Direct Camera Capture

[mitpjones]

Enhancement

I have added in-app camera capture functionality, allowing users to take photos directly within Lychee without needing to switch to a separate camera app. Please see screen shots at bottom of page.

Would the Lychee team be interested in adopting this new functionality. I can send a test URL to a private email if you need.

Enhancement: Take Photo directly from within Lychee

Currently, to add a photo taken on a mobile device you need to use the device's camera app, save the photo to the gallery, and then upload it manually through Lychee. This adds unnecessary steps when you want to quickly capture and add a photo to your collection.

Proposed enhancement:

Add a "Take Photo" option to the "+" add menu in both the album view and the root albums view. Tapping it opens a camera capture dialog that:

• Streams the device camera (rear-facing by default)
• Shows a live preview with a Capture button
• On capture, freezes the frame and shows a still preview with Retake and Upload options
• On upload, feeds the JPEG directly into the existing upload pipeline — photos taken inside an album upload to that album, photos taken at the root view upload to Unsorted
• Shows a clear error message if camera access is unavailable (e.g. non-secure context) rather than throwing a JavaScript exception

No backend changes are required — the captured image is passed directly into the existing upload queue.

This is particularly useful on mobile devices where Lychee is accessed via a browser, removing the need to context-switch between apps just to add a freshly taken photo.

1. Menu with 'Take Photo'

2. Photo capture dialog

[ildyria]

A PR would be greatly appreciated :)