• After 15+ years, we've made a big change: Android Forums is now Early Bird Club. Learn more here.

How To Clean the camera lens

C

cpetku

Newbie
When I started playing with my new Droid (4409) I saw that it had the same auto-focus issues that everyone else complained about. Setting the unit to action made it focus at infinity, so somewhat better but I couldn't get shopsavy to recognize any barcodes. I cleaned the lens even though it didn't seem dirty and now Shopsavy locks onto bar codes and the unit seems to Auto-focus with just about 100% lock (green corners). Could some of the problems people are having just be be caused by lens placement and skin oils?
 
Good God! Green Corners! I've never seen those before! You're right! I just took ~15 pics in a row all got green corners. Then tried the barcode scanner, got it on the first focus every time!
 
Guys, keep votiing on this one, I think it may need to become a sticky under tips...

What is the 12/11 SW fix? If there's an oily spot on the lens and they make it lock by averaging the edge detection algorithm, the picture will still look like the devil (I've had that issue on higher end cameras).

I'm hoping that the SW fix (whatever it is) includes a lower setting for the Flashas well since it causes the photo's to wash out. They're still a bit grainy and focus still doesn't approach the quality of my Lumix cameras, but face it, these optics are pretty limited.

Make sure you set the focus back to AUTO in the settings. You should hear the stepper motor click a few times as it figures out focus then get green corners!

I've also been playing with the camera pixel settings and fineness to improve the shopsavy recognition. ShopSavy Seems to work pretty well now whereas it didn't work at all this afternoon....
 
I think this man solved the camera focus issue most of us have lol. I got green corners after every shot inside my house.
 
Worked for me as well...kind of. I do get green corners, but most of the pictures are not focused great. But much better overall, thanks for the tip. This along with the software update and maybe this will be a decent to good camera.
 
And all this time we thought it was a software issue... Now I'm actually getting amazing quality photos! Thank you so much! And to think that this "problem" went as far as to Verizon and Google planning to fix this non-existent auto-focus problem in December's OTA update :o
 
wow, that made my camera have green almost every time when it was red most of the time, can't believe I didn't think of it.
 
This is f'n incredible. I cleaned it and now I get green corners....which I never got out of the box.

Yet...I cant image that it's the cleaning of the lens. Maybe it is the pressure on the lens that is applied while cleaning it that made it function better???

STRANGE. But it works!
 
RazrVin said:
And all this time we thought it was a software issue... Now I'm actually getting amazing quality photos! Thank you so much! And to think that this "problem" went as far as to Verizon and Google planning to fix this non-existent auto-focus problem in December's OTA update :o
Click to expand...

Regardless of the green corners or not, I don't believe that the camera focuses correctly. It's still a software issue imo.
 
Well, I was very doubtful this would work for me at first, but it seems to have done the trick!

All I used was a "lens cloth", which was basically a moist towelette sort of thing. I imagine rubbing alcohol would work just as well.

So what did Moto do? Coat the lens with some oil :D

Anyways, I'll be sticking this in the tips and how-to's section. Great find!
 
cpetku said:
When I started playing with my new Droid (4409) I saw that it had the same auto-focus issues that everyone else complained about. Setting the unit to action made it focus at infinity, so somewhat better but I couldn't get shopsavy to recognize any barcodes. I cleaned the lens even though it didn't seem dirty and now Shopsavy locks onto bar codes and the unit seems to Auto-focus with just about 100% lock (green corners). Could some of the problems people are having just be be caused by lens placement and skin oils?
Click to expand...

You are a freaking genius. OMG.

I feel somewhat embarrassed now. Dude. :-D
 
cpetku said:
When I started playing with my new Droid (4409) I saw that it had the same auto-focus issues that everyone else complained about. Setting the unit to action made it focus at infinity, so somewhat better but I couldn't get shopsavy to recognize any barcodes. I cleaned the lens even though it didn't seem dirty and now Shopsavy locks onto bar codes and the unit seems to Auto-focus with just about 100% lock (green corners). Could some of the problems people are having just be be caused by lens placement and skin oils?
Click to expand...

This is something I always do before using the camera phone or my SLR. The camera will focus on the spot/smug and giving a hard time if you set your camera to auto.
 
sho95 said:
This is something I always do before using the camera phone or my SLR. The camera will focus on the spot/smug and giving a hard time if you set your camera to auto.
Click to expand...

I'm absolutely obsessive about keeping my SLR's lens clean, but it didn't even occur to me to clean the one on my phone. I guess I just read so much about everyone else's autofocus issues that I just took it for granted that that was a firmware problem. Heh. :)
 
Is it possible that an update, or temporary fix was pushed out to droids? My phone was cleaned thoroughly prior to putting Phantom Skinz on, and wiped down completely after. I tried cleaning the lens and was met with camera issues prior to today. I don't know how those updates work, but is it a possibility?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom