Image Sensor from Discrete Parts Delivers Glorious 1-Kilopixel Images

-

Chances are pretty good that you have at least one digital image sensor somewhere close to you at this moment, likely within arm’s reach. The ubiquity of digital cameras is due to how cheap these sensors have become, and how easy they are to integrate into all sorts of devices. So why in the world would someone want to build an image sensor from discrete parts that’s 12,000 times worse than the average smartphone camera? Because, why not?

[Sean Hodgins] originally started this project as a digital pinhole camera, which is why it was called “digiObscura.” The idea was to build a 32×32 array of photosensors and focus light on it using only a pinhole, but that proved optically difficult as the small aperture greatly reduced the amount of light striking the array. The sensor, though, is where the interesting stuff is. [Sean] soldered 1,024 ALS-PT19 surface-mount phototransistors to the custom PCB along with two 32-bit analog multiplexers. The multiplexers are driven by a microcontroller to select each pixel in turn, one row and one column at a time. It takes a full five seconds to scan the array, so taking a picture hearkens back to the long exposures common in the early days of photography. And sure, it’s only a 1-kilopixel image, but it works.

[Sean] has had this project cooking for a while – in fact, the multiplexers he used for the camera came up as a separate project back in 2018. We’re glad to see that he got the rest built, even with the recycled lens he used. One wonders how a 3D-printed lens would work in front of that sensor.



from CommaFeed - Real Time Trends Network https://ift.tt/2MIvGcp
via IFTTT

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Takeaways from the outcry over Dior’s Johnny Depp perfume ad: Tuesday Wake-Up Call

-
Welcome to Ad Age’s Wake-Up Call, our daily roundup of advertising, marketing, media and digital news. You can sign up to get an audio version of this briefing on your Alexa device. Dior pulls a perfume ad starring Johnny Depp Yet another luxury brand just had to backtrack after a culturally insensitive move. Dior on Friday pulled an ad for its “Sauvage” perfume, as Business of Fashion reports ; the spot starred Johnny Depp playing guitar in the desert while a Native American dancer, Canku One Star, performed in traditional dress. The company portrayed the spot as “an authentic journey deep into the Native American soul.” But the brand was quickly accused of cultural appropriation. Critics seemed most troubled by the juxtaposition of Native American imagery with the word "Sauvage"—which means “wild” in French, but which also evokes the history of labeling indigenous groups as “savages.”  LVMH-owned Parfums Christian Dior had apparently tried to proceed cautiously. It coo
Read more

When the coronavirus infodemic strikes

-
Image
Social media sites are stepping up their efforts in the war against misinformation… specifically, the coronavirus/COVID-19 infodemic . There’s a seemingly endless stream of potentially dangerous misinformation flying around online related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and that could have fatal results. It’s boomtown in fake-news land riding high on the wave of people being left with their tech devices 24/7. I myself regularly see everything posted online from “hand gel is an immunizer” (nope) and “children can’t be affected” (not true) to “UK rules mean domestic abuse survivors have to stay with their abusive spouse” (absolutely not true at all and hugely dangerous to claim).  We even have engineers being spat on thanks to 5G conspiracy theories potentially resulting in transmission of coronavirus . Turns out a global pandemic is a lightning rod for pushing people to conspiracy theories galore, to the extent that some folks have to go hunting for guides to wean their family members a
Read more

Patch, Or Your Solid State Drives Roll Over And Die

-
Image
Expiration dates for computer drives? That’s what a line of HP solid-state drives are facing as the variable for their uptime counter is running out. When it does, the drive “expires” and, well, no more data storage for you! There are a series of stages in the evolution of a software developer as they master their art, and one of those stages comes in understanding that while they may have a handle on the abstracted world presented by their development environment they perhaps haven’t considered the moments in which the real computer that lives behind it intrudes. Think of the first time you saw an SQL injection attack on a website, for example, or the moment you realised that a variable type is linked to the physical constraints of the number of memory locations it has reserved for it. So people who write software surround themselves with an armoury of things they watch out for as they code, and thus endeavour to produce software less likely to break. Firmly in that arena is the size
Read more