Is there any new technology? Mobile phone cameras are becoming less and less common

Look at this phone.

Huawei Mate40 RS

It is Huawei Mate40 RS Porsche Design.

What do you think of the appearance on the back?

I feel quite uncomfortable.

But this seems to have become a trend. In the past two years, the number of domestic mobile phone rear cameras has exceeded 5.

Main camera, ultra-wide-angle camera, telephoto camera, ultra-telephoto camera, ToF 3D camera...

If we also include some miscellaneous things, there are less openings on the back of the phone. There are also seven or eight.

There were some weirdos in the industry before, and there were five main cameras alone.

It’s the Nokia 9 Pure View with five 12-megapixel cameras.

Many netizens will feel unhappy when they see these models.

In recent years, many netizens have pointed out the problem of too many mobile phone cameras.

But I want to avenge them.

In fact, these are the last resort choices at present.

Almost all of today’s multi-camera mobile phones use a periscope telephoto camera.

The magnification of these periscope telephoto cameras is not low, ranging from three to five times, and up to 10 times.

The problem lies in this ultra-telephoto camera.

If we can only make three cameras now, the main camera, ultra-wide angle and periscope telephoto lens.

Then their equivalent focal lengths are generally 16mm for the ultra-wide angle, 26mm for the main camera and 128mm for the telephoto lens.

That is, there are only three options: 0.6x, 1x and 10x zoom.

When we use such a mobile phone to zoom in and shoot, there will be an obvious missing focal length supported by the lens.

At this time, if you want to complete the zoom between 1x and 10x, the mobile phone can only use pure digital zoom instead.

It will be blurry.

But this is not the most serious problem.

What affects the experience the most is that when you slowly increase the telephoto ratio from 1x to 10x, the picture will slowly become blurry at first, and then when it reaches 10x, the picture will suddenly become blurry. Very clear.

The whole experience is very fragmented.

So, mobile phone manufacturers came up with the first compromise method - adding a telephoto camera in the middle between 1 and 10, such as Huawei's 3 zoom.

At this time, the phone has a fourth camera, which can achieve 1~3x zoom by cropping the main camera;

For 3~10x zoom, use the main camera and the telephoto lens

Switch to a super telephoto lens when zooming to 10x.

This solution of adding an extra camera can make the zoom process slightly smoother.

In fact, if users don’t mind, the more cameras added to these focal lengths, the better the experience will be.

It’s just that there are more and more cameras on the back of mobile phones.

If you want mobile phone manufacturers to solve this problem, they still have to start with a telephoto lens.

And the method is very simple:

Like a SLR, make a telephoto lens that can truly adjust the focal length, and use one camera instead of three or four.

In this way, the conflict between telephoto and multiple cameras can be solved.

So, is there such a thing?

Yes.

Previously, domestic manufacturer OFILM made one this year.

That’s it.

OFILM periscope continuous zoom camera

As early as June, OFILM made a demo of this camera’s optical zoom.

Judging from the demo, OFILM's periscope telephoto camera achieves a continuous zoom of 3 to 7 times by moving the internal lens.

The lens module itself supports AF autofocus, and the prism supports OIS optical image stabilization.

Subsequently, OFILM announced more detailed information.

First of all, this lens module provides an equivalent focal length of 85~170mm.

As mentioned before, you can use it to zoom continuously between 3x and 7x.

Different from the zoom currently used in mobile phones, this set of lenses from OFILM is a full optical zoom.

Rather than a single-magnification optical zoom of only 2x, 3x, or 10x, strictly speaking, this lens with only a single magnification cannot be called an optical zoom.

In addition to combining several telephoto lenses into one, this continuous optical zoom brings an unprecedented change:

The picture quality of mobile phone photos will not be deteriorated by adjusting the focus.

From now on, the only thing that will affect the quality of your photos is WeChat’s compression algorithm.

In addition, this module is composed of three groups of "1GMO6P" and uses a long-axis piezoelectric motor to move the lens.

Piezoelectric motors can improve the stability and accuracy of lens movement.

Combined with the OIS optical image stabilization of the front prism, the stability of the zoom process can be further improved.

The first two characteristics determine the image quality that the lens can provide.

Strictly speaking, it is not a big breakthrough.

OFILM’s biggest breakthrough this time is to make this thing fit into a mobile phone.

The thickness of this module is only 5.9mm.

What is the concept?

It is 0.05mm thicker than the 10x optical zoom camera module of the Huawei P40 Pro.

It can be put on mobile phones for commercial use.

And.

This set of periscope telephoto cameras was independently developed, designed and produced by OFILM.

In addition to 3~7x zoom, OFILM can also independently design periscope continuous optical zoom modules with different focal lengths and magnifications such as 3~5x, 5~8x, 3.5~9.5x, etc. .

With these lens modules, we can use a variable aperture periscope telephoto camera to achieve an experience that cannot be achieved with the current three telephoto lenses.

However.

It should be pointed out that OFILM also mentioned that this technology is still in the demo stage.

There is still some time before mass production.

Of course, we have seen technology that can be mass-produced before.

On vivo APEX 2020, in addition to the micro gimbal, a variable focal length telephoto lens is used.

However, the zoom lens of vivo APEX 2020 only provides 5~7.5x zoom, which is worse than OFILM’s latest solution.

Seeing this, some netizens may be confused.

Who is this Ou Feiguang that suddenly appears?

OFILM is a Chinese technology company.

Mainly engaged in touch display modules, camera modules, and fingerprint recognition modules, developing into the field of smart cars.

In the equipment you have used, there may be lens modules provided by OFILM.

This is a technology company established in 2002. According to the records that can be found, they have several major events.

Let me tell you a little bit, and you will know what the company OFILM is like.

In 2016, OFILM acquired Sony's South China factory and then began to develop the mobile phone lens industry.

In 2017, OFILM participated in the supply of front lens modules for iPhone 8 and iPhone X.

In the same year, Cook also went shopping at OFILM.

In 2018, OFILM participated in lens supply for Huawei P20.

In 2019, OFILM shipped 135 million mobile phone lenses, and its partners covered almost all mainstream technology companies.

Simply put, this is a Chinese technology company specializing in optical-related technologies.

Therefore, OFILM’s launch of this set of lenses has different meanings from vivo’s launch of a concept machine with a continuous optical zoom lens set.

The launch of vivo may mean that vivo has calibrated this set of cameras with the supplier, indicating that vivo may launch this product next.

The launch of OFILM means that mobile phone manufacturers such as OPPO, vivo, Huawei, Xiaomi, Apple, Meizu, etc. have the possibility of using this set of lenses.

That’s why I wrote so much!

With OFILM announcing the successful development of this product, we are one step closer to everyone being able to use this lens.

When mass production occurs, there will be no reason to increase the number of cameras on mobile phones.

In my opinion, a main camera, an ultra-wide-angle lens and a continuous optical zoom lens are the standard features of future mobile phones.

Come quickly on this day.