My “kinda new to me” Pixel 4a (I know its EOL and not new) is the fastest phone I currently have.
I run GrapheneOS on it, based on Android 13 with latest updates.
But also it has a hardened Kernel and Malloc, which may be the problem here.
In comparison: A Nokia 7+ with unofficial LineageOS based off Android 13. And a Google Nexus 5 or so, with some very old Android 8 or so.
OpenCamera works perfectly well on both the non GrapheneOS phones? But on my pixel, it loads extremely slowly, like 10s at least. Its pretty unusable.
OpenCamera is a weird project, I can imagine this is a memory overflow or something, so the hardened Malloc is the problem.
OpenCamera only has a SourceForge repo which is very weird. Do you use it and have an idea why this is happening?
As a workaround: I think GrapheneOS let’s you sandbox apps, including Google apps. You might install the standard Pixel camera in a sandbox and see how it performs.
Risk in this setup should be minimal due to the limited access the app would have.
He could also disable internet access to the Google camera and use it on his main profile
I have the GCam installed, but it sucks for many things. Its the opposite of OpenCamera.
/DCIM/Cameralocation, annoying for SyncthingWith GCam service provider (GSF) and GCam photo preview it works, but you cant use GrapheneOS sandboxed play services.