Mishaal Rahman / Android Authority
TL;DR
- Android 16 is implementing assist for true HDR screenshots, enabling you to take screenshots of HDR content material.
- This functionality is reside in Android 16 Beta 2 and builds upon the earlier work that Google did to assist HDR in Android screenshots.
- Nevertheless, HDR screenshots captured by Android aren’t simple to view on different units.
The explanation most individuals take a screenshot on Android is to share what they see with different individuals, and Android can deal with that kind of factor fairly simply. Till not too long ago, Android hasn’t wanted to assist taking HDR screenshots as a result of the overwhelming majority of content material we entry has been in SDR. With HDR content material turning into increasingly more standard, although, individuals are inevitably going to take screenshots that embrace HDR parts. Fortunately, Google is lastly including HDR screenshot assist on this yr’s Android 16 launch.
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What’s HDR?
HDR, or excessive dynamic vary, refers to photographs or movies with a wider vary of brightness and colours than customary dynamic vary (SDR) content material. The result’s extra life like visuals with brighter highlights, deeper shadows, and higher element, making photographs seem extra lifelike. Principally, HDR goals to seize and show a higher vary of sunshine and darkish tones, nearer to what our eyes would understand in the true world.
To show HDR content material, units want HDR shows that assist a wider coloration gamut than the comparatively restricted sRGB customary. Whereas some trendy Android telephones and tablets characteristic HDR shows, nearly all of content material continues to be in SDR.
Critically, even screenshots taken of HDR content material on these units are at present saved in SDR. It is because Android hasn’t been preserving the extra coloration data when encoding screenshot photographs; with the encoding course of for the SDR screenshot format, extra coloration data from the HDR content material is misplaced.
With the introduction of end-to-end assist for HDR video in Android 13, Google needed to replace Android’s screenshotting algorithm so screenshots would nearly match what’s on display. Nevertheless, since screenshots remained in SDR format, HDR areas inside screenshots would seem dimmer whereas SDR content material would seem as vivid as HDR content material.
Android 14 additional sophisticated issues by introducing assist for HDR photographs, i.e. Extremely HDR. As a result of HDR photographs are sometimes displayed inside SDR app UIs, Google needed to devise a solution to encode each the SDR UI and the HDR picture in a single SDR screenshot. As a result of screenshots remained in SDR, Google’s answer was to brighten the app’s UI and clip HDR highlights. The tip result’s that screenshots don’t really seize what you’re really seeing.
Left: A screenshot of an HDR video overlaid on high of a Chrome web page containing Extremely HDR. Proper: A screenshot of an HDR video overlaid on high of the Settings app with subsequent screenshots. Each screenshots have been taken on Android 14. Supply: Google.
HDR in Android screenshots
In Android 15 QPR1, the working system launched a neighborhood tone-mapping algorithm for HDR screenshots. This algorithm each preserves UI colours and prevents clipping HDR highlights, leading to a major enchancment to taking screenshots of HDR content material. Even with the development, screenshots are nonetheless SDR and received’t have the total influence on HDR shows.
Left: A screenshot of an HDR video overlaid on high of a Chrome web page containing Extremely HDR. Proper: A screenshot of an HDR video overlaid on high of the Settings app with subsequent screenshots. Each screenshots have been taken on Android 15 QPR1, which makes use of a tonemapper to protect UI colours and HDR highlights. Supply: Google.
Lastly, Google is implementing assist for true HDR screenshots in Android 16. In Android 16 Beta 2, I discovered that screenshots of HDR content material have been saved in HDR format. After I considered these screenshots within the Photographs app on my Pixel cellphone, I instantly noticed my display brighten as HDR highlights began to pop. I confirmed this by evaluating screenshots of the identical HDR picture taken earlier than and after updating my Pixel 7 Professional to Android 16 Beta 2. The pre-update screenshot was in SDR, whereas the post-update screenshot was in HDR.
Digging by Android’s supply code, I noticed a number of references to a “true HDR screenshots” characteristic in SurfaceFlinger, a system service that performs a important position in display rendering on Android. When the “true HDR screenshots” characteristic is enabled, HDR content material might be screenshotted with out tone mapping.
Show analyst Dylan Raga and GitHub person ledoge inspected the HDR screenshots that Android 16 produces and confirmed that they’re PNG recordsdata with HDR gainmaps embedded in them. Most standard instruments are unable to detect these gainmaps, however a specialised PNG inspector was capable of detect them. These gainmaps are what permit the screenshots to look as HDR when considered on Android 16 units however as SDR on different units.
It’s unclear why Google caught with PNG for HDR screenshots as an alternative of a format supported by Extremely HDR resembling JPEG. Maybe they wished to keep away from potential JPEG compression artifacts, particularly when cropping. Hopefully Google formally shares extra particulars on how HDR screenshots in Android 16 work so we will get a greater concept of share them between units.
