Samsung made a 200 megapixel smartphone sensor

Samsung just threw in a glove and insisted its new imaging sensor could be what knocked Sony off its perch. The Korean giant today announced the ISOCELL HP1, which it claims is the first 200-megapixel (with 0.64m pixels) image sensor for mobile devices. He added that silicon is already small enough to accommodate mobile hardware, and the promise of all those extra pixels is to retain fidelity when images are cropped or resized.

Of course, those eye-catching numbers don’t really mean a huge sum considering that the HP1 will use pixel-binning like any other overpowered image sensor. But arguably the biggest innovation here is ChameleonCell, which can adjust the extent of binning according to the environment. For example, in very low light, the camera is reduced (by 16) to a 12.5 megapixel sensor, but promises much brighter and clearer images compared to its rivals.

When shooting video in bright light, the system will divide by four, offering a 50 megapixel lens capable of shooting 8K video at 30 frames per second. According to Samsung, all of this average will produce images and videos containing “an astonishing amount of detail that helps the image stay sharp even when cropped or resized.”

Samples of the new silicon are available now, and we expect to see them appear in mobile devices in the distant future. It should be noted that Samsung’s Exynos 2100 already supports image sensors up to 200 megapixels. not say that.