Hasta La Gadget!

This week we’re seeing HTC come into the light with a massively important new device by the name of HTC One, and with it, a new collection of features included under the “HTC UltraPixel Camera” umbrella. With the features we’re working with here on the HTC One hero phone’s implementation of HTC UltraPixel Camera, you’ll find that image quality is, first and foremost, not solely dependent on the amount of megapixels a camera has. HTC UltraPixel Camera technology is here demonstrated with an UltraPixel Sensor, HTC ImageChip, f/2.0 Aperture, and Optical Image Stabilization.

UltraPixel Sensor

HTC is bringing what it calls its first UltraPixel sensor to the market with the HTC One, showing off the full setup in the image you see below. This image shows the HTC ImageChip architecture (not unlike what we saw with each of the HTC One models in the past), the UltraPixel Sensor itself, an f/2.0 Aperture, and the HTC One’s lens. With the UltraPixel sensor, you’ll now be working with larger pixels than the average camera.

With the UltraPixel Sensor collecting UltraPixel-sized pixels, you’ll be getting the ability to capture “300% more light than many of the 13 megapixel cameras on the market.” Each pixel contains more light and more data than ever before, all this with a sensor whose size is equivalent to that of a standard 8MP or 13MP smartphone camera. This UltraPixel Sensor is a CMOS BSI and is classified as having a 1/3′ sensor size.

Each photo you’re going to be taking will be 2688 x 1520 pixels in size on the HTC One at a 16:9 aspect ratio, and you’ve got a 5 piece lens element setup with a focal length of 3.82mm. Each one of the pixels you’re picking up here is a 2.0 micrometer UltraPixel. These pixels have “effectively” twice the surface area of the standard pixels you’re working with on 8MP and 13MP setups, those being generally 1.4 micrometers and 1.1 micrometers respectively.

In effect, you’ve got the same size photo, but instead of creating smaller pixels to fill the area as larger megapixel cameras are doing, HTC is creating larger pixels to fill the area. This results in the HTC One’s camera being 4MP strong, but creating photos that are the same size – and better quality – than the larger megapixel solutions. File sizes are smaller for the HTC-taken photos here as well.

HTC ImageChip

With the newest edition of HTC’s own ISP (Image Signal Processor), you’ll find that the HTC ImageChip feature collection has expanded since the HTC One X arrived on the scene right around a year ago with ImageSense. The first big innovation is a rather speedy 200ms full distance scan for use with Continuous Auto Focus. That’s quicker than a human blink – you’ll have a harder time being out of focus than you will getting instant focus.

Next you’ll find Real-Time Video HDR – with a dynamic range that can be cranked up to a lovely -92dB, you’ll be able to “match the human eye capability” as you capture interlaced frames at 60fps. You’ve what HTC notes is “always on” HDR here for video, even at HD 1080p. Due to the nature of the curved lens, darker spots appear near the edge of your photos almost no matter what – HTC has compensated for this with an algorithm designed specifically for the HTC One’s hardware.

This newest HTC ImageChip also works with de-noise processing on both the front and the back-facing camera on the HTC One. With this simple concentration of effort, HTC says noise is cleanly removed at all times.

f/2.0 Aperture

HTC shows quite simply how the HTC One uses the largest of three apertures available in some of the best selling smartphones on the market today, with the Galaxy S III working with an f/2.6 and the iPhone 5 utilizing an f/2.4. With the HTC One’s f/2.0 size, one whole heck of a lot more light is able to be let in, this resulting in better results in low-light photo conditions.

Optical Image Stabilization

The HTC One’s camera setup allows its camera to capture a full sized photo as fast as 1/48 of a second. This compares with the current market standard of 1/30 of a second, that speed also the best the HTC One X can do currently. Along with this you’ve now got a real-deal physical optical image stabilizer (OIS) on the HTC One working with the smartphone’s dedicated imaging gyroscope.

With its own OIS, the HTC One’s lens physically moves according to what the dedicated imaging gyroscope tells it, this countering the inevitable shake that happens when someone takes a photo without a tripod. This OIS is different from the more common digital stabilization used on many competitor model solutions, those solutions opting to cut out shaking bits of the photo, reducing the resolution of the photo in the process.

The HTC One’s OIS works at an “unprecedented” frequency of 2000Hz and has been made small enough to fit inside the HTC One’s relatively thin chassis. Working on two axis, this OIS detects pitch and yaw movements and counters them at 2000 times a second. Video quality is also significantly improved over past solutions as the OIS effectively removes background shakes and mimics smooth panning, top to bottom.

More on the HTC One

Below you’ll find a timeline of HTC One hands-on or otherwise in-depth explorations from SlashGear. We’ll also have a full review of the HTC One up sooner than later, so be sure to stick around for the big drop! Seeya then!

SlashGear 101: HTC UltraPixel Camera Technology is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

CyanogenMod 10.1-toting photography fans are in for a treat: the latest version of the modified Android OS now packs an HDR mode, which was in development for three months, within its stock camera app. When a user snaps a photo with the function, a total of three pictures (one at minimal, neutral and maximum exposures) are taken and combined into a single HDR image with the help of an algorithm. Differences in shutter speed, sensors and optics means quality will vary across smartphones, but the CyanogenMod team says that mid- to high-end devices outfitted with decent imaging hardware — especially those with zero shutter lag — should perform admirably. Of course, the group also recommends using a stand or tripod to thwart movement and vibration from fouling up photos. Android Central points out that a few handset builds haven’t received the update, so a handful of CyanogenMod-wielding photogs will still have to get their HDR fix elsewhere.

Filed under: Cellphones, Mobile

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Via: Android Central

Source: CyanogenMod (Google+)

Lots of today’s cameras have some sort of image stabilization tech built in, but none of them really provide the kind of smooth moving shots you can get from a professional camera rig like a Steadicam. A new gadget aims to smooth out bumpy shots, without any mechanism or gyroscopes.

The SteadyWheel takes advantage of a physics principle called the moment of inertia, which helps it smooth out the smaller jitters and shakes thanks to a set of weights at the outside of the ring. Operating the SteadyWheel simply requires that you attach your camera and then carry it by the outer handle.

It’s small enough to fit in a backpack, and will fit just about any small to medium sized camera with a standard tripod mount. It’s made from durable ABS plastic and stainless steel weights, and because it has no moving parts or adjustments, there’s virtually nothing to break, and it can even go underwater.

Best of all, the SteadyWheel is much cheaper than competing rigs. You can get in on the Early Bird action with the basic SteadyWheel for just $50(USD). For $60, you can get the version with a GoPro mount, or for $65 there’s a version with a SnapMount tripod case for the iPhone 4/4S. If you’d like a SteadyWheel for yourself, head on over to Kickstarter now and show your support by March 17, 2013.

HTC’s most controversial decision with the HTC One is going to be the choice of camera. In a market where “more” is so often seen as “better” the 4-megapixel equivalent main camera on the back of the One is going to raise eyebrows, no matter how hard HTC pushes its “UltraPixel” branding. Assuming the company can get would-be users to pay attention to the theory, though, there’s a whole lot to like about the UltraPixel approach: increasing the amount of data for each pixel that makes up the final frame.

Unlike Nokia’s original 808 PureView], the One doesn’t use over-sampling. Nokia’s system created roughly 5-megapixel shots from a vast 41-megapixel sensor, taking the “average” data from clumps of multiple pixels for more accurate images, and ironing out glitches along the way. The downside to that is you need a bulky phone to physically accommodate a high-megapixel sensor, something that simply wouldn’t fit into the HTC One’s slender frame.

Instead, HTC’s custom-made camera sensor has individual pixels that are bigger than what you’d find in a typical flagship smartphone. In fact, the array is made up of pixels 2 micrometers to a side; in contrast, an 8-megapixel phone sensor, such as the one used in HTC’s own One X, is more likely to use 1.2 micrometer pixels. Bigger pixels mean more room for light information to hit the sensor: more light means more accurate final shots, as well as the possibility of faster shutter speeds even in low-light settings. That reduces camera-blur (and is helped by the One’s optical image stabilization, which controls pitch and yaw shake at 2,000 Hz).

When rivals like Sony are stepping up to 13-megapixel cameras on their new flagships, HTC’s 4-megapixels seems an odd choice. However, the One’s camera gathers up in excess of 313-percent of the light a 13-megapixel camera can squeeze through to its tiny pixels; in fact, the One’s pixel size is bigger than that of Samsung’s Galaxy Camera and Canon’s S100 point-and-shoot.

That data gets pushed to HTC’s new ImageChip 2 – another custom part – which does its digital finessing on RAW data before JPEG conversion (most phones convert first, then process, which is less computationally demanding). There’s lens compensation to adjust for any aberration of the f/2.0 optics, along with de-noise processing and ghosting reduction; the One supports continuous autofocus, with the camera locking in under 200ms, and uses dual-path encoding for simultaneous Full HD video capture and full-resolution photos (at up to 5fps) spitting out 1080p H.264 footage and 2688 x 1520 16:9 JPEGs at the other end.

Does it work? It certainly looks that way, even in the prototype One handsets running non-final firmware we had the opportunity to use. Low-light shots are easily the most impressive: side by side with a Galaxy S III and an iPhone 5, the One captured images in a darkened room that were still clearly visible (though not artificially lit, as when you use an LED flash) while the Apple shots were murky. The shots from the Samsung, meanwhile, were basically frames of dark murk, with nothing visible. That the One’s are lower resolution than either of the other phones can produce is, frankly, irrelevant: you’d only be hitting delete on the larger pictures anyway.

Yet it’s when put into context with the new HTC Sense 5 and, specifically, HTC’s “Zoe” photography features that the UltraPixel technology – and its ability to capture photos and video simultaneously – makes most sense. Zoe takes more than a little explaining (and as such is likely to be the second most misunderstood element of the One experience among consumers at retail) but, as HTC told us, it’s basically “TiVo for your life.”

Photos, HTC explained, are easy to shoot, but only capture a static moment in time; they lose out on valuable context, which is missed altogether when you go back and review them later. Zoe content – the name deriving from the zoetrope, an ancient device for creating moving pictures from rapidly spinning stills, and from the Greek for “alive” – anticipates the convergence of photo and video, however, using the One’s photographic prowess to snatch both stills and footage at the same time.

Hit the Zoe mode icon on the left of the redesigned camera app UI, and when you tap the on-screen photo button it progressively changes from grey to red over the course of around three seconds. During that time, it’s snapping fifteen still frames as well as Full HD video; they’re combined with the five stills and 0.6s of footage from just before you hit the button, and packaged up into what HTC refers to as “a Zoe.”

So, when you browse through the Event folders in the One’s gallery app, you see small animated Zoe thumbnails looping through the 3.6s clips. Alternatively, you can scroll through the twenty photos making up each Zoe, with various effects and tweaks to be made. These range from the Instagram-style basic, applying colored filters and such, to more complex real-time effects.

You can create a sequence shot, for instance, joining the action from four images into a single frame, or use face-recognition to take the best expressions from multiple images and combine them into one frame (similar to the Scalado-based technology BlackBerry 10 and Nokia’s Windows Phones use, though HTC tells us it’s a home-grown alternative). There’s also object removal, and the face-recognition means the One can automatically identify eyes and selectively whiten them (if there are multiple people in the same frame, the phone asks which you want to edit), enlarge them, or smooth out skin tones.

At the top of each Event view there’s what HTC calls the “highlight reel”: a 30 second edit containing chopped up content from the stills, videos, and Zoe clips from that event. The One creates these on-the-fly, identifying what it believes are the most interesting parts of any video – i.e. where there’s action, or faces showing – into an instantly-sharable snapshot of that collection. The cuts themselves can’t be manually changed, but there’s a “Remix” button that automatically triggers a new assembly, and a choice of six themes which each have their own visual style, overall mood, and background music. Eventually, HTC intends to offer more themes, as well as the ability to load your own backing track.

Content that’s included in the highlight reel is usually automatically selected, but the One’s “smart curation” bases its choices, in part, on how often you’ve looked at specific photos, how you’ve rated them, and other meta-knowledge so as to educate the cuts it makes. Alternatively, you can select which photos, videos, and Zoeys get included, and merge different Events to give the phone more content to choose from; the One is clever enough to discard the first couple of milliseconds of the beginning of each Zoe clip, when you’re likely to have experienced some camera shake.

It feels, admittedly, like a gimmick at first. Then again, so did Instagram, and look how that caught on: HTC picked thirty second highlights as it felt people wouldn’t watch anything longer, and we can see that being the case. The time-investment to watch through a half-minute showreel is minimal, and the immediacy of the system is worlds away from the generally clunky phone video editing apps other manufacturers are pushing.

Zoe and the highlight reel concept is still pretty raw, of course. Manual settings perhaps aren’t in keeping with the “smart curation” idea, but we’d like a little more control over cuts and highlights; similarly, some sort of Remix history would be a nice addition, since right now it’s only luck as to whether you get a better mash-up than you already have. A Zoe API for third-party apps to integrate with Zoe, or to offer their own extras, is in the pipeline, but likely won’t be ready for the One’s release.

It’s the Zoe Share service – an online gallery of highlight reels and select Zoe content – that we find most frustrating, though, at least in its first iteration. Getting videos there, and keeping them there, are both flawed processes: for instance, at the moment Zoe only outputs highlight videos in Full HD resolution (think 12-20MB apiece depending on footage) which means uploads aren’t quite as snappy as creating the MP4 itself is. Meanwhile, HTC has decided to only store uploaded Zoe collections for thirty days: after that time, they’re automatically deleted.

That, the company argues, is a concession to making Zoe Share a free service: with webspace so cheap – Dropbox is giving all One buyers 25GB free, in fact – we’d argue HTC loses more in goodwill than it saves in hosting fees. If I’m taking the time (and potentially paying the data charges) to upload a chunk of photo and video content, I probably want to know it’s going to last for longer than a month.

Changes may well be afoot, though, to address some of our concerns. HTC told us that it’s testing out different output resolutions, thus decreasing file size and making it faster to share Zoe content. At the moment, individual stills can be saved from Zoe Share, but HTC is looking at more comprehensive archiving options for entire Zoe collections.

HTC’s challenge will be explaining all this, particularly at the point of retail. Zoe makes more sense the more you play with it, and – once you grasp the idea of the total amount of light being more important than the number of points of light – the 4-megapixel camera sheds what confusion it initially prompts. Explaining them, though, will take time, and in the world of spec-sheet bingo, where comparisons are made on the size of numbers and not what they necessarily bring to the table, that’s going to be an uphill battle. We’ll know more when we have a chance to put the HTC One’s camera through its paces properly for the full SlashGear review.

HTC One hands-on: UltraPixel Camera and Zoe is written by Chris Davies & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.

Leaning towards the Samsung Galaxy Camera but don’t think that cellular connectivity is of much use for you? Well, Sammy‘s just taken the covers off a new variant, dubbed the EK-GC110, forsaking the 3G / 4G modem and making the device more affordable in the process. Other key specs remain the same as its sibling, the EK-GC100, including a 16.3-megapixel CMOS sensor, 21x optical zoom, 4.8-inch display, 1.4GHz quad-core processor and Android 4.1. The all-important pricing and availability information is still TBA, however. And while this WiFi-only iteration is even less likely to make you set your smartphone aside, hopefully it won’t hurt your wallet so much.

Filed under: Cameras, Samsung

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Source: Samsung