Too much aliasing on Galaxy S23

giovannymf

I'm experiencing a lot of aliasing in my timelapses in 1080p. I tried to record in 4k and then export to 1080p and the aliasing got a little better, but lost too much detail. The aliasing persists no matter the quality i export the video. See frame exported below.

frame

Noah

Hello @giovannymf and welcome to the forum.

I don't have an S series Samsung device, so I'm not sure if this is the case here and I'm unable to test myself, but from what I hear over-sharpening like this is a pretty common complaint for S22, S23 users in auto mode with scenes that have a lot of depth. This over-sharpening is due to Samsung's auto-mode adjustments.

Is this with Timelapse mode or Photolapse mode?

Would you be able to try a few things to help determine what this issue could be?:

1) How does a photo from the native camera app with the same resolution look?
2) Maybe try setting the manual camera settings (tap the camera icon and set the ISO and shutter speed to proper exposure for the scene) and compare the resulting photo?

Thank you.

giovannymf

The photo i attached was taken in timelapse mode, but the same happens in photolapse.
I tried using max resolution setting and it fix the problem with the oversharpening, that clearly shows that the problem is caused by the downsampling to FHD. I don't know if the downsampling is provided by the camera api tought.
Also, the native app don't have the option to save in FHD, only 12mp and 50mp.
I tried to make the timelapse in manual mode but I find out that the live preview of the app is not reflecting the changes made in the shutter speed, so it's kinda hard to get the exposure right. See the screen record attached.

Screen record

Noah

giovannymf Okay, thank you.

You are right about the shutter speed not affecting the preview the way it should. That is a regression in that version. In the next update this issue is fixed (hoping to get it out within the next few days). Thank you for bringing it to my attention.

For the down-sampling, that is quite interesting. On my end, there is no difference in the way that I handle the max resolution images vs. the other resolutions. The API provides the sizes and thus also any necessary down-sampling. Not sure what is going on. The s23 native camera app normally captures good photos I assume?

Noah

giovannymf the update is now available on Google Play.

giovannymf

Noah Saw the update today, the shutter speed preview is indeed fixed!
As you suggested I tried shooting a timelapse in manual mode (iso 50, SS 1/30), but the aliasing persists.
Since the native camera app don't let me choose a FHD (2mp) resolution I tried other camera apps and saw the same problem with the aliasing. It is as you stated, a problem with oversharpening provided by the downsampling of the camera API.
For now the only way to get timelapses without the oversharpening is to take it with max resolution and then export to FHD. It's not a good workflow though, space and time wise.
One curious thing is that the native camera app can make timelapses in FHD without the oversharpening.

Noah

giovannymf Okay, thank you for confirming that it happens with other apps too so it is the camera api.

One curious thing is that the native camera app can make timelapses in FHD without the oversharpening.

My guess would be that they use video for timelapse mode, and aliasing is handled differently for video.

If you haven't already, I'd definitely set the Default Capture Resolution setting (https://guide.velocitylapse.com/settings.html#default-capture-resolution) to Max available, since you know that is what works. It will save a bit of time changing it each project.

I'm not really sure what else to suggest. 🙂

giovannymf

Noah I already set the default capture resolution to max, but that gives me another problem: lack of disk space. At max resolution each frame is 6-7mb, so a 1min, 30fps timelapse subtracts 10.54GB of storage. Currently I have 64gb free (on my 256gb S23), so that's not scalating very well. I basically have to choose between the aliasing or being able to make <5min videos (or less, as free space shrinks).
There's any plan to allow to use the video for timelapse too?
And do you know if is this a Galaxy only problem or affects other manufacturers?

Noah

giovannymf sorry for the delay.

Yeah, that certainly is a problem. Does your phone have an SD card slot for external storage?

I do not have any plans to add video-based time-lapse functionality to Velocity Lapse in the near future at this time.

As far as I am aware, this over-sharpening problem is an issue with the Samsung Galaxy S series (this is largely based on what I have seen online since I haven't had an S series device myself). My A series Samsung device does not have this issue, and neither does my Pixel 6 or ZTE. Yours would be the first report of this issue in relation to Velocity Lapse.

I will mention that sometimes different sub-models of the same model can behave differently (for some reason I don't have a clue about). For example, a number of months ago someone reported an issue with white-balance, but it only affected South-American devices. When I tested it on Russian and European devices (through an cloud device farm) it was fine, but the Brazilian sub-model had issues. Thankfully I was able to fix the issue. That was an A series Samsung device.

However, I don't think that is the case here since many people online I see complain about the S series oversharpening.