound noobish, but to recap all your testing with the camera, would you say the following are accurate:

1. Outdoor picture taking is fine to leave on Auto but turn HDR off, right?

2. Indoor/low light, always use Manual mode and keep HDR off?

When using manual mode (I'm not a pro-photog), what is a good rule of thumb for setting ISO speed and shutter speed, particularly in low light conditions? Also for both indoor and outdoor, what settings are recommended for the flash (I currently have it on Auto). Thanks!!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
First the easy part. Yes, I suggest just shutting off HDR in Auto and it isn't listed in Manual as a setting. Auto actually works pretty well in most situations but Manual will just give you finer control over the exposure to suit the purpose of the photo you want to take and how you want it to look. That's the hard part that's actually not that hard once you get everything kinda tucked away in your head but at first, that's the hard part.

A couple of keys to keep in mind with manual shooting:

1.) With cellphone cameras, the exposure triangle has one corner that's fixed and that's the aperture. Good news/bad news is that we get a fast aperture. This is great when the light isn't so great but it can be problematic when the light is full sun outside. I've already had it once where I was really close to hitting the fastest shutter speed available (1/4000) on the phone while at the lowest ISO (50).

2.) The lowest/base ISO of 50 will be the cleanest, least amplified ISO you can get. You want to get as close to that as conditions will allow. (I actually have a caveat to this rule generally but I haven't been able to test that on this phone yet so I'll have to update that later.)

3.) Choose your shutter speed based on what you want to accomplish. If you want to freeze motion you need a fast enough shutter speed and that depends on the speed of what you want to freeze. Shooting still items it's just a matter of your hand steadiness or getting a tripod or something.

4.) You can speed some parts of the process if you already know you're going to be hemmed in by certain conditions. Outside in daylight you know you can probably be at the base ISO or closer to that end of the spectrum. If you're in a dark club, you know you'll probably need to just set the ISO to the max 3200. Then you just adjust your shutter from there.

That's the quick and dirty of it. There's creative choices you can make that'll go against those guidelines. Photography is a science with artistic applications. Back in the film days it was physics and chemistry and now it's physics and electronics.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] Zeromus2003:
Thanks for the tips!! You obviously know your stuff, for sure. Wish me good luck! :) Oh, and what about my flash setting, leave at Auto? Thanks a ton! Very informative!! (Makes me want to enroll in a class for it)
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Good luck! No need for classes. I'm self taught and I think that's really the best way to go in the arts. As for flash settings, I don't like to even have it on ever. The flash on phones is really only good for about 5 or 7 feet max and it's very harsh and annoying. I'd leave it off until you find a situation where you really really need it but I usually try to find creative alternatives when I can.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] crowsnestitsupport:
I have only had it a few days but I have made some observations. Now I never have been a fan of any of LG's camera app, not on the G3 or G6 switch were the last 2 LG phones I owned and the V30 is no different. I have the pixel XL and really like the simple google camera interface. I took some outdoor photos but not really enough to do a good review. But I take a lot of indoor photos and I must say, so far I'm frustrated. I can't get the thing to take focused true color pictures in the stock app. Below are 2 samples. I used the default app with all settings default, and the newly ported google camera app, all setting default. In both, the default camera app photo is on the left and the google camera app photo on the right. As you can easy see the focus and color is off badly on both photos with the stock app. I can't see to get it fixed no matter what I try, even with HDR off the stock app indoor photos are blurry and have bad color. View attachment 4301599 :( What is the deal? Below are all 4 originals.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Do you have a link to the Google Camera app you used? I've been meaning to try it side by side in the V30. I'm guessing it's the compression rate each app is using but I won't know without shooting side by side and analyzing the exif info.

I'm running on a rough theory from shooting the V20 app and Google Camera app side by side. The Google Camera app I've got for it compresses the file a little more and it shows when I pixel peep the files.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] crowsnestitsupport:
This is the link to AFH where I found it. I don't own this or get any credit for it :) https://androidfilehost.com/?fid=817906626617934890
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Thank you very much for that and I have your answer. Took me longer to download than to take photos and compare. So with the V30 app vs the Google Camera app that you linked to the results support what you're seeing. It's the compression. I took the same photo at the same spot and this is what I'm seeing:

V30 app Auto mode: 3.9mb file size

V30 app Manual mode: 4.0mb file size

Google Camera app: 5.2mb files size

Zooming in on them shows more detail in the Google Camera app. So I'd say that if you're running just Auto shots, go for that Google Camera app. (And at this point, unless I see a better version of the app come down the pipe I'm not updating form the one in hand.) If you want to do manual shooting or use any other special modes other than just dumb auto, go for the V30 app.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] Zeromus2003:
Is this "Google Camera" different then the one in the play store? Just asking since its being sideloaded and not off play. Please advise....thx!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
This is a port of the one you would see in the Play Store if you go from a browser. That one in the store is meant for Nexus and Pixel devices. On both my V20 and V30, it always has to be sideloaded and with certain parts broken. In this case, HDR doesn't actually seem to work.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
A couple of videos from last Wednesday.

Some notes:

*Both shot in Manual Video mode.

*The bar this was shot in is known for having a guy on the sound board that is deaf and he's out to take us all with him. Both of these files have the Receiver As Mic activated. (This happens automagically when the phone senses ear bleeding sound levels. It took me two days to not hear loud ringing in my left ear!)

*I'm used to shooting stills and not video so my hand holding technique sometimes leads to fingers over where the main mics are. That said, I have noticed that whatever filter comes on to stabilize the loud volumes becomes more aggressive as the noise becomes more aggressive. So it's already kicked in and kicks in more as the louder looped instruments come in. If I were a sound mixer, I could probably level that out a bit but I'm a photographer and not a sound person.

*OIS doesn't like extremely loud sounds in the bass range. This was something I would see in the V20 and see here in some of my 1080 footage I've shot.

[YOUTUBE]https://youtu.be/83Cjt1WZghc[/YOUTUBE]

^Shot on the 4K setting.

[YOUTUBE]https://youtu.be/SfC3U-Fkmos[/YOUTUBE]

^Shot on the 1080 setting but I don't remember the frame rate. The B&W is just the built in regular filter as I was shooting in Manual and the LUTs are not an option in manual.

A note about the YouTube app: It was initially set to upload at max 1080. Oddly, the 4K file uploaded at 1080 but the 1080 file only uploaded at 720. Weird. I reset the setting to upload Original quality and it looks like the files loaded properly the second time.

Oh, and just for giggles so you can hear what the place is like with another phone that doesn't have RAM, here's an attempt I made a year ago with the V20. Same weird OIS issue.

[YOUTUBE]https://youtu.be/zb_ncY5lbB0[/YOUTUBE]

1080 setting with directional mics set forward I do believe.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Oh, about the above videos, I should also note that these were shot at the pretty extreme end of things. ISO 3200, 1/25 of a second for a 24fps frame rate. That's not ideal settings at all.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
I was just told that the links to the videos don't work so here they are in the same order:

https://youtu.be/83Cjt1WZghc

https://youtu.be/SfC3U-Fkmos

And the V20 video link in the same place a year ago:

https://youtu.be/zb_ncY5lbB0
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] emmanuelw:
thank you CHH2 exactly the kind of demo Iw as looking for, and LG has done a good job with the audio recording
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
So I'm going to modify my advice as to which cameras to shoot when. If light is good and you want auto, shoot the Google Camera port. Any other situation, shoot the LG camera app. Low light auto shots with the Google Camera don't seem to have very good noise reduction.

And I found a workaround for the LG camera app always opening in Auto mode. If you press and hold the icon for the camera a quick options menu pops out. Grab the handle of the one you want (in my case, it's the manual camera) and drag it somewhere else to create a shortcut to the manual camera. Other options include Cine Video, Selfie Camera, and oddly Auto Camera which is weird because that's what the app icon already does.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] t1mman:
Woah! Thanks bro! That's what I've been looking for since the phone came out! You should check your tags, those videos where not out when I search for them!

I've tested all sort of microphone setup back in the days but it was a PITA to get the setup into shows, this one looks like It'll hit the sweet spot!!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
You're welcome. Unfortunately, formerly having worked a lot with metadata my personal use of it falters as I still have a disdain for it. I'm slowly coming around to hashtags, although I thoroughly hate those. I'll get around to it at some point though.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] t1mman:
The decision is up to you, bear in mind that you can moneterize youtube video so, the more view you get, the better you are!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] khanjan2khan:
YT changed their policies recently. Only those with a cumulative channel views of more than 10k can be monetized.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Ha! Well, considering I'm self-professed as to having a lot to learn about video and my YouTube has a total view count under 1000, I'm not too worried about monetization of it. Heck, I've supposedly got a gallery representative in San Francisco for my photography that I haven't talked to yet this year to see if they've sold anything out there. Just really not all that worried about it. (Judging from the choices he made of prints, I'm guessing he hasn't. I never would have picked those but oh well.)
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Ok, color me impressed.

https://flic.kr/p/YWgse5

That was shot in a very dark bar where one person will come along and turn down the lights then another person will do it again 15 minutes later. I look really good in this bar. :P The EXIF for the shot is ISO 3200, f1.6, 1/15 of a second which is as slow as I was going to go hand held. (This was shot in manual mode. I tried auto and the new GCAM port but neither one would render the same level of detail.) Here's the fun part, that wasn't slow enough to get the exposure you see. In post I had to push it a little more and brighten it up a bit. That's a very delicate thing to ask of an image from such a small sensor but it did extremely well.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
Am interested to know what settings you used for audio in terms of limiter, gain etc

It does not peak much here and am interested in knowing how you did it. Were you monitoring with a earphone as you recorded

V20 for all its audio prowess doesn't do a good job in auto in loud environments and knowledge as to what TO-DO is sparse
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
First off, I have to say that while I have a really good grasp on still photography and all that goes into it, I'm still trying to wrap my head around video and audio. And I completely agree, there isn't really much, er anything, from LG about how to best use this to it's maximum ability. So I had to cheat and go look at what LG's HD Audio Recorder app was using as settings for concert mode and apply those to the video app.

The real help though is whatever is happening with the Receiver As Mic. It's not perfect and if I knew a bit about audio post production I could probably improve what the phone is getting but it is indeed a big jump over what the V20 was getting. Just realize it doesn't kick in until you're about to go deaf. There's only one venue I visit where it'll kick in (the place these are filmed) and the sound guy is going deaf himself and taking us all with him.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] banshee28:
Wondering how the Open Camera app compares to both the LG, or the Google one?
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
The concert settings is just the gain at -17ish, everything else is as is

is that all it took :D

Did you record with Hi Fi enabled ? this will let in more of the low end i think

I don't follow what you mean when you say 'receiver as mic' ?
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] ChazzMatt:
The earpiece speaker actually turns into a 3rd microphone at high decibel levels (like a live concert).

https://www.androidauthority.com/lg-v30-audio-797447/
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
Both v10 & v20 also had three mics. The blurb with the v20 was it could handle 132dB of deafening noise. Am pretty sure it can if setup properly. I look at this as no different to manual controls in camera. I

t's not clear how the earpiece works better but having it face in the opposite direction for a start helps.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Don't know. I don't use it.

The post with the sample videos would be a pretty good indication of the difference between the V20's mics and the V30 using R.A.M.. They're all shot in the same venue with the same earsplitting volume. (Actually, I'd venture to say the ones shot with the V30 were louder.) The RAM on the V30 doesn't even kick on until 120db. When it does, you get a message that it is on. Which is your queue that you're about to suffer ear damage. The V20 had no such thing and it obviously didn't handle it so spectacularly. The V30 isn't so much a three mic set-up as a two mic set-up with a third one that takes over when it gets hairy. The V20 was three with you being able to decide which ones were used by setting the focus in front or behind the phone or both. It never really did much for adjusting to high volumes.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] Dizzyrul3z:
Damn very nice photos. You have gr8 eye for photography! I am really impressed (with LG camera's too) ;) Thanks!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Thank you. I can confidently say that there really isn't any reasonable issues with the V30's cameras, any of them. They all work as I would expect a cellphone's cameras to work if not better if you take control of them. Which is what the V30 is designed for, the user to run the show.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] Dizzyrul3z:
Thanks for review. V30 is my future phone. I am waiting for EU launch :) Best regards!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
Does distance away from the source help at all. Get too close and it saturates, little further away and you're fine. Check

this

from the G4. He digitally zooms in the first second but the sound is great with no saturation. G4 has no audio controls at all.

i notice you're pretty close, is that to get the best visuals and sound is then secondary
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Ha! Well, my closeness to the stage in any of those video samples is more about my physically being there as close to the action as I can get without getting into any fights with other attendees. I would have loved to been closer for photo purposes. In either case, I'm no more than 6 feet away from the main speaker stacks. In the V20, there's a speaker stack within 6 feet of my right shoulder. In the V30, there's a speaker stack within 6 feet of my left shoulder.

What I have noticed is the sound when I'm not in a situation where the RAM is triggered. I'm still trying to sort out the details on that one but had to take a break as I'm currently in a production. (Which would have been an awesome test to record as it's an opera (I don't sing, I just do physical stunt work in it.) but they don't want us to record or video it.) I did find that when I was trying to record in a jazz club where they don't set insane sound levels, I would always get either air noise or crowd noise. So in that case, I still want to try getting up close and see if that doesn't improve the sound quality. I'm thinking/hoping it will. But again, I'm just not a sound or video professional so I'm kinda stumbling through it. I keep threatening to have one of my sound pro friends try it but they never have headphones on them to try it when I see them.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] flp11748:
Noise Reduction

Hi!

If you turn off image noise reduction on manual mode, the processed JPEG doesn't have noise reduction applied?

Thanks!
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
On LG's, manual mode disables HDR or night shot mode. The latter is where additional noise reduction is applied. In some scenes it does a good job but not always

I'd pay more attention to focus if you find images are coming out soft.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
Correct. I've not actually tried it in good lighting to see the difference but in low light, it's a very noticeable difference.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] ashishp633:
Guys please let me know , how we can make bookeh type image on lgv30+ ,any third party app ?
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
I have yet to see a bokeh done by software that looks right. You're better off just getting creative and finding a better background. Realistically, a lot of people attempt to use bokeh to try to cover up for bad choices and the bad choices still show through.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] coldbeverage:
CHH2 - Thanks for all your work on this. I just moved from a Nexus 6P to the V30. Want to love it, but have been taking jpegs indoors of my son tho photos are sooooo soft. I'm in manual, but used to shooting in Aperture priority on my dslr. So, a few questions:

1. Are you shooting RAW only and then editing in Snapseed? Are you using "auto-tune" in Snapseed, or editing manually?

2. Is there any way to change the aperture? When I saw f1.6 and bought the phone I assumed (you know what they say about assuming) that that was max aperture and I could stop down. Is that not the case? Honestly, my shots are soft. I've been shooting jpegs.

3. Is there a way to hold the phone in upright (portrait) and have the manual controls move? They're only set-up for landscape view shots?

4. What Gcam port are you using?

5. Have you tried open camera?

I really want to like this phone - despite the bloatware and software.

---------- Post added at 03:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:42 PM ----------

[MENTION=7789117]CHH2[/MENTION] -

CHH2 - Thanks for all your work on this. I just moved from a Nexus 6P to the V30. Want to love it, but have been taking jpegs indoors of my son tho photos are sooooo soft. I'm in manual, but used to shooting in Aperture priority on my dslr. So, a few questions:

1. Are you shooting RAW only and then editing in Snapseed? Are you using "auto-tune" in Snapseed, or editing manually?

2. Is there any way to change the aperture? When I saw f1.6 and bought the phone I assumed (you know what they say about assuming) that that was max aperture and I could stop down. Is that not the case? Honestly, my shots are soft. I've been shooting jpegs.

3. Is there a way to hold the phone in upright (portrait) and have the manual controls move? They're only set-up for landscape view shots?

4. What Gcam port are you using?

5. Have you tried open camera?

I really want to like this phone - despite the bloatware and software.

---------- Post added at 03:53 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:53 PM ----------

[MENTION=7789117]CHH2[/MENTION] -

CHH2 - Thanks for all your work on this. I just moved from a Nexus 6P to the V30. Want to love it, but have been taking jpegs indoors of my son tho photos are sooooo soft. I'm in manual, but used to shooting in Aperture priority on my dslr. So, a few questions:

1. Are you shooting RAW only and then editing in Snapseed? Are you using "auto-tune" in Snapseed, or editing manually?

2. Is there any way to change the aperture? When I saw f1.6 and bought the phone I assumed (you know what they say about assuming) that that was max aperture and I could stop down. Is that not the case? Honestly, my shots are soft. I've been shooting jpegs.

3. Is there a way to hold the phone in upright (portrait) and have the manual controls move? They're only set-up for landscape view shots?

4. What Gcam port are you using?

5. Have you tried open camera?

I really want to like this phone - despite the bloatware and software.

---------- Post added at 03:54 PM ---------- Previous post was at 03:53 PM ----------

Sorry everyone. Been a while.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] CHH2:
1 - I gave up on shooting RAW and editing in Snapseed as Snapseed doesn't do noise reduction and the app has been a little wonky as of late opening RAW files. Not to mention that since the V30 isn't a dedicated camera with dedicated processing chips, when it shoots RAW, it shoots a RAW frame AND a JPG frame, one after the other instead of shooting a RAW and processing a JPG out of that frame. So if you're shooting anything that moves, you end up with two different photos. Or, if it's a long exposure, you end up with a twice as long exposure you have to sit perfectly still for.

2 - Negative. Cellphones are a one trick pony. The aperture it ships with is what you get. Which can be problematic in bright sun and it wants an insanely fast shutter speed. I don't think the softness is from the huge aperture.

3 - Also negative. The stay in landscape which hasn't really bothered me at all. I'm used to it from my V20 and from shooting with DSLRs and my mirrorless when looking through the viewfinder. Flip a camera into portrait and all of that info still stays in landscape too.

4 - The Arnova (sp?) port but from a few months ago. I haven't updated to a newer version. I was using the old Google Camera port that came out a while go. That turned out better auto photos. The port I have now isn't so hot.

5 - I have not. There's just only so many camera apps you can use at any one time. I'm actually pretty happy with the results of the LG stock camera that I'm sticking with it for now. Even my paid cameras like FV5 are now collecting relative dust.
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] One Twelve:
Quick and dirty way. I said quick and dirty

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KR0xIQtk5Bw

Read the comments below the video for better ways suggested by his viewers
[LG V30 Guides, News, & Discussion] coldbeverage:
Thanks for this and the thorough reply. My son's 16 month's old. Not a still subject. Was shooting indoors tonight but in good light. He's usually a between 2 and 7 feet from me. Tonight he was sitting right next to me. I'm in manual, using main camera, upping the ISO (but "only" to about 1200), using a faster shutter speed, constant focus, but still soft (even somewhat blurry). It's annoying.

Any thoughts???