Gadgetory

what's happened brian Tong here in welcome to google issues for all the google that we can pack inside of a show each week let's get to the show and Google i/o is just a couple months away and one of the big focuses this year will be about design now Google has added more sessions on Android user experience wearable app design speech interfaces and more and it's clear that the googs really wants to make a push around design now they've even released three videos showing the design process of making things simpler for glass maps and even search and it's moved to voice this is the way in which people are talking to Google you're doing to this tiny little box I said well why don't we make that bigger it was very simple design change and auto completions gets larger and people started noticing anymore I'm noticing the more if they actually started using it more see bigger is better for a search bars all right Google i/o is also a chance for the big G to reveal new hardware and we've seen plenty of Nexus products from them in the past it's been a long-standing rumor but according to digit times google reportedly plans to release an 8-inch HTC made tablet the Nexus 7 tablet has been produced by asus and their Nexus 10 has been manufactured by Samsung ACC and Google have work together in the past so we'd expect to see some sort of announcement at i/o if this nexus 8 is coming this year and ACC is known also for its elegant hardware and you can look no further than the HTC One but their camera image quality has been a point of criticism because of its four megapixel ultra pixel resolution now in an interview with Vodafone ACC's camera expert Simon Whitehorn spoke about 4k video and DSLR image quality but he also dropped a tidbit saying that optical zooming on a smartphone is not far off at all for HTC now they could be one of the first to get a true optical lens in a smartphone but they're also the first to say this acc wants to own the selfie market yes and white horn added you'll see a lot more investment in that area in some markets ninety percent of pictures taken are selfies plus he says selfies are a very different imaging environment so guys to some things all up the self-obsessed market is the next battlefield for smartphones all right let's take a breather and check out a how-to with Lynn law to get the most out of your gs5 camera first be sure to check that your default settings are tailored to your exact preferences to adjust them tap the little gear icon in the corner and scroll through each of these items personally I always turn my compositional gridlines on to help me frame and straighten out my pictures for frequently change settings you can have three shortcuts directly accessible on the viewfinders dash just long tap any of these settings and drag them over now there's one particular setting here that brings me to my second tip you've probably seen HDR or high dynamic range imaging before but the gs5 now has the option to toggle real-time feedback of what your HDR image would look like before you take a picture make this toggle your friend HDR combines several shots taking at varying levels of exposure and composites it into one image this can result in really striking almost surreal photos that have great contrast sometimes though it can also create unnatural images that you might not like so be sure to check by tapping on and off the HDR icon which is represented by this little Venn diagram looking icon here third familiarize yourself with photo effects you can access some of them directly on the camera through the settings menu here it's indicated by the magic wand icon and displays the filters in real time other effects can be applied after you take the picture these are accessible through the photo manager just go to your gallery tap on this Polaroid with a pencil icon and several options will appear fourth get to know selective focus this is a new gs5 feature that lets you change the focal point of your picture by manipulating the depth of field pictures can look more professional and even dramatic you have to turn this option on before taking a photo so it's good to have an idea about it while you're shooting to turn it on tap the icon with the two human heads in the camera dash the device will tell you that for best results stand at most a foot and a half away from the closest object the object itself should also be at least four and a half feet away from the background tap on the object you want in your foreground and click the shudder to initiate selective focus click on the icon here with the two little heads three options will emerge near far and Pam focus near will bring your closest object into focus and blur out everything behind it far sharpens only the background and pan gets everything in focus when you're finished tap done to save your changes thanks Lynn but I was actually hoping there would be tips for taking selfies all right now sticking with phones we're still hoping and expecting to see a new Nexus phone at Google i/o it's almost a no-brainer we'll see one but according to Chinese rumor sites google might be working with chip maker media tech to take on a budget Nexus device that could be priced as low as 100 dollars in hopes to broaden its global market share and it would be a direct competitor to X google company motorola that has had a real success with the moto g's 4.5 inch screen quad-core processor and all-day battery at a ninety nine dollar price point with contract and guys in some fun stuff the googs is still pushing smartphone innovation with project tango we've shown off tango in past shows and its ability to track the full 3d motion of its smartphone while creating a 3d map of the environment and space around it now they recently took their motion mapping phone and paired it with spear robots in a zero gravity environment to see how it would react and the data it would capture in a near real-life space scenario now they never reveal the results but it's another really cool way that Google could be able to even create 3d maps of space or build new applications with project tango or it was just an excuse to do flying monkey tricks in zero gravity alright guys that's going to do it for this week's show email us at google issues at cnet com or tweet me up brian Tong thanks so much for watching and we'll see you guys next week for some more of that ghoulish Google ish asst