Camera (Offline)

Pikcn Technologies

About this app

Camera is a photography and video application. It does not declare the Internet permission, so it cannot itself reach a network, and it works without an account, advertising or analytics. A capture leaves the application only through an action the user starts, such as sharing it, opening it in an editor, or answering another application's request for a picture.

Capture
• Photographs and video on both the front and rear cameras
• Flash control, an HDR scene mode where the hardware provides one, a self-timer and composition grid lines
• Tap to focus, pinch to zoom and exposure compensation
• A review strip showing the latest capture, with share, edit and delete

Choice of save location
Photographs are written to the standard camera folder by default and recordings to the standard video folder. A different destination for both can be chosen through the system folder picker, and the application then keeps access to that folder alone; no broad storage permission is requested or held at any point. Captures written to a chosen folder are not listed in the review strip.

Metadata removal, enabled by default
A photograph normally carries an embedded record of the device make and model, the software that produced it, the time of capture and a small preview copy of the image. This application removes those fields before the file is written. Orientation and image size are kept, so photographs still display correctly. The setting can be turned off where that information is wanted for editing or cataloging.

Photographic controls
• Photo quality, in three levels, applied both to the internal encoder and to the capture request
• Capture mode, in three levels, trading shutter delay against per-shot processing
• Mirrored selfies, deciding whether a front-camera photograph is saved as the viewfinder showed it or as others see the subject
• Maximum screen brightness, which raises the display only while the viewfinder is open and leaves the system brightness setting untouched

Interface and languages
The interface uses the current design language and extends to the full display, and the layout adapts to tablets in both orientations. The application is supplied in 82 languages and regional variants, and on Android 13 and later its language can be set separately from the system language.

Documents carried inside the application
The privacy policy and the complete license text for every component included in the build are packaged within the application and open from its settings screen. Neither needs a connection to read. The policy is also published at the Camera privacy policy.

Permissions and their purpose
• Camera: required to show a viewfinder and to capture photographs and video
• Microphone: requested only when a video recording is started, for that recording's audio, and photography is unaffected if it is refused
• Wake lock, and a short foreground service: allow a capture that is still being written to finish if the application is left before it completes

This application does not request location, storage, contacts, telephone, account or advertising-identifier access, and requests no network access of any kind. Because no location permission is requested, no location tag can be written into a photograph in any setting.

Open source
Camera is released under the Apache License, Version 2.0. Source code on GitLab

What’s new

First release.

• Photographs and video on both cameras, with flash, HDR, a self-timer and grid lines
• A choice of save location, selected through the system folder picker
• Metadata removal enabled by default, and no location tag in any capture
• Three photo quality levels, and three capture modes trading shutter delay against quality
• Mirrored selfies, and a maximum-brightness viewfinder for sunlight
• 82 languages and regional variants, selectable per app on Android 13 and later