Luminous Landscape Forum
The Art of Photography => The Coffee Corner => Topic started by: Michael West on June 22, 2011, 10:52:39 pm
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lytro...claims they have develope an entirely new type of sensors that can capture images which can be focused...after the fact.
I sense they arent being particularly forthright with this but know so little physics that I cant say much with any degree of certainty
I was under the impression that LENSES rather than sensors were what focused images.
http://www.lytro.com/
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The additional recording of the angle of a light ray allows these special features, but it comes at a price: resolution.
The dissertation of their CEO available at their website is an interesting read - you can skip the all too complicated mathematical stuff when reading.
I think we'll have to wait for the real world product to see how it really works, and I believe it will take some time until it makes its way to high resolution photography.
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There have been tech demos of this for years, it's the real thing: there are several academic papers on this, and here's an article from 2008 (http://news.cnet.com/8301-13580_3-9876296-39.html). Whether the product is the real thing is another matter.
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The additional recording of the angle of a light ray allows these special features, but it comes at a price: resolution.
The dissertation of their CEO available at their website is an interesting read - you can skip the all too complicated mathematical stuff when reading.
I think we'll have to wait for the real world product to see how it really works, and I believe it will take some time until it makes its way to high resolution photography.
The current 3 megapixel ceiling seems a bit limiting, and points toward a long road before its ready for "prime time"
Thanks
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The current 3 megapixel ceiling seems a bit limiting, and points toward a long road before its ready for "prime time"
3 MP is plenty for screen and web use, and the tech needs a computer and screen to be fully utilized. Printing photos is already a niche activity, anyway.
Besides, it was only a few years ago 3 MP was a lot in a compact camera, and they are now in the 12+ MP realm.
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This may be an area where very small pixel sensors could be useful in the future (especially since the principle of the images combination/practical downsampling itself leads to noise reduction). And of course, it will depend a lot on the micro-lens array characteristics. If the idea catches, we'll probably see a lot of progress in terms of suitable micro lens array manufacturing.
AFAIC
Coolest practical thing in the paper: the camera could have a dual personality. Forget flexible focus and get full resolution, or close. Sacrifice resolution and get flexible focus and even a certain amount of 3D imaging.
Most amusing idea: working with current sensors, a camera with a square aperture should be better at the task.
Quite fun to imagine, a few years from now, a camera that would automatically operate optimally from a DR point of view (forget ISO), would seamleslly switch from max res to max focus depending on the subject and that would have a... square aperture.
:o