As excitement builds for Google’s soon-to-be-released Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro, yet more information has leaked regarding their planned camera upgrades—and this time, the information has leaked directly from Google.
In an official survey recently sent out to Pixel Superfans, the company sought opinions on the “Future of Pixel Sports,” asking its most loyal customer base to select from a number of spots-based photography scenarios, saying which would be most likely to influence their decision when buying a new smartphone.
Interestingly, the list of scenarios includes a selection of unreleased camera-based features not currently available in any Pixel product. I’ve listed them below:
- A new Audio Magic Eraser function, already detailed in a previous leak, which uses AI to remove unwanted background sounds from your video recordings.
- AI Photo merging, which can “create the perfect team picture by merging everyone’s best shot with your phone’s AI technology, so everyone looks great.”
- New “Gphotos” editing features—referring to new AI-based features in Google Photos that let you “instantly change the photo background, peoples’ clothes, or anything else in the photo.” This presumably refers to the Magic Editor function announced earlier this year.
- Faster camera opening—The Pixel 7 Pro camera is already very quick to launch, so it will be interesting to see what the Pixel 8 is able to pull off here and whether it will make a noticeable difference.
The full list of scenarios has since been posted on X (neé Twitter) by seasoned tipster Kamila Wojciechowska.
Group photos are notoriously difficult to get right, especially with larger numbers of people (someone always has their eyes closed!), so any AI-powered assistance would be more than welcome here. It’s not uncommon for professional photographers to take several versions of a group shot before painstakingly cutting and pasting the best elements from each one into a new “perfect” result. Casual users are unlikely to go to this trouble, so having the smartphone do it for you would be an impressive addition to the camera.
In addition to these software tricks, the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro cameras are expected to feature an updated camera app and some significantly upgraded camera hardware. It looks like we’re in for an impressive show when the Pixel 8 range finally launches later this year.
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