DARPA may have already gone to the trouble of building a 1.8 gigapixel camera as part of its
ARGUS-IS project (pictured above), but it looks like the US Army is setting its sights a little higher, and it's now soliciting proposals for a 2.3 gigapixel camera that would be used for some super-wide aerial surveillance. While obviously still quite a ways from becoming reality, the Army hopes the system will be both smaller and lighter than previous systems, work in the infrared range to boot, and capture images at a rate of two frames per second. The key bit, however, is of course that 2.3 gigapixel sensor, which should let the camera provide continuous coverage of a range of about sixty-two square miles at a resolution of 0.3 meters, or just enough to make out the outline of your tinfoil hat.
posted Aug 20th 2009 5:36PM
1.21 gigapixels?!!?
Great Scott!
omg doc you're still alive
I want Terra Pixel for my mobile camera
Dont matter, I bet the lens will be crap and no autofocus!
ZING!
http://lifeinmegapixels.com/fullscreen.php?location=bath
1.3 gigapixels
I've got just what they need!
http://img34.imageshack.us/img34/7595/00029910.jpg
DANG.... and people are wishing for a iPhone camera thats higher then 4 Megapixels....
the us army sure does have high expectations...
Yes, because more megapixels in the iPhone will sure make the camera much better...
A giant taco.
He was just waiting for an excuse to find out what a vagina looks like
How is babby formed with 2.3 gigapixels?
62 square miles on 2.3 megapixels? Something ain't right.
GIGApixels
The story said megapixels the second time, it needs to be changed.
Someone ain't used to saying gigapixels :P
actually, the camera would have a series of sensors at 2.3 each. with enough, you'd have a camera capable of 2.3 gigapixel images.
Thats GIGApixels.....
"The key bit, however, is of course that 2.3 megapixel sensor"
Should be giga :)
Ditto :-)
Tritto.
Or... Uh, something.
-Taylor
Gigady gigady..
2.3 megapixel sensor on a 2.3 gigapixel camera. Read your articles before posting them engadget people.
That will never happen.
@Joseph
I almost roasted you for your comment, thinking you meant that a 2.3 gigapixel camera will never happen. boom, close to being roasted.
What kind of memory/busses/etc are they using that can handle that much data that fast?
was asking myself the same question. must be a NASA processer.
*Dr. Evil Voice:*
I want infinity BILLION pixels!
yay w8 for terapixels
Well eventually they're bound to hit the point where the sensor for each pixel would have to be smaller than the wavelengths of visible light and making any more just won't help. That or the cameras will have to be friggin' ginormous
Tin foil hat..Pah! The more high tech they go the lower I go..My hat is now made of soil and grass..
Want someone to start complaining that simply upping the number of pixels won't help.
Simply upping the number of pixels wont help. Nothing but a marketing trick to fool terrorists who don't know any better.
"The key bit, however, is of course that 2.3 megapixel sensor"
Or rather, the scores of them that need to be taped together to get the total resolution up to 2.3 gigapixels.
Now they just need a 35964p (33.3 x 1080p) TV monitor with 3D support at base, so they can shoot and watch XXXXXXXXHD p0rn!
Life is good.
Place on the ceiling.
OVER 9000 (gigapixels)
I emphatically disagree with your misleading rhetoric.
WTF does the Army want with arial survellience? They couldn't even get the FCS to work right!
Hey Army, stick to kicking in doors and let the pros (USAF) handle UAV technology, K?
There is a rap-gangsta related joke I want to make here, but it would probably get me banned.
OH come on! tell it already...
In 20 years this will be in the iPhone and it still won't be enough for the haters. LOL
You make no sense.
u have the same name as i do
and why do i always have to confirm and type in my email + password, cant i just login?
Ack! Just when we thought the megapixel race was over, they start the gigapixel race!
Wouldn't a Film-based surveillance camera still provide more Gigapixel goodness? I was told that despite digital photography's advances - we're still not yet able to match the Gigapixel equivalent that you can get with film.
From Wikipedia:
" Many professional-quality film cameras use medium format or large format films. Because of the size of the imaging area, they have higher resolution than the current top-of-the-range digital cameras. It is estimated that a medium format film image can record around 50 megapixels, while large format films can record around 200 megapixels (4 × 5 inch) which would equate to around 800 megapixels on the largest common film format, 8 × 10 inches "
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_versus_film_photography
But then again, I'm probably wrong since I'm talking about consumer level photography equipment.
There's a very good chance that the images will be sent ASAP to some command location. Can't do that with film ;)
You should probably read quotes before you post them. That quote says 200 megapixels which could possibly upscale to 800 megapixels. That's still just a tiny bit more than 1/3 the resolution this article is talking about.
even the largest format film would never even come close to even a single gigapixel. it even says so in your wikipedia quote......
@cesium: Yeah, that was one of the things I thought would justify digital. Also - the fact that digital photography is a lot easier to manipulate.
@mark and @owdee : You should probably read a bit more before offering a counter argument. Film has surpassed the Gigapixel mark a long, long time ago. Both the U2 and SR 71 spy planes carried cameras with several Gigapixels. In fact, a group of people acquired the U2's camera technology and have 4 Gigapixel FILM Camera ( see their project here: http://www.gigapxl.org/project.htm )
So, you're wrong - film has long ago surpassed the 1 Gigapixel equivalence mark.
Alright, then you should have used that quote. I wasn't saying you were wrong, just that the quote you used didn't back up your argument.