Luminous Landscape Forum
Equipment & Techniques => Medium Format / Film / Digital Backs – and Large Sensor Photography => Topic started by: Anders_HK on February 27, 2012, 10:59:10 pm
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Yes!!! Time to forget medium format, why use it?? Dang, a camera phone with 41MP that should be good in studio for high end fashion shots! It is all about the number of pixels!!! Never mind DSLR, waist of time. My new plan is to buy three Nokia 808 and mount them parallel, thus bringing me near 120MP (less overlap). This is great! Will put money in bank and less weight to carry. For shots that require less than 100MP I can simply demount one of them, point and shoot. ::)
For sure, in comparison the Nikon D800 E stands out as the joke, does it not??? ;).
Anyone else who will follow??? Please line up! ;D
Best regards,
Anders
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Hi,
I'm not familiar with the details, but it may actually work. The clue is really that the lens must be optimized for the sensor, if the sensor is a small the lens needs to be optimized for large apertures. Michael demonstrated a couple years ago that small sensor cameras can match MF on medium size prints under benevolent conditions: http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/kidding.shtml
Reducing pixel size below 2 microns may make little sense, as I think that's about how long light will diffuse in silicon.
Nokia has a white paper on the phone camera here: http://europe.nokia.com/PRODUCT_METADATA_0/Products/Phones/8000-series/808/Nokia808PureView_Whitepaper.pdf
I just have skimmed trough it, but it seems that they are heavily into binning and it will also be used for digital zoom for filming.
Obviously a small sensor like this will collect fewer photons, so it will not be able to reach very good DR and the image will be noisy. Little doubt that there will some noise reduction going on.
Ultimately, noise is dependent mostly on sensor surface size (really the sum of full well capacity over the sensor area), so a small sensor will always have a disadvantage over larger sensors.
Best regards
Erik
Yes!!! Time to forget medium format, why use it?? Dang, a camera phone with 41MP that should be good in studio for high end fashion shots! It is all about the number of pixels!!! Never mind DSLR, waist of time. My new plan is to buy three Nokia 808 and mount them parallel, thus bringing me near 120MP (less overlap). This is great! Will put money in bank and less weight to carry. For shots that require less than 100MP I can simply demount one of them, point and shoot. ::)
For sure, in comparison the Nikon D800 E stands out as the joke, does it not??? ;).
Anyone else who will follow??? Please line up! ;D
Best regards,
Anders
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Yes!!! Time to forget medium format, why use it??
Anyone else who will follow??? Please line up! ;D
I am in!
I have almost finished the design of a special bracket that holds 9 Nokia 808 in perfect nodal point position so as to generate a 120 mp image with 30% overlap between frames.
They will all be triggered simultaneously which will eliminate any issues.
A small robotic arm will extract the memory cards according to a pre-defined sequence and introduce them in memory card readers automatically as well as press the return key on the Mac to launch the stitching process.
Cheers,
Bernard
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@ Bernard,
I am just off the phone with Nokia and Photmatrix, since the Nokia will have 3G there is not need for memory cards. They say they are optimizing stitching for a maximum of 18 x Nokia 808. Sorry have not had time to figure out the number of pixels that would make, I guess depends on the overlap... but HUGE. Since you seem up on contacts with robotics in Japan, any chance they can make a robotic accessory that automatically go out and take professional quality pictures??? That way there will never again be a need to anymore go out and take photos by ourself... just let the stitching device go out and capture!!! Freedom at last!!!! ;D
I knew it!!! That the Nikon of 36MP would be superseded quick... never expected my 80MP Leaf to be beat by an assembly of camera phones, though... dang. :o
Choices, choices ;)
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I am in!
I have almost finished the design of a special bracket that holds 9 Nokia 808 in perfect nodal point position so as to generate a 120 mp image with 30% overlap between frames.
They will all be triggered simultaneously which will eliminate any issues.
A small robotic arm will extract the memory cards according to a pre-defined sequence and introduce them in memory card readers automatically as well as press the return key on the Mac to launch the stitching process.
Cheers,
Bernard
Sorry! The quality will not be acceptable, Bernard. The 808 has no RAW mode ;D .
By the way, it's not clear in the White Paper if one can actually download the full 41mp image. Is this not basically an 8mp camera with automatic binning?
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ROFL!
Alan
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Sorry! The quality will not be acceptable
Nonsense!!! When 36MP dslr has same image quality as a medium format back, of course the image quality from the Nokia will be no less stellar.
Are you gents with DSLRs planning on upgrading to the Nokia too??? ::)
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Actually the sensor, while small by MF standards, is huge for a phone camera -- 10.8mm x 7.5mm. As for the use of 40MP in such a small sensor, it makes as much or more sense to oversample spatially as it does to oversample by using 16 bits when the DR is less than 12 stops.
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DR should not be an issue since you can stack them, each one is good for 6 stops so 3 deep should do it
Marc
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Coming from film, I finally believe these stitching solutions are the way to go after I've been sceptical for many years.
8x10 film is history, Nokia 808 swarm shooting is the future.
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Wearing a belt made out of the phones should provide excellent panoramas as long as you keep your arms in the air whilst taking the photograph.
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Samples here: http://cdn.conversations.nokia.com.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Archive2.zip
I actually find them surprisingly good! Very impressive for a phone
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I have almost finished the design of a special bracket that holds 9 Nokia 808 in perfect nodal point position so as to generate a 120 mp image with 30% overlap between frames.
They will all be triggered simultaneously which will eliminate any issues.
A small robotic arm will extract the memory cards according to a pre-defined sequence and introduce them in memory card readers automatically as well as press the return key on the Mac to launch the stitching process.
While you are at it, how about adding an adapter for Canon 800mm lens? I presume the camera has a tripod screw mount.
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If they'd scale this to full format and make an M-mount camera under the Zeiss Ikon brand for it ...
With RAW output ...
Just imagine ...
Does anyone remember this awesome Terapixel invisible camera hoax some time ago?
Maybe what appears as Science Fiction today in photography is not as far as we imagine ...
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This is just ridiculous. Surely the best solution is for the phone manufacturers to weld a screw onto the phone so I can bolt it to the baseplate of my Hasselblad, I then have a MF phone in one reasonably neat package.
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Wearing a belt made out of the phones should provide excellent panoramas as long as you keep your arms in the air whilst taking the photograph.
With the built in accelerometers that phones have these days, we can fire them off with a simple pelvic thrust! (imagine everyone walking around looking like Duff-man from the simpsons)
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Funny post!!!
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Here's a well written photographer's perspective on the new Nokia.
http://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2012/02/41-megapixel-phone-camera
Pretty amazing findings, the lens appears to be pretty special too.
You guys over the pond may not know of this website; it's run by a group of highly respected UK landscape photographers.
For example, have a look at their recent Digital Back v Large Format Film analysis (http://www.onlandscape.co.uk/2011/12/big-camera-comparison/) which they conducted using their own kit in response to an article here on LL.
If Nokia would separate the camera from the phone it would make a heck of pocket camera.
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So long Lamborghini, the new Kia is in town....
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Most men, most photographers have this fervent unwavering mindset about sports teams, religion, politics, and cameras all for little longterm benefit.
This is an interesting statement. If you'd clarify, then I'd be able to formulate my own opinion on just where I stand in relation to the above grouping.
By the way, I do qualify because I have a smartphone with camera built-in!
Rob C
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Not sure at all a scaled up sensor (say full frame) with standard optics would benefit from that level of sensel downsizing. It's also a matter of matching sensel scale to physical focal length. I you have no choice, as in a phone, making very small pixels and compensating for the issues that arise is definitely worth the trouble. If you have enough sensor real estate and no hard constraints in terms of lenses, the exercise is a bit pointless and focusing on reducing read noise and improving photon capture using better micro-lenses yield greater rewards.
But In the area of point and shoot and smaller cameras, where size matters, yes, the evolution is a additional significant threat to that market which is already under intense phone pressure.
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I like the pelvic thrust firing mechanism. Imagine what that will do for street photography!
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What?!? Not available in the US? I was so there already! ;)
Rats! I'll have to stick with my Rollei.
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Actually we're mocking something which is really cool apart from that flagrant 41 MP claim.
These guys have really thought seriously about some basic things others were not able to invent before.
The principle of supersampling is not new - so where have you been Canon, Nikon, Sony and all the others?
What I do not get at all why they are shooting themselves in the foot with the OS which will be a showstopper for many.
Do they really believe they can rescue their OS with a cool camera?
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Actually we're mocking something which is really cool apart from that flagrant 41 MP claim.
What's flagrant about it? Oversampling is an uncontroversially good thing in every other area of signal digitization. Nokia has made it very clear that the 42MP are about oversampling, not feeding the appetites of 100% on-screen pixel peepers, and that the main goals are the options of either cropping/digital zooming when you cannot fill the whole frame with the desired image, or downsizing to fewer, better pixels when you can fill the frame. These, and the reduction or elimination of aliasing effects without need for an OLPF are all good options, possible only with an "over-abundance" of photosites.
I ask again: does anyone take oversampled audio at 96KHz or 192KHz, slow it down in playback so that the highest frequencies are audible, and then complain about the poor "per sample" quality? That's what 100% viewing and per pixel dynamic range measurements are!
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Using 41 MP in marketing speech is flagrant.
Most people will not understand what the concept behind the camera is and I assume a comparison between large prints from a D300 and an 808 will show the difference clearly.
I also didn't say the concept is bad - right the opposite.
No need to go wild.
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Well, saying "we use 41 millions smaller pixels instead of 10 millions larger pixels" has at least the merit of being accurate. Certainly not worse than the claim of "16 bits of dynamic range" because bits don't come in different sizes ;D. I expect most people to understand the difference between "x small pixels" and "x large pixels". OTOH, very bright people have been confused by those damned shannonian creatures....
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Using 41 MP in marketing speech is flagrant.
How is an undeniably accurate, relevant, and useful fact like the total pixel count "marketing speech"?
See what Nokia actually says quite prominently in PR like this
http://europe.nokia.com/find-products/devices/nokia-808-pureview
not just in the white paper. Nokia puts clear emphasis on the ideas of (a) 7->1 downsampling to 5MP and (b) achieving "zoom" by cropping while using a small, bright, sharp prime lens. Nor do I see the slightest hint from Nokia of a claim that IQ will be comparable to that from a DSLR, so I do not see the relevance of your "comparison between large prints from a D300 and an 808"; that seems to be a straw man criticism.
More to the point, the latter feature absolutely needs a high total pixel count: a 5MP or 8MP or even 16MP 1/1.2" sensor would lose significant flexibly in a mobile phone where using a prime lens is a great advantage over a zoom lens. Crop-to-zoom is an essential part of camera-phone usage, making high total pixel count more relevant here than in compact cameras. In contrast, 18 million 1.2 micron pixels on a 1/2.3" sensor with a slow f/3.3-5.9 and f/3.2-5.8 zooms in some new Sony models is far more in the realm of marketing hype, because diffraction will almost always reduce resolution below what that 18MP promises.
What would you have Nokia do: not mention the fact of the pixel count at all, even though it is a key ingredient in the camera's zoom performance, and then try to explain the ability to maintain true 5MP resolution over a wide zoom range in contrast to competing camera-phones which "zoom" by cropping to under 1MP and then interpolating up, wasting space in a pretense of higher resolution?
This seems like the "anti-megapixel myth" at work, to coin a phrase.
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+1
Not sure how 41MP is just marketing speech. For daylight shots, the sensor delivers 41MP files which are comparable in quality at 100% to most point and shoots. So what's the issue? Download the jpegs that are everywhere now. The one with the two rock climbers is quite nice of an image considering the source. I think people get there panties in a bunch because spending $20K on 40MP hurts when a camera phone has 41MP for a few hundred bucks. Sure the quality is different but for their respective uses, the sensors still have the same number of pixels.
The one fact for most shooters to get real about is the lack of innovation in the medium format market. Glacially slow progress, low volume, high cost. Anything that puts fire under their butts is needed.
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Download the jpegs that are everywhere now. The one with the two rock climbers is quite nice of an image considering the source.
Yes, some of the samples indicate that, within the multiple restrictions of good lighting, no desire to compress contrast by bringing up deep shadows to be artificially closer to highlights, little enough subject movement to allow use of low ISO speed, and a desire for sharpness but not for unnaturally blurred backgrounds (unnatural, in that things never look that way when we actually view a scene), then a camera like this can actually outperform many larger and more expensive cameras with up to about 12MP or even 16MP, through the greater sharpness and detail. The fun of zooming and panning around an image on-screen is, by the way, one counter-argument to being too dogmatic about "12MP is enough" or "standard viewing distance is the measure for resolution needs". (Quick quiz: what is the name of the rock-climber hanging by one hand? It is to be found in the photo.)
However, this should not cause any rational user of a larger, more expensive photographic kit to go on the defensive --- clearly there are many, many other "use cases" to consider!
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The samples are quite impressive. These small devices are becoming more crazy every month.
I'm glad I still have my terribly heavy and slow 600MP 8x10 camera.
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I think this "phone" is a truely remarkable milestone for camera technology. Why ?
This is the first real digital camera that takes into acount the specialties of electronic imaging and a combination of optimized optics, chip, onthe fly processor and software for getting new never seen before features. A lossless Zoom without moving parts using a fixed prime lens with high open aperture, a variable filesize and image aspect for various purposes , total lack of Moiree and color noise even with these tiny pixels. Liveview with zoom up to 12x again without a zoom lens.
It is the first camera that I know of which could not do the same thing with a piece of film instead of a chip- think about it ! This is new !
This all in a package with GPS, WLAN, WIFI,Phone,Radio games the usual smartphone stuff and memory cards up to 64 Gigs
for a price of 450 €.
I´d call this a word to be heard.........
Regards
Stefan
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PetaPixel has some unedited raw files from the camera which you can download. I believe they are only taken at 38mp but I believe they are indicative of the quality of the sensor.
http://www.petapixel.com/2012/02/27/untouched-sample-shots-captured-with-nokias-new-41mp-camera-phone/
Direct Link to download: http://cdn.conversations.nokia.com.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/02/Archive2.zip
I downloaded the files and played with them. The first things that hit me was that they all seemed to be slightly out of focus. Then I realized that they were truly untouched, and absolutely no sharpening at been done. After using my normal sharpening settings in Photoshop's unsharp mask, I still wanted a little but more and bumped it up a bit. I found that they were pleasant enough images after this. Of course they are no where near the quality of any real camera, but they certainly aren't to shabby for a camera phone with a tiny sensor.
Of course there is a significant amount of noise in the channels, if you look at them, especially the red channel, as is to be expected. And of course they only show samples from bright daylight. Which of course means the low light performance is absolutely terrible, like any other camera phone. And again, of course it will flop, because it is Nokia, but they certainly have generated some talk about their phone by adding such a high MP count sensor.
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Most people will not understand what the concept behind the camera is and I assume a comparison between large prints from a D300 and an 808 will show the difference clearly.
Come on, this is dilerious. With all writing in this forum of that dslr now is same level as medium format, surely everyone must now be convinced that 41MP from a camera phone now beats medium format. A pixel is a pixel! No matter if from medium format, drls or camera phone ;). Why else would all arguing of dslr vs medium format come from???
The interesting is thus that it leaves the "new" Nikon D800 E in the dust as old technology before it has reached sales... ;D. The Nokia beats it in pixels, hence must have better image quality!!! Just add some sharpening, done.
I do like my Hy6... I wonder, is there someway I can adapt the Nokia 880 to mount in place of my Leaf back??? ;)
What?!? Not available in the US? I was so there already! ;)
Rats! I'll have to stick with my Rollei.
@ Eric,
Dont worry, I can help you. Can pick one up for you in Hong Kong at discounted price since no sales tax in Hong Kong. Do you have any idea how to slap it onto the back of the Hy6? Is duct tape the only means? Will look like crap, but never mind we will get same image quality as our Leaf backs and save weight in bag with money to return to the bank! :)
Best regards,
Anders
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Anders,
You seem to be forgetting the evidence and arguments that there is no clear advantage in per pixel performance of medium format CDDs and the somewhat smaller pixels of modern high end DSLR CMOS sensors, and instead in fact some evidence to the contrary, of the DSLR CMOS pixels Peking better for noise levels and dynamic range. (this still leaves lenses as a strong candidate for medium format superiority). With the Nokia 808, there is no question that its 1.4 micron CMOS pixels are far inferior, pixel to pixel, to those of DSLRs.
In short, yours is a "deliriously" false analogy.
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Anders,
You seem to be forgetting the evidence and arguments that there is no clear advantage in per pixel performance of medium format CDDs and the somewhat smaller pixels of modern high end DSLR CMOS sensors, and instead in fact some evidence to the contrary, of the DSLR CMOS pixels Peking better for noise levels and dynamic range. (this still leaves lenses as a strong candidate for medium format superiority). With the Nokia 808, there is no question that its 1.4 micron CMOS pixels are far inferior, pixel to pixel, to those of DSLRs.
In short, yours is a "deliriously" false analogy.
No, no no, if those smaller DSLR sensors can equal medium format in image quality, very surely the Nokia 808 can equal medium format too! All needed is some sharpening and done. ::)
I will confess that if your claim is not correct of "evidence and arguments" for those smaller "modern high end DSLR CMOS sensors" being able to reach image quality same as current medium format CCD sensors (@ low ISO), then... frankly I will have to admit that my analogy of the Nokia 808 vs medium format may stand out as a sheer joke... ;D
... but remember, with medium format we speak of low ISO, the Nokia 808 will assumably excel also at high ISO, thus there should be no point to argue compared to the D800/E ;)
Will you upgrade your DSLR to the Nokia?? Assumably you will need to duct tape only one 808 to each of your lenses, while to maintain my current pixel count I will need duct tape two to my Hy6... Will look tad ugly but never mind. I think still shows the superiority of medium format, since I can get by to tape them to my camera body, hence save $$ compared to getting one Nokia to tape to each lens.
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Hi,
Just a few observations.
The Nokia is optimized for large apertures, the sample images are at full aperture. The sensor is large to be used in a phone camera, it's more like the ones used in compacts. The lens is fixed focal length and probably cannot be changed.
Having a large number of pixels gives a lot of flexibility. The Nokia paper indicates a lot of subsampling options.
The published images are JPEGs, and quite reasonable at around 40 MP, and also essentially sharp corner to corner. That is very impressive for a pocket size camera. The idea with a phone camera is that it's a device that is always carried, because of the phone functionality.
My impression is that the design taken with the Nokia is quite smart. It will put a lot of pressure on compacts.
I cannot say if it will match Nikon D800/D800E in image quality. It will certainly lack in noise and DR (which are essentially a function of sensor size if technology similar). From what I have seen there is an amazing tendency for smaller formats to keep up with larger ones. It makes a lot of sense to make the pixels smaller, as long as noise can be kept low.
Finally, what is coming out of the camera depends on lens, sensor but even more importantly subject and photographer.
Best regards
Erik
No, no no, if those smaller DSLR sensors can equal medium format in image quality, very surely the Nokia 808 can equal medium format too! All needed is some sharpening and done. ::)
I will confess that if your claim is not correct of "evidence and arguments" for those smaller "modern high end DSLR CMOS sensors" being able to reach image quality same as current medium format CCD sensors (@ low ISO), then... frankly I will have to admit that my analogy of the Nokia 808 vs medium format may stand out as a sheer joke... ;D
... but remember, with medium format we speak of low ISO, the Nokia 808 will assumably excel also at high ISO, thus there should be no point to argue compared to the D800/E ;)
Will you upgrade your DSLR to the Nokia?? Assumably you will need to duct tape only one 808 to each of your lenses, while to maintain my current pixel count I will need duct tape two to my Hy6... Will look tad ugly but never mind. I think still shows the superiority of medium format, since I can get by to tape them to my camera body, hence save $$ compared to getting one Nokia to tape to each lens.
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Anders
I think it is out of question that current MF and as well a D800 will beat this Nokia hands down in Image quality.
But it is a landmark of what technology can achieve and what smart engineering does squeeze out of such a tiny pixel.
Do you remember the discussion when the first Hybrid Prius came out ?
People were laughing and complaining how ugly he was and the consumption of a Diesel would be better etc.pp.
Today even Mercedes and BMW offer Hybrids , Peugot has launched a DieselHybrid now.
Can you imagine what this technology will do on a Medium format chip ? !!!
Or even more likely - on a fullformat 24x36 chip in a mirrorless Sony Nex..... whatever maybe 10 ? Remember Zeiss and Sony cooperate and Sony sells the chip to Nokia.
Now think about it and then tell me this is all nonsense.......
Regards
Stefan
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Zeiss and Sony cooperate and Sony sells the chip to Nokia.
Nokia has identified Toshiba as its technology partner, not Sony. And Toshiba could be open to supplying various camera makers who are open to out-sourcing sensors, such as Olympus and Nikon and Pentax.
And maybe future Toshiba tablets will have killer cameras! Just add tripod and black cloth for the full view camera experience.
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There is a video with one of the system devellopers Damian Dinning - he tells some things that are not in the docs, especially showing of the camera menues.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=ZheH4PjEows
Woa......if this is a so called bad operating system (Symbian), at least the camera partlooks smooth and very logical to me (I own an iPhone 4, but this doesn´t even come close).
There is another video- a Nokia guy speaking about the lowlight capabilities and more
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=f23fSxjRiy4
The phone has a Coprocessor /numbercruncher for the image handling supporting the CPU- this was said to be made by Toshiba. If they also do the 41Mpix sensor - I don´t know.
regards
Stefan
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Another link with solid opinions:
http://www.digitaltrends.com/mobile/the-skeptics-guide-to-nokias-808-pureview-five-reasons-41-megapixels-are-not-a-gimmick/
regards
Stefan
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Stefan,
Thanks for the links.
Pixels aside, I think a lot of what's impressive about the 808 and that MFDB and DSLR makers alike could learn from is the user interface.
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The phone has a Coprocessor /numbercruncher for the image handling supporting the CPU- this was said to be made by Toshiba. If they also do the 41Mpix sensor - I don´t know.
The only information I have seen is about Nokia describing Toshiba as "its technology partner", apparently in the singular, which implies that Toshiba is the _only_ external source relevant to this camera. If you have other information, I would like to see it, but it would seem very strange for Nokia to credit Toshiba in that way on the basis of the processing chip while being completely silent about another company like Sony providing the unique sensor itself.
So do you have any evidence pointing to any role of Sony, or it is just the common assumption that Sony is the only company wiling and able to provide a good sensor? In reality, there are numbers makers of sensors with small pixels, for mobile phones and such; the photographic sensor market is far bigger than we see when we only look at "pure cameras" as opposed to cameras embedded into multifunction devices.
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From 0:41 to 0:57 in the interview, Dimming says that they had to develop the sensor with partners (plural). It's of course a bit hard to be certain of anything with such an interview, but it has been interpreted on other sites as meaning that the sensor is not exclusively of Toshiba origin.
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I already had searched for this info but this is not available.
So it cannot be verified which maker does the chip. I thought I read someone mentioned the chip being made by Sony,
but obviously this was just hearsay.
Regards
Stefan
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Pierre: thanks for that. So Stefan I agree: the mystery continues. Maybe Nokia worked with the same un-named partner as Olympus did for the sensor in the OM-D E-M5! (And I suspect that the partner there is Panasonic, not wanting to acknowledge that a new sensor has gone to Olympus before arriving in a high level Panasonic body later this year ... just to confuse the speculation further!)
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Yes!!! Time to forget medium format, why use it?? Dang, a camera phone with 41MP that should be good in studio for high end fashion shots! It is all about the number of pixels!!! Never mind DSLR, waist of time. My new plan is to buy three Nokia 808 and mount them parallel, thus bringing me near 120MP (less overlap). This is great! Will put money in bank and less weight to carry. For shots that require less than 100MP I can simply demount one of them, point and shoot. ::)
For sure, in comparison the Nikon D800 E stands out as the joke, does it not??? ;).
Anyone else who will follow??? Please line up! ;D
Best regards,
Anders
+1
Just part exchanged my H4D for a 67 Mach 1 Mustang in bright red, bought a white suit, a fedora, and a big cigar. With my unlit cigar, in my motor and my 41MP Nokia I AM THE MAN.
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From the little I know, phone companies do not develop their cameras...at best they might draw the basic specs and contract the project to an external company (there are quite a few of those around...Aptina, Omnivision etc.), normally they just buy a module with its SDK and API's etc.
Lenses, if they are branded ones, come as part of the module and they pay for the badge (Zeiss or whatever)
Not saying this is the case here but I doubt that Nokia developed the camera or the sensor from scratch by themselves
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From the little I know, phone companies do not develop their cameras...at best they might draw the basic specs and contract the project to an external company (there are quite a few of those around...Aptina, Omnivision etc.), normally they just buy a module with its SDK and API's etc.
Lenses, if they are branded ones, come as part of the module and they pay for the badge (Zeiss or whatever)
Not saying this is the case here but I doubt that Nokia developed the camera or the sensor from scratch by themselves
There are several interviews on YouTube with someone from Nokia's design team that mostly corroborate that: Nokia participated in the design with unnamed technology partners (though the names Toshiba and Toshiba do float around), including Nokia setting the specifications for the sensor.
However, the interviews do claim that the lens in this case is a custom design by Zeiss for the special needs (higher angular resolution than any previous phone camera module), so I would not be too quicPk with the suggestion that the Zeiss branding is simply "badge engineering". After all, for a relatively high volume and low size component, it can make sense to pay for the best in design skill, and high quality materials. The lens design is apparently unusual, with five aspherical elements. Nokia also claims to have been involved in developing the algorithms for the custom signal processing chips.
In short, this is very far from an off-the-shelf phone camera module like the ones from Omnivision and Sony and such in so many phones.
P. S. to put it another way: the unit volume of lenses for phones like this can easily be a thousand times greater than for a good MF lens, or a hundred times greater than for a high end SLR lens, so that even allowing for the great differences in selling price, the total revenue from sales of one such lens design can be comparable to that for one MF or high end SLR lens design. Then it can make sense to spend a comparable amount on the design and other fixed costs associated to producing a good phone camera lens. Economies of scale can be a wonderful thing.
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Hi BJL
you are right about the Economies of scale. Just the scale is even more impressive - if a company like Hasselblad does a turnaround of around 100 Mil € a year (I think it is less but lets assume this for easier calculations) and the average system price of a sold Camera is 20000 € with an average of 1,5-2 lenses per system (which could be questioned maybe its 30000 and 2-3 lenses per system but I want to be friendly to get better numbers) then thereare 5000 systems sold with a max of 5000 lenses of the same kind (maybe the 80mm?) made for these cameras /year. See attached numbers for Mobile phone makers (here from Q2 2011) Nokia sold 16,7 Mill units - per quarter - Apple 20,3 Millions /quarter. Lets say the market has even grown since then (which is confirmed by the actual numbers ) and we have an overall sale of 100Mil units for e.g. Apples iPhonein 2012 then this is 20000 times more - for the more expensive and rarer lenses I´d guess the comparative numbers are more closer to 100000 times more............
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From the little I know, phone companies do not develop their cameras...at best they might draw the basic specs and contract the project to an external company (there are quite a few of those around...Aptina, Omnivision etc.), normally they just buy a module with its SDK and API's etc.
Lenses, if they are branded ones, come as part of the module and they pay for the badge (Zeiss or whatever)
Not saying this is the case here but I doubt that Nokia developed the camera or the sensor from scratch by themselves
Yair,
It seems you don't really know.
Most phone cameras are bought in as you say, but I know of several "high end" over the years that have been custom jobs, with real lens design work done on them. As an industry consultant I don't think I should name names, but I'm sure your own industry contacts will update you if asked.
Also, why do you assume that a product that sells 100 million copies or so like a high end smartphone should be badly designed or manufactured? To the contrary, one can expect - and gets - superb design on the high end, and performance limitation may actually be mechanical ie. due to lens tilt or voice coil focus actuators.
I just wish some unnamed manufacturers of medium format gear had been as good in the past at sourcing "standard" LCDs as the phone guys.
To finish on a sarcastic note, as usual, are you really sure that on a pixel-to-pixel basis a Leaf or is it Phase sensor is better designed and fabricated than a Nikon D800 or D4 sensor or even better than a current Canon Rebel sensor?
Edmund
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But how does it perform as a phone? If it has such an amazing camera built it should enable us all to take better photos.
If the phone part of it, which we are all pretty much ignoring, is as good as the camera then I will get one. I expect to only receive calls from famous, good looking ,rich and intelligent people with such a good phone. I mean if it works for the camera it should work for the phone calls right.
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Yair,
It seems you don't really know.
Thought I said "from the little I know"...
Also, why do you assume that a product that sells 100 million copies or so like a high end smartphone should be badly designed or manufactured?
Did I say that?
I just wish some unnamed manufacturers of medium format gear had been as good in the past at sourcing "standard" LCDs as the phone guys
When the Aptus came out 7 years ago most phones had a 2x3cm monochrome LCD...and obviously the IQ now uses a screen that is on par if not better than most phones...
To finish on a sarcastic note, as usual, are you really sure that on a pixel-to-pixel basis a Leaf or is it Phase sensor is better designed and fabricated than a Nikon D800 or D4 sensor or even better than a current Canon Rebel sensor?
Did I say that???
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+1
Just part exchanged my H4D for a 67 Mach 1 Mustang in bright red, bought a white suit, a fedora, and a big cigar. With my unlit cigar, in my motor and my 41MP Nokia I AM THE MAN.
+1 to above!!! ;D
I hate to do it, but need to make a serious disclaimer... for those of you who have not realized that there is no way the 41MP Nokia equals medium format even by stitching it ( ;D ;D)... I need to clarify that there is no way I am selling my Leaf!!! My posts above are obvious on joke side and there is obvious more than number of pixels in a sensor and in imaging chain, including the size of sensor and for specific what purpose it was designed. As such expect the Nikon D800/E to exceed the Nokia in image quality, and indeed medium format digital backs to excel in image quality over DSLR and Nokia, assuming of course we do speak of low ISO for which medium format is designed. Any discussion on contrary is pointless.
Not sure I would pick a 67 Mustang... but it would be something else a tad sporty ;D
Regrettably (Happily) I am "stuck" with Leaf due to its very high image quality, but I also fully enjoy that ride. Thanks Yair and Gavin (HK). ;)
Best regards,
Anders