Google Pixel 2/2 XL camera allegedly crashing after December update

Google forayed into smartphones in full swing with Pixel devices in October 2016. Though they’ve had a history with Nexus, the phones under that series carry the label of other manufacturers (Nexus 6P by Huawei, for example).

Right from the first generation, Google Pixel earned a feat of touting the best-in-class camera. However, Android 10 turned out to create numerous bugs on the gadget that even loyal fans started looking for alternatives.

To recall, we already reported Google Pixel 4 camera’s clicking sound on third-party applications. Today our radar caught concerns from various Pixel 2/2 XL users who just can’t use their cameras due to constant crashes.

Pixel 2 Camera not working after December update
I have a Pixel 2. On Friday, I updated to the December security update (build QQ1A.191205.008) . Following the update, my rear camera has stopped working. Opening the camera app results in the camera app crashing. Opening the app shortcut for a selfie still works. It appears to only affect the rear camera. The problem isn’t specific to the Google camera app. Any app that tries to use the rear camera fails.
I tried a few other steps:
I tried rebooting into safe mode. The camera still fails.
I tried a factory reset. The camera still fails.
I downloaded the android platform-tools and enabled USB debugging. While in safe mode I ran “adb logcat” to capture the logs while I attempted to use the camera. It looks like there is an AF sensor error that corresponds to the camera crashing.
Is this caused by a firmware problem related to the December update? Or have I had some purely coincidental hardware failure immediately after the update? How do I fix this?
(Source)

If it evokes your interest, you can have a look at the log given below, which the user is talking about on Google support forum. In case of having the same issue, you can follow the same USB debugging procedure to compare your log with his.

So for many, the issue started surfacing after the latest December OTA update. And, it does make us believe something has gone wrong with the new build. Most of the affected users (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) couldn’t capture images even using third-party camera apps .

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