The Essential PH-1 is getting an over-the-air update right now, it’s a fairly small one, coming in at around 72MB and it appears to mostly be targeted at the camera. Which is a good thing, seeing as the majority of the reviews on the Essential PH-1 already out there have shown that the camera just isn’t that good. There are quite a few improvements here for the camera, and of course the usual bug fixes and performance improvements are in this update as well.
For the camera, Essential states that the capture time is going to experience a speed boost of around 40%. This means that the shutter should be faster, making it easier to take better pictures that aren’t blurry. Additionally, low-light pictures should come out a bit better. The rest of the fixes actually apply to the 360-degree camera that Essential has been selling. This includes Spatial sound for shooting in 360, which is being supported on the Essential PH-1 as well as on Facebook and YouTube. There is also a countdown timer available for the 360-degree camera, and finally users can use the volume buttons as shutter buttons while using the 360-degree camera. So quite a few fixes for the camera, and there are still more on the way.
In its blog post, Essential did also note that it has a good number of other fixes on the way for the Essential PH-1 in future updates. Including one to address HDR, which has been pretty subpar so far. Other upcoming changes also include the ability to stream in 360-degrees on platforms like Facebook and Periscope, as well as providing animated 360-degree stills and filters. Essential is also looking at bringing in Portrait and Pro modes to the camera in the future. The company says that these updates will continue to roll out through the Google Play Store, as the camera app is available there, allowing Essential to push out updates a bit faster than having to push out a full system update each time. Those that do have the Essential PH-1 should be seeing this update rolling out to their device today.