Slashdot Mirror
New Digital Camera Lens Made of Liquid
Clarinase writes "101reviews is running an article about a new type of camera lens called Fluidlens. This patented lens made of liquid is no bigger than a contact lens, but can still achieve up to 10 times optical zoom by changing its shape similar to the human eye."
BTW, I checked, all the links in the original article still work.
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
I have yet to master the art of 10x zoom by changing the shape of my eye ..
Cool beans. That's pretty sweet. Wonder if they'll be able to build something like an eagle's eye that can see both macroscopic and microscopic extremes. That'd be sweet.
Since it seems the lens size is necessarily very small, will the maximum resolutions of the resulting picture be limited in any way? Or is lens size correlated with the maximum resolution of a camera?
-Rob
Biblical fiscal responsibility
So can you distract a party by yelling, "Nobody move! I've dropped my camera lens."
Glass is a liquid...
Being able to get good image quality in tiny cameras is becoming increasingly useful because of the adoption of cameras into phones and similarly small devices. The amount of times I've see something I want to take a picture of, but don't have my camera is pretty significant, and I've found that since getting a camera phone its filled this void nicely. Being able to get a high quality image from a phone would be a great step forward for those who are using phone cameras for this kind of role. (Especially as the amount of storage available increases)
Business Voyeur
I mean, a camera lens is a camera lens, right? http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/ 02/1940255&tid=100
If they could make it into a contact lens, allowing the wearer to view distances without the benefit of binoculars.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
I'm glad to see someone patenting an actual invention instead of just claim-jumping someone's idea for a website layout.
You are in error. No-one is screaming. Thank you for your cooperation.
Somewhat light on detail. So is the effective zoom limited only by the amount of liquid they can put between the squeezy-things?
Is the real innovation in the material of the lens or the method to make it deform to specification?
There are 11 types of people. Those who understand binary, those who don't and those who are sick of this lame joke.
is it waterproof?
To err is human, to really foul up requires a computer
Does this mean your camera will have a "squint" button instead of a focus?
Some people are like slinkys. They're useless, but it puts a smile on your face to push them down the stairs.
"OIL LENS: hufuf oil held in static tension by an enclosing force field within a viewing tube as part of a magnifying or other light-manipulation system. Because each lens element can be adjusted individually one micron at a time, the oil lens is considered the ultimate in accuracy for manipulating visual light." -- DUNE, "Terminology of the Imperium."
This is right up there with those relatively small, sealed nuclear reactors, IMHO. Neat.
I belive this is directly related to why squinting your eyes helps you see better
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/ 02/1940255&tid=100
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
The diagrams show how it can both zoom and focus by changing shape, while the human eye only focuses by changing shape (and loses flexibility with age, thus presbyopia, or loss of near vision in age, which few of you slashdot whippersnappers know about).
The diagram shows how it gets pushed or pulled in two sections, a top and a bottom, which mimics a 2-element 1-group lens. It may focus with the "front" half and change focal length with the back, or use a combination of both to get the right focal length and focal plane for a given situation.
The lens in a vertebrate eye (and many invertebrates too) is flexible and is focused at "infinity" when in the relaxed state. When pulled by little muscles that surround it, it flattens, and that changes the focal plane so that it focuses on near objects. The focal length is fixed, so there can be no change in angle of view (zooming).
Normal myopia (nearsightedness), hypermetropia (farsightedness) and astigmatism come from the whole eye being the wrong shape, usually a function of the eye being squished one way or the other during childhood growth, and the lens tries to focus where it can't.
I could not open the link, probably /.ted.There was a post on /. earlier about this type of lens made by Philips and independently by a french company Varioptic and there was a lawsuit for patents. http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=04/12/02/194025 5&
See there webpage here.
Wonderful! Another advance in increasing the number of crappy snapshots in the world!
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
Except that the previous article talked about an oil-and-water lens, and specifically mentioned using 40V to alter the shape.
THIS article says it has no moving parts, and does not use electricity to deform the lens - a valuable attribute in things like camera phones.
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
This is a duplicate story, and even worse, it's a story that ran on Slashdot in MARCH.
So thanks a lot for the 6 month old news.
Do I have to pee in it?
Blog,Twitter
Considering it isn't, you're an idiot.
If this lens is made of liquid, then why is this story under hardware?
Nice Marmot
Well, it does seem... curiously familiar.
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
Camera lens sat on a wall
Camera lens had a great fall
And all the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put all the splatters together again
Just the thing for potty-training your kids - sort of like those invisible fence things for dogs!
Glass is an amorphous solid.
...is that it actually took this long for such a thing to be invented: it's basically imitating nature, and a simple concept, at that.
Consider that geometrical optics is a very old science, and some sort of plastic/elastic material has probably existed for the better part of last century.
Sigged!
It doesn't say no moving parts though, at least as far as the drawings are concerned. Something has to be doing the pushing and pulling to change the shape of the lens.
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
In DUNE, Frank Herbert had his characters use binoculars with "oil lenses"...
Wow, this is an old story. It was on Engadget back in March and in the local paper in May. I wonder how many times the story was rejected before they finally posted this . . .
Next stop, bionic eyes!
Mmmmmm... Bold, yet refreshing!
Magnificent invention.
"God fights on the side with the best artillery." - Napoleon, Marshal of France - speaking truth to power
... is intelligent design!
it's a story that ran on Slashdot in MARCH.
:o)
So thanks a lot for the 6 month old news.
It's not a dupe, it's a tripe (at least - it was posted in December, too.)
And the pedant in me has to point out that the link you posted was from March 2004 - which makes it 18 months old, not 6
My digital didn't work well on the ski slopes anyway - I ran out of charge in double-quuick time. It seems that the batteries just don't like it cold.
My Karma: ran over your Dogma
StrawberryFrog
I read the article twice, trying to figure it out. There was a quote about 'a single drop of water and no moving parts', while it was pointed out later that there was no electricity involved, as was traditionally the case with water lenses.
/.'d.
Yes, _something_ has to be doing it -- which is why I started reading the comments here, in hopes of somebody in the know dishing out more details.
Instead, it seems that most people are assuming it's one of the many other liquid lens stories, likely as a result of it being
(I didn't realize their server was limited, or I wouldn't have closed that page, and could repost the article.)
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
A perfect (diffraction limited) lens gives more resolution, the bigger it is. However, a lens bigger than f/8 (6.25 mm, or 1/4 inch for a 50mm focal length) is not likely to be both perfect and affordable. Most film cannot take advantage of higher resolution than would be provided by an f/8 lens. These are rough approximations, of course.
Contribute to civilization: ari.aynrand.org/donate
Oh but it is. You're the idiot. Now back to your regularly-scheduled feverish masturbation session with pictures of Jessica Simpson.
The human eye can change shape... and zoom?
I've got to figure out how to do that... hell I could fix my nearsightedness!
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Use the adjustable lens as a means of approximating distance by noting when the object is in focus. This is extremely relevent to robotic/sensor-fusion/autonomous-vehicle stuff. It could replace or augment the stereoscopic 3D work.
I have the page as a PDF which is less than useful for most applications, but if you want it, drop me an email. The address cetan_post@yahoo.com is valid.
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
that would be great if they could invent a camera than ran on urine. it sure would save batteries when i'm filming girls on the can.
Or, I could just post the text of the article here :)
--**--
Named Fluidlens, this lens is made of liquid and is no bigger than a contact lens, but can achieve an optical zoom of up to 10 times, matching the zoom capabilities of lenses found on mid-range and high-end digital cameras and superior than most cellphone cameras which use digital zoom that relies on software rather than the lens to zoom in on an object.
This liquid lens system achieves optical zooming through altering its focal length by changing its shape which mimics the action of the human eye.
"Currently there is no practical alternative to compensate for the fixed focus lens system where a camera lens, for example, is moved along a linear axis until the image comes into focus. Our liquid lens, on the other hand, comprises only a droplet and no other cumbersome movable parts," explains Dr Saman Dharmatilleke, a research scientist working on the technology.
Fluidlens liquid lens system To date, research in other liquid lenses involves using an applied electrical voltage to alter the curvature of the lens so that it can focus and zoom in on an image. Patented Fluidlens does not need this, which means it saves on battery consumption, is cheaper to manufacture and occupies less space in the device.
Singapore-based A*STAR's Institute of Materials Research and Engineering (IMRE) who developed and patented this new liquid lens has licensed the technology to electronics manufacturer, PGS Precision, for an undisclosed sum. The manufacturer expects production cost of Fluidlens to be 20 per cent cheaper than conventional lenses.
PGS Precision will run field tests over the next 18 months and is currently in talks with cellphone makers. It expects to make 10 million lenses a year after tests are completed.
Fluidlens will enable digital camera and camera cellphone makers to create slimmer, better-featured devices with longer battery-life.
In Soviet Russia...michael would be rotting in Siberia!
Can't find any link to it but I remember watching a tv proggy how you could make glasses by creating liquid filled lenses. All the glasses were identically built but were adjustable - it was being touted as a cheap way to bring glasses in Africa.
At the risk of pandering to your astonishing stoopidity, the gpp was pointing out that glass is not, in fact, a liquid. Not the fact that the site had been slashdotted. Dufus.
There was show on the NGC about killer whales and while different pods use different hunting techniques, one group of whales that prey on sea lions that rest on the shallow shores, make use of the water to help them hunt. They first spy their target and then swim quickly into shore (surfing the waves for additional speed) to the target. The bow wave made by their head acts as a magnify/zoom lens for the whale helping them spot their target....or at least that is what the show claimed.
"Look Lois, the two symbols of the Republican Party: an elephant, and a fat white guy who is threatened by change."
The first autor talking about Liquid Lens are JJ Benitez in theri Caballo de Troya on 1984
glass
When all is said and done, nothing changes...
If you read the entire article, you'll see that "liquid" is by far the least supported classification. Lots of people think glass flows like a liquid over hundreds of years, but it does not. It dosn't flow, or form to its container at all. So it's not a liquid, although it does have some other properties that are liquid-like. Its more a question of "what do mean when we say 'liquid'" then how glass actualy acts.
Most people would not call glass a liquid if they knew how it worked.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
Thanks. And on re-reading, I spotted the catch. The quote to which I referred actually reads "no cumbersome moving parts" (emphasis mine).
;)
So it's presumably a mechanical devices -- which is supported by the link another person posted, regarding the effort to provide eyewear to 3rd-world countries, where the glasses (which use this lens, apparently) are 'dialed in' for each user, and then locked at that setting. Because there is no need for an optician to grind the lenses, it's an ideal solution for some parts of the world.
Thanks for the PDF offer, btw. I do want to go back and look at the diagrams (and I'm surprised no one has posted a patent link), but I can wait for the server to stop smoking first.
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
Styrofoam and cotton candy are liquids? I don't think so. Glass is a solid because it dosn't move at all, slowly or quickly.
autopr0n is like, down and stuff.
>up to 10 times optical zoom by changing its shape similar to the human eye
I had a zoom lens built into my eye socket and I learn about it now?
Man, I gotta thank you...
FOR DASHING MY HOPES AND DREAMS.
I'm gonna go sulk now.
Sorry, teleporters just kill you and then make a copy. A perfect, soul-less copy.
The original article and its links may be visible, but my browser can't quite focus on the current one due to the /. effect.
Hindsight is 20/20. *rimshot*
I'll be your candy shop of infinite deliciousity if you'll be my discotheque of endless rump-shaking.
Nice way to build in obsolescence, those pesky glass lenses last generations, we cant have that now can we? Need that perpetual revenue stream.
This is also REALLY old tech.. but nice to see a new spin on something, yet again..
Has everying new been invented or what? We are doomed to rehash everything for the rest of eternity? ( or until we self destruct )
---- Booth was a patriot ----
This is correct - squinting = reducing apeture, this is why most people see better in bright light (outdoors) than in doors.
I've heqard that in russia you have to be very careful to keep your vodka warm in the Siberian winter; it's actualy possible to take a swigg of vodka that has chilled to -50F with fatal results.
Apocalypse Cancelled, Sorry, No Ticket Refunds
Straight Dope
I have discovered a truly remarkable proof which this margin is too small to contain.
To use the human eye "zoom" feature, simply move your head closer or further from the object. No other fancy features, just the "zoom"
Man, you really need that seminar!
When you are in bright sunlight, the iris hole becomes very small and a floater may block a significant part of the light coming through. Using sunglasses or going to a place that is dimly lighted causes the iris ot open larger and the majority of the light path is not blocked by the floater. Hope that makes sense.
Shouldn't this be under the Software category?
"Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door." - Emily Dickinson
but better link straight to the argument:
The case against glass being liquid at room temperature.
This one's updated! See, the previous article was a Piquepaille article @primidi.com, but this one is direct to the point.
True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.
I was looking to patent an idea like this. I created a liquid lense with oil and Iron-Oxide -- nothing really exotic, Ferro-fluids have been used for quite a while. In my design I used a combination of ionization and magnetism to shape the lense. It was only part of a more complicated idea--I didn't think the lense was worth a patent by itself--kind of obvious. The only reason this is useful now is that we have new technologies in video that can actually use such a tiny lense.
I was actually using this to move a laser to boost radio signals. I kind of gave up on the whole thing because I didn't have a job and didn't have any idea how to get the ball rolling. I'm an idea synthesizer-- not a lawyer. Anyway, I could have had about five patents out of this.
So, in short, this lense may possibly be as simple as mineral oil and rust surrounded by water between two pieces of glass (I haven't been able to read the article due to the "slashdot effect"). Inside the small area of water, surface tension works to hold the shape and relax the effects of gravity--It's best to have an oil of the same specific gravity as water (most are lighter) so that motion will not pull one liquid more than another. Still, unless you used a strong magnetic field on the ferro-fluid, motion would change its shape-- so no long exposures. The difference in light distortion between the water and the oil will allow for your lense to focus. My idea was to use two lasers--one as a reference beam to calculate unwanted distortions. I'm guessing there is going to have to be some feedback mechanism to determine what the spherical abberation of the resulting liquid lense would be. I wouldn't want to say anymore because it would then be easy to guess the tricks I figured out. Since I have nothing but a love of science and no degrees in the material sciences, the actual fabrication of this device would not be my forte.
On an aside, I still think it would be a nice idea to spin water in space to create a large lense for telescopic or sunlight collection purposes. About 30 years ago, when fiber optics first came out, I played with a lot of ideas for uses-- things like piping sunlight into the house, using it to peer inside the body and lase out blockages (I used a parasol design to stop blood flow and expand arteries--rather than a more obvious and more elegant balloon). It amazes me that things as obvious as a liquid lense can still find patentable uses.
I actually submitted this as an idea to a company that says it helps people with Inventions. When I got a follow call asking for $1200 more than the original $500 I realized it was a scam (sigh). If these scumbags realize they have prior art--I'm guessing they won't, since they are about scamming more than actually understanding any technology that people submit. Well, lessons learned. Nobody is going to "discover" your brilliance in life--everyone has to do their own leg work.
One of these days, I'd love to get back to inventing.
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
Since we get temps of minus 40 degrees Celsius in the winter.....gotta wonder how the lens will hold up. Interesting. Maybe the company could send me a lens to do some cold weather "product testing"??
glass is a liquid, so what's new?..
There is prior art... Newton's microscope used a drop of water as the first effective lens.
Well it is always nice to see science catch up with Science Fiction. I remember Frank Herbert writing about binoculars with oil lenses in Dune. Nice to see our favorite authors weren't crazy, just ahead of their time.
this was also in Wired Magazine months ago...
"I'm glad to see someone patenting an actual invention instead of just claim-jumping someone's idea for a website layout."
Note the implication that for an invention to be real. You have to be able to hold it in your hands.
Just one small problem with that. The world changes, and technology changes. We're in the digital information "economy of the mind" society that Alan Toffler spoke about in the Third Wave. Unfortunately Slashdot is still living in the Industrial "I have to be able to touch it, or it doesn't exist" Age.
So I hereby declare that Slashdot Geeks are the Buggy Whips around here and need to change or be left behind.
Isn't there a large wealth of data about this at http://www.research.philips.com? It dates back at least one year.
An "iris hole"? Are you sure that you don't mean "pupil"?
Ted: Oh my god! There's a hole in my iris! Aiieeeee!!
Ed: Uhh.. dude, that's just your pupil.
Ted: A pupil? Like that kind that goes to school and makes out with the teacher?
Ned: Uh, no dude. Now give me the bong, I think you've had enough dope for now..
Ah, you found me!
Yes, I can think of two creatures with multiple fixed focal length optics (no zoom lenses to my knowledge).
The first is the dragonfly. The configuration of this insect's compound lens is such that the upward facing facets operate like a telephoto lens and the bulk of the rest of the eye is wide-angle. This gives the dragonfly near 360 vision but with a high resolution zoom on the airspace above to enable seeing (and catching) small flying insects.
The second are spiders which have 4 pairs of eyes of differing sizes. These eyes, especially in ambush hunters such as a jumping spider, have different effective focal lengths to provide wide angle vision for an overview and narrow field vision for catching stuff.
Two wrongs don't make a right, but three lefts do.
Yes, this is a dupe of a dupe, although the means by which the lens is focused (mechanical motion vs. electrowetting) is different.
Interestingly, this allows us to complain more efficiently, as we can merely cite our original complaints, instead of having to type them in again.
Another technical advance brought to you by your friendly Slashdot editors!
Glass lenses are ground to specific shapes. When this is done wrong (e.g. Hubble) you get a bad lens.
The fluid lens only seems to have one axis of control: you can make it more convex or more concave, but that's all you can do. It doesn't seem like there's enough control to let you shape the lens so there aren't Hubble-like problems.
Does this mean it will have low image quality? Is that why they are only looking at mobile phone cameras, and not the higher end?
tx for all your comments. just wanna highlight from the article that this lens is new (press release by IMRE is dated 16aug05), and is different from other liquid lenses (previously reported at various places) in that it does not require electric charge to change its shape.
I'd like this in my camera, but I'd REALLY love to have adjustable eyes again. At about age 50, the eye's lens gets too stiff to see both distant and closeup objects - a real pain. If these new lenses can be made large enough for eye glasses, or uses as a lens implant, they could auto adjust to the range one is looking at using an ultrasonic ranging sensor. Many people over 50 would buy it if the price was at all reasonable. It's an idea with trillion dollar potential. I've heard that it will soon be possible to replace the overly stiff gell inside the eye's lens so that it will work like a young eye, which would be even better than an electronic eye. Optometrists beware - your unadjustable overpriced product may soon be obsolete!
The reason you get sharper images with a tinier aperture, is because the amount scattered, i.e. unfocused rays, are being reduced.
When the aperture's wide open, it's receiving light for many points of view. With a narrow aperture, its receiving light for a much smaller set of points of view.
Perhaps first of this type. But I know someone who has a few patents on a liquid in plastic membrane lens which he developed after Nikon said it couldn't be done.. for cheap eyeglasses for the third world. A syringe for each lens is dialed to inject clear fluid into a round plastic pocket which bulges, changing focus. You dial until things look clear, once for each eye. Then a crimp is put in the tubes and you snip off the syringes. It is difficult to make non-circular lenses so same is probably true for this one as well.
If it's anything like all the auto compasses I've owned, it'll dry up in a month, or when the warranty runs out. I wonder if there's a Visine for that.
They say the first thing to go is your penis. Well, it's either that or your brain. I forget which...
are really more the domain of artists, historically speaking. Sure, hobbiests have played with them, too, but artists innovated that one, and continue to this day to make serious use of the pinhole camera.
i do alot of photography in tempretures as low as minus 20C, i'm sure it wouldn't work at the time, but if it DID get frozen, would this destroy the camera or would the lens melt and work again?
we all know what happens when you put a bottle of glass beer in the freezer.. it expands and smashes!
You must be a Leica owner, right?
...can still achieve up to 10 times optical zoom by changing its shape similar to the human eye.
If somebody can please tell me how to take advantage of this 10x optical zoom in my human eye, that'd be super.