After updating the Google Camera app in my Android Lollipop phone, when I tried to change the app settings, it threw up an error “Unfortunately, Camera has stopped” and closed down. My photography career ended before it could start. I tried all sorts of “tricks” to get rid of the error so I could open the Google Camera app settings and increase the exposure level. Finally, I figured out how to resolve the problem on my phone. So here is a series of steps that you can take if you are also facing a similar problem:
1. Clear Google Camera App Data
When an app is updated, it might not work properly because of the settings and other data saved by an older, incompatible version of the same app. So one way to fix these errors is to clear the app data. In this case, you have open the Android Settings, select the Apps section followed by the Google Camera app. Then tap on the Clear Data button to clear all the app data.
2. Turn off Developer Options
For some mysterious reason, developer options might interfere with the way some apps behave. If you have enabled developer options in your Android phone, then you have to turn them off, restart the phone and see if the problem in the Google Camera is gone. In order to turn off the developer options, you have to open Android settings, select Developer options from the very bottom of the list and then toggle them off using the flip switch.
3. Update Google Play store
Updating the Google Play store could fix some issues specially when a newer version of the Play store has been released recently. In this case, you can wait 2-3 days for the Play store to get updated automatically or you can use a trick of checking the Play store version to make Play store update faster. After the Play store has been updated, you can try to reinstall Google Camera app.
4. Check with the Apps Package Source
Some people use custom firmware like Cyanogen and they have to use some Google apps packages offered by third parties. Such packages are not officially supported by Google and could have problems of their own. You can try to update the package from the same source or switch to packages offered by some other source.
I hope you would be able to launch Google Camera without any problems after following these steps. Even after this, if Google Camera is throwing up errors and closing down, then you may have to reset Android or flash the original firmware once again.