Photography is becoming more and more important on the smartphones we use every day. It depends on some sensors which in recent years have extended their resolution as their main commercial claim, and to be honest with a real utility such as ‘Pixel Binning’. The two main manufacturers of sensors found in Android phones are two old industry acquaintances: Samsung and Sony.
The first of these two well-known firms is once again launching new sensors which will hit the market and will be available to different smartphone manufacturers. Your Xiaomi, Pixel, Realme and of course Samsung Galaxy phones will benefit from these three sensors which on paper look very good. That’s how they are new ISOCELL from the Suwon-based tech giant.
GNJ, HP9 and JN5. Samsung’s ISOCELL series continues
The new Samsung sensors were announced this morning in Korea, the Galaxy company’s country of origin. Samsung itself subsequently published the characteristics of each of them in its press room. More precisely, there are three of them, one of them stands out from the others by being the first sensor for telephoto lenses that reaches a huge 200 megapixels.
This is the ISOCELL HP9 sensor, 200 megapixels with sharp focus on telephoto lenses.
We start with the ISOCELL GNJ: with a sensor size of 1/0.57 inch, is similar to what we saw this year on the Galaxy S24 and Galaxy S24+. In fact, it also has one-micron pixels, like the one referenced. Of course, there haven’t been any very noticeable changes since 2022, when the Galaxy S22 launched this sensor and pixel size. The new one also maintains the 50 megapixels.
What appears to be different is one minor change: a “antirefractive layer” improved which will allow better light capture, while reducing reflections, thus achieving better color reproduction. Samsung brags about it, saying it’s more efficient, up to 34% with 4K/60fps video.
On the other hand, the HP9 is the flagship of the new trio: 200 megapixels to give more resolution to telephoto lenses. In addition, it is already present in a smartphone, the Vivo X100 Ultra, presented in China last month. It has a size of 1/1.4 inches and 0.56 micron pixels, similar to the main camera of the Galaxy S24 Ultra.
The Galaxy manufacturer makes the most of low-light improvements, thanks to a 16-in-1 pixel binning. It also comments that this sensor can offer 2x or 4x zoom modes, reaching a zoom up to 12x when combined with a 3x telephoto zoom module.
Finally, the JN5 is a 50 megapixel sensorwhich takes the sensor size from its predecessor, the 2021 ISOCELL JN1. It adds HDR and autofocus settings, such as dual slope gain (DCG) technology for prime and autofocus detection. Super Quad phase which promises to improve the second aspect.
It does not give more details on these new features, even if its size suggests that it can be combined with main lenses, ultra wide angle, telephoto and even front lenses. It can achieve 2x zoom when used as the main camera and up to 6x when included with a 3x telephoto lens.
And here is the news about Samsung ISOCELL sensors: we do not know the availability both of which have not yet been seen on smartphones, but which should soon be available to mobile manufacturers who rely on these photographic elements.
More information | Samsung
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