Develop Reference

How to Block Camera switching in android?

I want to use font camera by default and want to disable the switch option to the back camera.
How can i do it???
var i = Intent(MediaStore.ACTION_IMAGE_CAPTURE)
i.putExtra("android.intent.extras.LENS_FACING_FRONT", 1);
i.putExtra("android.intent.extra.USE_FRONT_CAMERA", true);
startActivityForResult(i,101)
}```

You would need to use the camera APIs directly or using a library (CameraX, Fotoapparat, CameraKit/Android, etc.).
Your current code is launching the user's choice of camera app, and you have no means of forcing that camera app to disable certain cameras.
Also, please note that not every Android device has a front-facing camera. If that is a requirement of your app, put the appropriate <uses-feature> element in your manifest.

How can Android service take photos

Can I take a picture from an IntentService in Android without displaying a preview surface to the user?
I have tried:
SurfaceView view = new SurfaceView(this);
c.setPreviewDisplay(view.getHolder());
c.startPreview();
c.takePicture(shutterCallback, rawPictureCallback, jpegPictureCallback);
But it doesn't work on my phone, Galaxy S2X

You can record video without live preview, see e.g. https://stackoverflow.com/a/14997460/192373. You can force this recording to contain one frame if you wish. You can not capture a still photo without a View. Note that on some devices this restriction is not enforced, and in any case there are write a few known workarounds that make the live preview invisible to the end-user. Here you can find an answer how you can create a view from a background service.

Android cwac-camera to take multiple photos?

The title may be unclear, but I'm using this awesome library by CommonsWare(nice meeting you at DroidCon btw) to deal with the notorious issues with Android's fragmented camera api.
I want to take 5 photos, or frames..but not simultaneously. Each frame should capture another shot a few milliseconds apart, or presumably after the previous photo has been successfully captured. Can this be done?
I'm following the standalone implementation in the demos, and simply taking a photo using
mCapture.setOnClickListener(new View.OnClickListener() {
#Override
public void onClick(View view) {
try {
takePicture(true, false);
}catch(Exception e){
e.printStackTrace();
}
}
});
Passing in true to takePicture() because I will need the resulting Bitmap. I also disabled single shot mode since I will want to take another photo right after the previous has be snapped, and the preview is resumed
By default, the result of taking a picture is to return the
CameraFragment to preview mode, ready to take the next picture.
If, instead, you only need the one picture, or you want to send the
user to some other bit of UI first and do not want preview to start up
again right away, override useSingleShotMode() in your CameraHost to
return true. Or, call useSingleShotMode() on your
SimpleCameraHost.Builder, passing in a boolean to use by default. Or,
call useSingleShotMode() on your PictureTransaction, to control this
for an individual picture.
I was looking for a callback like onPictureTaken() or something similar inside CameraHost, that would allow me to go ahead and snap another photo right away before releasing the camera, but I don't see anything like this. Anyone ever done something like this using this library? Can the illustious CommonsWare please shed some light on this as well(if you see this?)
Thank you!

Read past the quoted paragraph to the next one, which begins with:
You will then probably want to use your own saveImage() implementation in your CameraHost to do whatever you want instead of restarting the preview. For example, you could start another activity to do something with the image.
If what you want is possible, you would call takePicture() again in saveImage() of your CameraHost, in addition to doing something with the image you received.
However:
Even with large heap enabled, you may not have enough heap space for what you are trying to do. You may need to explicitly choose a lower resolution image for the pictures.
This isn't exactly within the scope of the library. It may work, and I don't have a problem with it working, but being able to take N pictures in M seconds isn't part of the library's itch that I am (very very slowly) scratching. In particular, I don't think I have tested taking a picture with the preview already off, and there may be some issues in my code in that area.
Long-term, you may be better served with preview frame processing, rather than actually taking pictures.

OpenTok Android SDK 2.0, setPublishVideo(false) does not free the Camera. Any workarounds known?

I'm trying to take a picture while there's an ongoing OpenTok video conference in an Android application. I use OpenTok SDK 2.0 for Android.
I tried to use publisher.setPublishVideo(false) to temporarily free the Camera so that the default Camera Activity can be used to take a picture. But looks like OpenTok does not free the Camera hardware.
As a workaround I tried using session.unpublish(publisher), which frees the Camera (and it also cuts the audio stream which is not desirable for me) but once I'm done with taking a picture, this time the a/v is not restored with session.publish(publisher).
Any help on this?

Late response, but figured this may help for anyone who comes across the same issue.
My solution was to destroy capturer prior to starting intent to take picture
mPublisher.setPublishVideo(false);
BaseVideoCapturer bvc = mPublisher.getCapturer();
if(bvc != null){
bvc.destroy();
}
//intent to start picture capture (Ex. ACTION_IMAGE_CAPTURE)
When you resume after taking the picture, you will need to initialize again
BaseVideoCapturer bvc = mPublisher.getCapturer();
if(bvc != null){
if(bvc.isCaptureStarted() == false){
bvc.init();
bvc.startCapture();
mPublisher.setPublishVideo(true);
}
}

Have you ever tried publisher.onPause() and publisher.onResume(), this work for me.
Regards.

I personally have never tried it, but using Android 2.0 beta 2, you might be able to use PublisherKit to accomplish something like that. There are methods like setRenderer(BaseVideoRenderer renderer) and setCapturer(BaseVideoCapturer capturer) that might allow you to programmatically free the camera on setPublishVideo( false )
Good luck!

Android Camera.takePicture - Possible to disable shutter sound and preview surface?

I am working on an app that will allow a user to take quick click and forget snapshots. Most of the app is done except for the camera working that way I would like. Right now I have the camera working but I can't seem to find a way to disable the shutter sound and I cant find a way to disable displaying the preview. I was able to cover the preview up with a control but I would rather just not have it displayed if possible.
To sum things up, these are the items that I would like to disable while utilizing the built in Camera controls.
Shutter sound
Camera screen display
Image preview onPictureTaken
Does anyone know of a resource that could point me in the right direction, I would greatly appreciate it. I have been following CommonsWare's example from this sample fairly closely.
Thank you.

This is actually a property in the build.prop of a phone. I'm unsure if its possible to change this. Unless you completely override it and use your own camera code. Using what you can that is available in the SDK.
Take a look at this:
CameraService.cpp
. . .
CameraService::Client::Client(const sp<CameraService>& cameraService,
const sp<ICameraClient>& cameraClient,
const sp<CameraHardwareInterface>& hardware,
int cameraId, int cameraFacing, int clientPid) {
mPreviewCallbackFlag = FRAME_CALLBACK_FLAG_NOOP;
mOrientation = getOrientation(0, mCameraFacing == CAMERA_FACING_FRONT);
mOrientationChanged = false;
cameraService->setCameraBusy(cameraId);
cameraService->loadSound();
LOG1("Client::Client X (pid %d)", callingPid)
}
void CameraService::loadSound() {
Mutex::Autolock lock(mSoundLock);
LOG1("CameraService::loadSound ref=%d", mSoundRef);
if (mSoundRef++) return;
mSoundPlayer[SOUND_SHUTTER] = newMediaPlayer("/system/media/audio/ui/camera_click.ogg");
mSoundPlayer[SOUND_RECORDING] = newMediaPlayer("/system/media/audio/ui/VideoRecord.ogg");
}
As can be noted, the click sound is started without your interaction.
This is the service used in the Gingerbread Source code.
The reason they DON'T allow this is because it is illegal is some countries. Only way to achieve what you want is to have a custom ROM.
Update
If what being said here: http://androidforums.com/t-mobile-g1/6371-camera-shutter-sound-effect-off.html
still applies, then you could write a timer that turns off the sound (Silent Mode) for a couple of seconds and then turn it back on each time you take a picture.

You may use the data from the preview callback using a function to save it at a picture on some type of trigger such as a button, using onclick listener. you could compress the image to jpeg or png. In this way, there no shutterCallback to be implemented. and therefore you can play any sound you want or none when taking a picture.

You can effectively hide the preview surface by giving it dimensions of 1p in the xml file (I found an example the said 0p but for some reason that was giving me errors).
It may be illegal to have a silent shutter in some places, but it doesn't appear that the US is such a place, as my HTC One gives me an option to silence it, and in fact, since Android 4.2 you can do this:
Camera.CameraInfo info=new Camera.CameraInfo();
if (info.canDisableShutterSound) {
camera.enableShutterSound(false);
}