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New Sensor Has Real Per-Pixel RGB Sensitivity
jonr writes: "Well, the holy grail of digital photography is finally found. A company named Foveon have developed a sensor that captures RGB colours on each pixel. So what you say? Well, for the past 30 years (or since the CCD was invented) we have been using CCD with with red, green & blue sensors (or cyan/magneta/yellow) and then used software to figure out the real colour. But Foveon is the first company to deliver RGB-in-each-pixel sensor.
For those of you who are not into digital imaging, this makes a lot of difference, it's would be just as revelutionary if somebody would make a flatscreen with a real colour pixels, instead of the RGB dots. dpreview.com has the scoop.
(No, it won't mean the death of film, but I suspect we'll see dramatic improvement in quality)."
You spend $3,000 on that Sony MiniDV camera with 3CCDs and it's quickly outdated.
No matter how many time I tell myself I'm over the fact that this will alway happen (stuff being outdated right after you buy it), the first thing that pops into my mind is "damn, if only I could have waited a little longer..."
Actually, this is very cool. Combine it with the depth capturing story we heard about earlier and hopefully dept projection and the future looks really really awesome!
More resolution, while nice, is not what digital photography primarily lacks. Light and shadow sensitivity is what really sucks with digital cameras. Film has a logarithmic sensitivity to light, while a digital sensor has a linear sensitivity.
Just out of curiosity, does anyone know of any technologies in development to give better light/shadow sensitivity.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Personally, this is major droll material for me. I hope this technology comes to the consumer level by the time i'm ready to dish out money for another digital...
According to this article it says the first camera with this new sensor will be Sigma's SD9 SLR digital camera. No details on when, how much, what features. Anyone have more info on when this will be available? domo
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If anyone is interested how photography resolution compares to digital, I found a great link once about this: http://www.users.qwest.net/~rnclark/scandetail.htm
It's pretty eye-opening if you think digital photography is getting close to film.
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
There's also a decent article on business2.com
http://www.business2.com/articles/web/print/0,165
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Please check out superconducting tunnel junction technology, which is the basis for detectors that can measure the frequency of impinging photons. No need for separate RGB pixels - stacked or not - because each pixel can determine the exact frequency or wavelength of each photon it detects. You can take a spectrum and create an image in one exposure with one detector, without using any diffraction gratings or RGB filters.
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There are already some (very high-end) digital cameras using CMOS technology, and judging on the sample images I've seen, they are awesome. Take a look at the review of Canon's EOS-D30, for example.
__
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Due to the sensor thickness, is depth of field going to be restricted to smaller stops in order to have the entire thickness of the sensor in focus?
*whup* "Get along, little electrons. Heeyah!"
Question though: Why does someone (Nikon) not produce a truly modular upgradable digital SLR camera?
The D1 is a step in the right direction, but it's too big and way too expensive.
CCD's should be replacable like film backs on film cameras, so that you don't have to throw the whole camera away, just replace your 3Mp back with an 8, then a 12 etc.
And interchangable lenses, preferably standard F mount, for Christ's sakes people. You can't do serious photography with crappy builtin zooms.
My dream camera would be an updated Nikon F3, but with upgradable digital backs, and an option for an LCD screen, but not built in.
WOW. I worked on a project trying to do some pretty accurate work with digital cameras, and I can tell you this... Until you spend around $20,000US, you will not even get close to your original. Heres an example.
The subject is a GretagMacbeth color checker (a bunch of square swatches of color with a black boarder)
With a pro-sumer camera, say around 3k, the image overall looks OK, but zoom in to any "grayscale" swatch, and you'll see that the image is still very much little RGB dots blurred together, and your grey never has all the same RGB vales as a true grey should.
As you go up to the 20k price range, a variety of tech is used to get more accurate color. The best I have seen was a back for a large format camera (can't remember the name for the life of me) that, when used in a studio setting only, could capture exact grey values for each pixel. What this means, is that if you took the captured image in to Photoshop, with no image correction, and you used the eyedropper over a grey swatch, your RGB values would read (x , x , x) over the whole swatch without a hiccup (1 pixel sample).
The camera achieved this by physically moving the CCD array so that it took something like 3 or 4 shots of the image (hence needing to be in a studio set up).
Now, a single CCD camera setup that can be used in the field, probably generating the same results as above, is going to be HUGE.
I don't know the target price range to start, but cameras using this tech, if it lives up to its promises will be HUGE in the pro photo field. Capturing a more true color vs. totally interpolated has enormous impact on color correction and manipulation images. In my experience, images for lower end cameras don't always manipulate in ways you expect because of the interpolated nature.
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...and I think the death of film may really just be around the corner.
Not so fast, though...IIRC, the upper limit right now is something like 6 megapixels, for a ludicrously expensive unit. 6 megapixels scales to roughly the granularity of 200 ASA film - fine for everyday photography, not so fine when you want to blow up images to ludicrous sizes. People who like to make poster-size prints will continue using ASA 40 and 50 film with cameras that cost a fraction of what one of these digital-wonders cost, with film that gives them not only better resolution, but superior color balance as well.
Seems like every time there's an advance in digital imaging, somebody has to whang the "death of film" gong - the fact of the matter is, even _after_ digital cameras have surpassed analog ones, there will be people who will _still_ prefer film, if for no other reason than they like the images better. You can't measure artistic value with "real color, nn megapixel" stats - and as such, film will really never die.
But what does my opinion matter, I just vote here. It's not like I have any money or anything.
If I'm right in my assumption, it should be possible to build an arbitrary stack of layers (with reduced efficiency) for any color ranges you care to deal with. It might be possible to make a camera that has a special layer to pick up the 700nm wavelength that chlorophyll absorbs line to determine plant health for use in agriculture.
I suppose it could be stacked the other way, but that would probably be a much larger engineering challenge.
--Mike--
The reality will be, assuming the price on these sensors is competitive, that manufacturers will run the same crummy resolution, because Joe Consumer is amazingly happy already with 35mm ASA 400 and 800 quality prints, which look terrible after a lifetime of ASA 25 & 64 film use, not to mention medium format, which is the only plausible choice for quality poster size prints.
It's a neat technology, but I'm underwhelmed until it translates into a high enough resolution sensor in a body I can use my existing glass on for a price comparable to buying a 35mm body. Granted, you get the luxury of instant feedback on your photo (though there are drawbacks, i.e. on how fast these hi-res images process in the camera see my webpage for SF Grand Prix pictures for further explanation and examples), film is still fast and affordable. All I really need is a better way to transfer negatives or slides to my PC. I have an HP photo/slide/negative scanner, but it's unimpressive.
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It's not just the resolution - it'll do away with the awful artifacts that are present on even the best of today's digital cameras.
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Actually there is a company producing a flat screen with lets call them nearly real color pixels. Rather than using filters in the panel they use extremely bright Red, Blue, and Green color LED's in the backlight. The image is then represented in a field seqntial fashion. The beauty is that each individual pixel is representing the full color, so you dont need silly and stupid gimmicks like cleartype.
Here's the link if anyone is interested:
LumiLeds
Carver Mead (the driving force behind foveon) is one of the few true modern visionaries out there. He was not only the pioneer of AVLSI, and therefore responsible for the microchip boom in the 1970's, but also one of the first people to start seriously looking at making electronics more like biology.
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2. See hypocrite.
how's that then?
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I don't know what exactly they've patented regarding "Variable Pixel Scale" technology, but it sounds like "binning" to me. We've been doing that in astronomy with CCDs for years. I can envision it now, a cease-and-desist next time I'm on Mauna Kea.