Samsung shows britecell camera sensor with rwb format for smartphones
Samsung has presented a new cmos sensor for use in smartphones. The manufacturer claims that its Britecell chip, in which the green subpixels have been replaced by white ones, enables smaller camera modules without loss of quality.
The information about the new britecell sensor has been released on the Samsung Electronics Investors Forum. In the presentation, Samsung showed a chip with a resolution of 16 megapixels and a pixel size of 1 µm. Thanks to the britecell technology, the camera module would be 17 percent thinner than a comparable chip with 1.12 1,m pixels, while the noise performance is comparable, despite the smaller dimensions of the individual pixels.
Traditional cmos sensors have a Bayer filter with red, green and blue sub-pixels. The original Bayer pattern has twice as many green subpixels as red and blue, as these are the most light sensitive. The final color of each pixel is calculated by interpolation. Since 2012, Sony has been making RGBW sensors for smartphones, which have extra white subpixels and can therefore capture more light. In the Britecell design, Samsung completely omits the green color filter, creating an RWB format with red, white and blue sub-pixels. According to the maker, the design results in improved light sensitivity and less color artifacts. How all colors are then calculated is unknown.
The chip also has Smart WDR technology, which stands for wide dynamic range. It is not yet clear to what extent this differs from current HDR technology. For autofocus, the britecell sensor uses phase detection; a technique that is already widely used.
Samsung introduced its isocell sensor in 2013, and the new Britecell technology is presumably its successor. In 2016, smartphones with britecell sensor will appear. The Korean manufacturer is likely to equip the Galaxy S7 with the sensor. Last week, Samsung already announced the arrival of the Exynos 8890-soc, which will probably also be used in the upcoming flagship.