The camera is also surprisingly software dependent. Using the pixel camera vs using default configuration with an app called open camera, the difference is so clear. The camera is basically all software — the images are pure trash before processing.
>Using the pixel camera vs using default configuration with an app called open camera, the difference is so clear.
Is this hardware dependent though?
I ask because I’ve seen custom android mods that port the pixel camera, presumably if that works for other devices it’s a good sign that postprocessing can be decoupled from specific hardware.
It's been many years since I did android rom stuff but how it was back then was that yes you can access the camera, but you lose the proprietary image processing pipeline which exists just as software. So your photos come out looking much worse since phone cameras rely heavily on software to look good.
On the other hand, you can take DNG RAW images and do the software processing later, except exactly the way you want. I rather like that flexibility, myself.
