new 29MP sensor from KODAK

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Image Sensors World: Kodak Announced 29MP W-RGB Interline Transfer CCD

 

Kodak announced KAI-29050 claimed to be the highest resolution CCD based on Interline Transfer technology. The 35mm optical format CCD is based on 5.5um pixels and features TRUESENSE W-RGB filter pattern to enhance low-light sensitivity.

 

This 35mm format CCD is the 7th in Kodak's family 5.5um pixel devices, a family that includes an entire set of image sensors from 1 to 29 megapixels. The KAI-29050 joins two other products - the 720p format KAI-01150 and the 1080p format KAI-02150 - as the first devices to use the KODAK TRUESENSE Color Filter Pattern. The TRUESENSE technology is claimed to provide a 2x to 4x increase in light sensitivity compared to a standard Bayer color sensor by adding panchromatic pixels to the standard RGB elements that form the image sensor array.

 

The KODAK KAI-29050 Image Sensor is sampling today in limited quantities, with production scheduled for mid-2011. The KODAK KAI-01050 and KAI-02050 Image Sensors are available today in PGA packages, with CLCC packages scheduled to be available Q1, 2011.

 

 

Update to the M system is inevitable!!

 

They said this sensor is plug and play... would love to see this plugged into m9 with updated LCD + sapphire glass... I am sold.

[likalar]

Thanks for the info. Progress has been so amazing in this area. I'm glad to see Kodak's name here. That sensor system with the right lens could be amazing, so look forward seeing some tests.

 

Larry

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[okram]

I think implementing this would mean completely new rangefinder design.

This 18mp FF is probably a borderline for this M system for lenses over 50mm.

Lenses, on the other side, can take it with no problem.

 

I hope M10 will mean exactly this- ground up design of key components, but essentially the same camera as M9.

At the same time- question is who needs more MP? I would rather see some other improvements (speed, noise, operational reliability and weather proofing).

 

 

 

m

[andybarton]

Is there any reason why at least some of these improvements might not come with the next generation M anyway?

[AlanG]

The date is from November 2010 so maybe it will be in a new camera before long. I'd think that a higher MP sensor would require a much faster image processor than the M9 has. And, in reading the Kodak press release, it seems that this is from a different "family" of processors than the one in the M9? I don't know what ramifications that may have for replacing the one in the M9 but I can't see it being a plug and play replacement. (But what do I know?)

 

Also, I see it has a choice of a Bayer array or Truesense. If Leica were to use the Truesense filter array, what would that mean to in camera and external raw conversions?

Edited April 28, 2011 by AlanG

[adan]

1. It is plug and play with previous (smaller) versions of the same sensor technology - which have nothing to do with the M9 sensor - so it may well show up in an M10 or some such, but not as a simple upgrade in the M9. Unless one considers an upgrade to be, "We'll re-use your top and bottom plates, but we'll be replacing everything else - at the same price as a new camera."

 

2. It is an interline-transfer CCD, whereas the M8/M9 sensors are frame-transfer CCDs. The good news is it can output a video signal as well as as single exposures, but again it will require different output/support electronics.

 

I do think that if Leica stays with Kodak as their imager supplier, that some or all of these technologies may well turn up in a new Leica camera eventually. But it won't go into an M9 any more than a Nikon D3X sensor can go into a Nikon D1X.

______

 

Alan - that's probably the easy part (Truesense pattern) - just firmware changes to the algorithms for in-camera, and new algorithms from Adobe, C1, Bibble, Apple, etc. for raw. It would take TIME - to fiddle with how to demosaic a whole new pattern, but the end results would just be new algebra, not new hardware.

Edited April 28, 2011 by adan

[ho_co]

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The Image Sensors World article has a nifty chart, but dates from five months ago.

 

The Kodak press release is dated 2 Nov 2010.

 

The topic was addressed on the forum in this thread started 7 Nov 2010: http://www.l-camera-forum.com/leica-forum/customer-forum/149913-new-kodak-sensor.html.

 

 

Does anyone know where the sensor is in use today?

Edited April 28, 2011 by ho_co

[jaapv]

Sorry to dash cold water on high expectations - this can hardly be classified as news. It is an older announcement of an industrial type sensor that requires activee cooling so it is not suitable for camera applications. It might be interesting for astronomy use though in large telescopes.

[AlanG]

 

Alan - that's probably the easy part (Truesense pattern) - just firmware changes to the algorithms for in-camera, and new algorithms from Adobe, C1, Bibble, Apple, etc. for raw. It would take TIME - to fiddle with how to demosaic a whole new pattern, but the end results would just be new algebra, not new hardware.

 

Yes I've got that. But what about the "look" from this sensor. This is a whole different ballgame than the CCD vs. CMOS debate.

[adan]

So far as I can tell, while there are various ways to introduce "white light" pixels into the RGB array, Kodak seems to be primarily working with and promoting a pattern in which half the pixels are white, with green making up 1/4 and red and blue making up 1/8 of the pixels each.

 

It shows up in this brochure for a lower-res version of the same sensor line, about page 9: http://www.kodak.com/global/plugins/acrobat/en/business/ISS/datasheet/interline/KAI-02150LongSpec.pdf

 

(WARNING: Brain damage may result for some if they try to read the rest of the spec sheet!! )

 

I'd say the different "look" from this array would be:

 

> little or no loss (perhaps even an increase) in monochrome resolution - all those white pixels side-by-side

 

> quite a bit less color resolution, especially green. Grass blades would be fuzzier, and it would not be able to resolve as fine a red/blue stripe pattern in the subject without moire.

 

> somewhat lower color discrimination/color clarity/color saturation - colored things will have a lot of pure white light desaturating them.

 

> and less noise - Kodak promotes it as "a brighter image" for a given ISO, but that also translates into "the same brightness" at a higher effective ISO. I.E. ISO 3200 brightness with ISO 800 or 1600 noise.

 

- as compared to an otherwise identical 29 Mpixel Bayer-patterned sensor.

 

The "tile" that comprises a full set of colors requires 16 pixels (GWRWWGWRBWGWWBWG) , while only four pixels are needed to build the basic RGBG tile of the Bayer pattern.

 

With Leica-M-style wide lenses with a high angle of incidence, this pattern would be much more prone to color fringing in the corners, given the physical separation of red and blue pixels being so much bigger. Not sure it would be possible to offset the microlenses as done in the M8/9. Probably also some increase in color fringing for SLR-type wides/normals.

 

For the intended market - surveillance where SOME color data is useful to ID clothes or skin or license plate colors, but perfect "happy client" color is not - it is probably a useful compromise.

 

Kodak's Truesense annoucement is pretty, well, obvious in defining the target market: KODAK CCD Image Sensors Increase Light Sensitivity for Applied Imaging Markets

 

OTOH, there was a Swiss jurisdiction that used M8s as traffic-surveillance cameras - so you just never know where these sensors might end up

[Your Old Dog]

Thanks for the post/info.

 

When I read stuff like this it makes me wonder how it is that this is not the Golden Age of Technology. Had you told me 40 years ago we would see this I'd have thought you were nuts

 

Instead of typing on my tiny cellphone screen (HTC Thunderbolt) I can just speak and interprets the language and prints out the words in my Notes program. Artificial intelligence can't be far away. So I whisper into my M12 as I hold it to my eye, "Bracket f5.6 to f11 in 1/3 steps" "speed 1/500" "lady with large hat and small dog". It would be great if we could all stick around for the tomorrow of tomorrows.

Edited May 1, 2011 by Your Old Dog