Here’s a preview of what’s going to happen to the market in the coming months: suddenly it’s going to be filled with cell phones with super high-resolution cameras. After a season where the resolution race seemed to have died down, we’re starting to see 200MP cameras on a number of new devices.
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As usual, it will be first the high-end mobiles which will release these new sensors, but they will not be the only ones, even less, to bet on a high resolution; this week, Samsung made sure of that by introducing a very special (and at the same time not) camera sensor.
200MP camera for cheaper mobiles
Although Samsung is developing cameras for its own phones, that’s not the only reason; in fact, his biggest business is in the supply to third parties, being one of the main figures in the sector. Many manufacturers buy Samsung sensors for their cameras, and this announcement should be understood in that context.
The Samsung ISOCELL HPX is a new sensor that we probably won’t see in any company mobile; it’s rather for Chinese manufacturers, and was announced specifically for this market. Samsung’s goal is to offer an inexpensive sensor, but with a feature that will allow brands to stand out from the rest: a resolution of 200 Mpx.
The 200 Mpx have already reached high-end models like the Motorola Edge 30 Ultra
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This is the most impressive technical feature of a sensor which, on the other hand, is really not surprising. It seems strange to say this about a sensor that has four times the number of pixels of today’s best cameras, but in the art of photography there are things as important or more important than pixels. For example, this sensor’s weak spot seems to be in low-light scenarios, although Samsung claims that for this it has integrated two variants of “pixel-binning” technology, which mixes information from multiple pixels into one; Thus, mobiles equipped with this sensor will be able to take 50 Mpx photos for poorly lit scenes, in addition to 12.5 Mpx photos in very low light.
Obviously the 200 Mpx photos will be the big attraction if we have good lighting, although it will not be the only one; will also record Video in 8K resolution, although limited to 30 frames per second. Another advantage is that it is a small sensor despite the large number of pixels it has, so manufacturers should be able to integrate it into all types of mobiles.
That’s the key to this release, phones that may not be high-end but can boast 200MP. Some of Samsung’s upcoming Galaxy S23 lineup phones are expected to use a 200MP camera (possibly the S23 Ultra), but it wouldn’t be that sensor; it would probably be a more capable ISOCELL HP2 sensor.
