Everything you should know about smartphone camera

Everything you should know about a smartphone camera

What is a smartphone camera?

Smartphone camera is a device or you can say feature of device which helps in capturing light signals of a particular location of a particular time in the form of digital signals. It is basically time saving option for everyone these days . Due to its various features it become very useful for all of us. In this blog we are going to talk about different features on which a smartphone works.

Which are the different types of camera sensors available in smartphones?

There are many types of cameras in smartphone used for different purposes. We will talk about them one by one. Different type of camera lenses and sensors are giver below

• Primary sensor
• Depth sensor
• Ultrawide angle lens
• Macro lens 
• Telephoto lens

Primary Sensor- Primary sensor is the main camera of the camera setup. It is basic camera of the smartphone which capture the picture. Other type of image are clicked when remaining sensors helps primary camera in taking a shot.

 Depth Sensor- Depth sensor helps in depicting depth of the particular object. While clicking the picture primary camera capture the complete camera view and depth sensor focus over the particular object hence the two different focus helps in creating portrait effect or bokeh effect. 

Image with depth vs normal image

 

Ultrawide angle sensor- Ultra wide angle lens helps main camera to capture wider view. UW lens capture view of angle more than 110°. UW lens is used when we have to capture or shoot a wide landscape or a group image. It also used in selfie camera. All action cameras are equipped with UW lens.

Normal view vs UW view

Macro Lens- Macro lens is when we have to capture a image when we want to capture image of very closer point or we can say very small objects. Macro lens helps primary lens to focus very close points near the camera. Macro lens is mostly used in miniature photography. 

Telephoto lens- Telephoto lens shifts focus of the camera to very distant objects hence main camera can click nearly clear image from very far away objects. Telephoto lens are used in astro photography.

Wide view vs normal view vs ultra zoomed view

Parts and features of camera with the help of we are able to click a picture are:

 

Image Signal Processor (ISP)

It is the part of camera which converts image or light particles to electrical signals. In human eye retina is the part where the light of a image project similarly in a camera image processors are retina of the  camera.

Some ISP available in some famous brands

Quad bayer in Motorola moto one fusion+

Exynos in Samsung galaxy s9

Snapdragon in most of smartphones

Camera

Mega pixels

 Higher megapixel images allow ‘cropping’ of the original without losing too much detail. Higher megapixel images also ensure a higher quality image when printed, for example when printing ‘posters. The resolution of the image taken by a smartphone is measured in megapixels, a higher megapixel count doesn’t always equate to a better picture. The desire to have more and more megapixels has slowed as manufacturers focus on the quality of those megapixels captured so Companies are using high quality sensors to capture more detailed as well as good lights and colored photos.

Different sized pictures clicked by different resolution camera

  

Aperture

The Aperture of a lens indicates how much light the lens lets in. The larger the aperture, the more light is let in, conversely a smaller aperture lets in less light. Measured in f-stops, these are inverse values, as shown in the aperture chart above, the larger the aperture the lower the f-stop number. An aperture of f/1.4 lets in more light than an aperture of f/8.

Image stabilization

Image stabilization is the phenomenon in which smartphone camera physically or programming stabilize the image or video while it is in motion. There are basically two methods of image stabilization.

• Optical Image Stabilization
• Electronic Image Stabilization

Optical image stabilization

Optical image stabilization work as there are some gyro sensors work while camera is in motion. They help in adjusting the lens according to that motion of the body hence giving clear stable and detailed image or video.  Some smartphones available in market with OIS support are Samsung galaxy S21 ulta 5g, Apple Iphone 12 pro Max and Vivo S9, One Plus Nord etc. This feature mostly comes in Highly priced smartphones, few mid range smartphones also has this feature.

Image showing OIS while capturing video of skydiver

Electronic Image Stabilization

Electronic image stabilization(EIS) is a software based feature which stabilize video after video shot. It understand minor camera movements and adjust accordingly.
According to the developers OIS is more effective than EIS as there is a saparate hardware used which is not in EIS.  If you want to learn About these two in detail than go for the explanation given by Geeky Ranjit.

Auto Focus

Auto focus system is self-focusing ability of a camera according to the depth of scenery or image. In the phenomenon the light or rays coming from a distance is captured and when and object comes before its lens’s focus point it start focusing on that. Although we can focus manually be touching object on smartphone screen.   Usually, it can’t be seen with naked eyes because auto focus sensors are the behind the camera lens due to which they can’t be seen via naked eyes. There many methods of auto focus which we given below

1. Contrast detection auto focus

1. Phase detection auto focus

1. Dual pixel auto focus

1. laser auto focus

1.     1.  CDAF (Contrast detection auto focus)- this type of focusing is the older way of focusing as it is used in dslr cameras but it is slowest way of auto focusing as in this method because in this method two or more lens moves manually and some time it is difficult to find perfect contrast point.

2.     2. PDAF (Phase detection auto focus): - In this phenomenon camera lens continuously change its focal point until it finds a nearby focal point. All smartphones now the days has this feature.

3.    3.  Dual pixel auto focus- This method is inspired with human eye as in human eye right eye helps in taking good detailing of the right side of the image and vice versa, similarly there are dual pixels which exactly works same. It is similar to PDAF but it gives sharper image. E.g. Samsung galaxy s7 edge.

4.     4. Laser auto focus- it is the fastest method of auto focusing where a laser beam is projected on the object or view which revert back and detected by its sensor. Some phones of Asus, Google Nexus and Motorola are equipped with this feature. 

h Flash

As we all know led flash is used when there are low light conditions. However, it only illuminates a very small area, it’s slow (resulting in blurred fast-moving objects)

There are many type of flash

Xenon flash: It the most powerful flash. the flash has longer range. A xenon flash consists of a small glass tube filled with xenon gas. When a very high voltage current of electricity is applied, the tube emits a very bright, but very brief – flash of white light. Previously it was given in some smartphones like Nokia and Samsung. 

Led flash- most common and currently used flash is led flash. LEDs can be strobed faster than any other light source, including xenon. LED flash is used in almost all the camera phones these days. LED’s light depends on how much current pass through it.

Normal LED Flash( Single Tone)

 Dual tone led flash- The idea is having two sources of light with different color temperatures (say, florescent and amber one) and to balance them to have a more natural “fit” with the ambient color temperature when using the flash as a fill-in or as a secondary source. Different manufacturers call it with different names like in apple it is introduced a true tone flash and in Motorola it is known as CCT Flash (color correlated temperature). Dual tone flash never means more light it means more accurate colors.

HDR (high dynamic range)

HDR or High Dynamic Range attempts to add more "dynamic range" to your photographs.

In place of taking one photo, HDR mode takes three photos at different exposures. The CPU/ISP combine these three images together and highlight the best parts of each photo. Often your smartphone can give you the regular photo and the HDR photo. The result should better mirror what you see rather than what your smartphone lens sees.

Panoramic photography

Panorama is method of taking a shot of a image which do not fit in a single frame. In HDR the ISP itself take 3 images( same image In different exposure), in panorama camera is moved in horizontal or vertical direction and by overlapping these images can make a large image which is large in either length of breadth .

 

Video

Now the days majority of smartphones has at least 720p HD video with 30 fps. In normal videography higher the FPS value means smoother the video and in slow motion means the slower you can make a video without losing quality. If the resolution and  number of frames are high the more storage space is required.

Common Video formats & frame rates are:

·         1080p HD at 30 fps

·         1080p HD at 60 fps

·         4K at 24 fps

·         4K at 30 fps

·         4K at 60 fps

Slo-mo

·         720p HD at 240 fps

·         720p HD at 960 fps

·         1080p HD at 120 fps

·         1080p HD at 240 fps

·         1080p HD at 960 fps

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