Question Some camera problems on the Motorola E13

[mrfdes]

Hi everyone,
My wife and I recently bought a Motorola E13 on Ebay, sold as "New" .
Thebuildnumber is TLA33-105-257.

The issue is: on my phone there is no problem taking photos, however, when my wife takes a photo, all that appears is a small black square, and when going to the gallery app, there is just a small black square labeled "Today" and when clicking on it the screen goes black. When you go back to the home screen and back into the Gallery app, the "Today" picture has disappeared.

Has anyone got any idea, going by the clues I am giving, what the problem could be?
I am, of course, willing to give more information, but this is all I could think about.

Thank you very much in advance to anyone who could contribute.

 

[SpookDroid]

Where are the pictures being saved to (if there's an SD card, chances are it's failing or corrupted)? Does she have issues saving any other type of data to the phone? What about using a 3rd party camera and/or trying with video?

 

[B. Diddy]

Welcome to Android Central! Can you clarify -- are you both using the same phone, or did you get two Moto E13's and this is only happening on her phone?

 

[mrfdes]

Hello, Snook droid and B. Diddy,
Thank you for replying.
We both have separate E13 phones and the problem only occurs on one of them.
There is an SD card installed and there are pictures on the phone, but new pictures just are not saved, the same for videos.
There are now thumbnails with an icon of a cloud with a stripe through it on newer pictures and clicking on them to try and open them gives a message "Unsupported media".
I hope my answers are sufficient as some of them are a biut tricky forme to answer.
Anyway, always willing to give more information (as far if I can).
Thank you for your input.

 

[B. Diddy]

Does the same thing happen if she sets the Camera app to save photos to Internal Storage by default? If so, then it's possible that your wife's phone has a faulty camera module. See if the problem persists in Safe Mode: https://en-gb.support.motorola.com/... the Power button,party apps will be disabled. If it does, that would suggest a problem with the camera hardware. I would contact the seller and ask for an exchange or refund in that case.

 

[mrfdes]

OK, B.Diddy,
after the tests you recommended, the possibility of faulty camera hardware does exist.
So I have taken the best way out possible: emailed the seller foe a replacement.
Thanks to everyone who helped out.
Much appreciated.

 

[smvim]

Hopefully her phone's camera module isn't the source of the problem. Hardware issues aren't likely but of course possible, and smartphone hardware repairs are more involved than software fixes. But at least this being a newer model you probably still have warranty coverage.

Anyway, is this a main, backside camera issue or do those black boxes show up with the selfie, front side camera?
If one or the other that might help narrow down the problem.
Does this black box problem also occur using a different app that also uses the camera module? (i.e. the Zoom app)
If yes that might indicate there is a hardware issue.
But this does sound more like a software-related problem so look into the Camera app itself. Try deleting the Camera app's Cache in her phone's Settings menu. You might also want to dig in to the Settings menu in the Camera app, reset it to its defaults, and then reset it up again accordingly.

If the default Camera app is still a problem, I'll suggest you try a different camera app. There are several really viable alternatives in the Play Store. I really like the Open Camera app:

Open Camera - Apps on Google Play

Open Source Camera app.

play.google.com

It's Open Source, free with no ads, and it has a more feature-rich, extensive number of options in the app's Settings menu. Motorola's default Camera app is a quite adequate as is (well, when it's working properly), but Open Camera is a very capable, third-party replacement.

 

[mrfdes]

Thank you, smvim.
The reset solved the problem.
It was a quick, short and simple solution, but if you don't know, you could be looking for it for a lifetime.

We are both ever so grateful.
And thanks again to everyone for their contributions.

 

[SpookDroid]

Glad you got it sorted out!

 

[mrfdes]

I did indeed.
Couldn't have done it without your help, and I then also installed Open Camera, which my wife prefers to the default app, and now, Bob's your uncle.

Thanks again.