Ultrapixel camera is an advanced imaging technology that offers a great leap in the quality of point-and-shoot photos and video

Faisal Siddiqui

For an industry that is built on science, the technology world certainly has its own share of myths. Thousands of people believe that forwarding a certain e-mail message to 50 friends will bring great riches, expensive cables are better and in addition to this is ?the more megapixel count a camera has, the better are the pictures? clicked. All have long been used to trick millions of people on frittering away money every year. The fact that there are plethora of seemingly ?good? camera options, adds to the dilemma of arriving at the right choice too.

We all live in a world, where we believe in ?this as well as that? but what happens to us when we are breathing an extraordinary experience and desire to capture it for eternity. Do we fancy to carry our DSLRs, digital gadgets to capture the moments and laptops to share along with us every time or do we wish to have just one solution that is portable yet compatible to replace all other high-end gadgets in our day to day lives?

It is almost axiomatic now to say that smartphones have

become the digital equivalent of a credit card. And like that venerable plastic money, a smartphone fits in your pocket and goes with you anywhere. Smartphones have become the primary camera for many. The new trend has flooded the market with smartphones adorning gigantic number of megapixels such as 41 MP and 13 MP cameras. Throwing more megapixels at the digital imaging problem is akin to bumping up the processor speed on a motherboard with a slow bus and small amounts of RAM. But the reality remains unarticulated, size matters and not the increasing megapixel counts. That is why now the end consumers have ultrapixel cameras to explore the new horizon of imaging world. Apparently, too ?technical? to comprehend, but actually it is not!

Ultrapixel camera is an advanced imaging technology that offers a great leap in the quality of point-and-shoot photos and video. The breakthrough ultrapixel camera redefines how people capture, relive and share their most precious moments. The ultrapixel camera adds many other features and effect, which one can now experience in the new HTC One. With this new camera, one will be able to quickly shoot vivid, true-to-life images with a wide range of colours, even in low light conditions. This has been accomplished by not increasing the number of megapixels in the camera, but engineering a more advanced CMOS Sensor, ISP, and optical lens system that captures more light than most 8 or 13 megapixel cameras.

The concept of the ultrapixel is that by introducing more light

into a single pixel, cameras are able to pick up more detail, better colour, and produce a higher-quality photograph. Theoretically, having a 2.0 micrometer ultrapixel absorbs more light than the 1.4 micrometer pixel in most smartphones, which delivers better image quality. The old approach of stacking as many megapixels as possible fragments the image sensor and allows each pixel to capture less light, which leads to distortion. This camera experience, with ultrapixels allows 300% more light than traditional smartphone camera sensors.

For years, a misconception among most consumers is that the higher the megapixel count, the better the quality of images. Actually, the number of megapixels is only one of a myriad of factors that determine picture quality, with sensors and image processors each playing a critical role. However, year after year manufacturers try to outdo each other with higher megapixels. How? By reducing the size of the pixels to cram more in, which in some cases can be detrimental to image quality. That?s because the smaller the pixel, the less light each one collects. This results in more visible noise and other defects in both still images and video.

Besides the size of the pixel, one of biggest concern about smartphone cameras had been blurry photos. There are two main reasons for this; length of time required capturing an image, resulting in misaligned light streams coming into the sensor and the physical shaking of the hand while holding the camera. Addressing the first issue, ultrapixel camera is now capable of capturing full size photos in up to 1/48 of a second and physical optical image stabiliser detects the motion of the camera, and the lens will physically move in the opposite direction of the motion to counter the shake induced on a phone. Its more like cars have shifted from power to safety and efficiency, and computers have shifted from giga-hertz to multiple cores, and cameras have shifted toward aspects that reflect the ?bigger & better? picture.

Invariably, the first question one asks about a camera? ?How many megapixels?, now will be dismissed as ultrapixel is now available in the market. Try fitting people weighing 1,000 pounds in a lift meant for 100 pounds. They may all fit, but will the lift be able to execute, won?t it? Similarly, when too many pixels get packed into a sensor the size of a fingernail, the pixels aren?t able to capture light optimally. Though focusing solely on the number of megapixels made marketing and buying phones easier, we are at a major turning point in the direction of further developments in camera technology.

The writer is country head, HTC India