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Canon's 120-megapixel sensor enhances video better than CSI
Canon has been playing with high-megapixel sensors up to 250 megapixels since 2010, but it's now showing what very high-resolution video looks like. It shot some clips with its 120MXS CMOS sensor (13,280 x 9,184 effective pixels) showing how much detail it retains even when you digitally zoom deeply into the video. You can do that with stills already, but it's impressive to see it happen at nearly 10 fps, bringing to life the silly "enhance video" cliché from Blade Runner and CSI-type shows.
DARPA threat detection technology uses a camera to see targets, software and soldier brains to identify them
DARPA aids our military in myriad ways, from designing one shot, one kill weapons to creating robotic pack mules to carry soldiers' gear. It's also been building tools for soldiers to better survey their environment and identify threats, and its latest such tool is called the Cognitive Technology Threat Warning System (CT2WS). CT2WS is comprised of a 120-megapixel electro-optical video camera with a 120-degree field of view feeding a laptop running cognitive visual processing algorithms. Those algorithms identify potential targets in the video feed, which are shown to a soldier wearing an EEG cap that monitors brain signals. You see, the human brain is particularly good at perceiving threats, and CT2WS looks for the particular brain wave that occurs when we see one. The human component drastically improves the accuracy with which the system can identify enemies from afar. How accurate? Testing in desert, tropical and open terrain showed that without a solider/EEG filter, the system had 810 false alarms out of 2,304 threat events in an hour. Incorporating the filter resulted in only five false alarms per hour, plus it was able to identify 91 percent of the potential targets successfully. Not good enough, you say? Add commercial radar into the mix and the army becomes omniscient -- the system then identified 100 percent of the test targets.
Canon's Wonder Camera, and other future concepts that tease us from behind glass
Canon had a lot to show for itself at its annual expo today, from the EOS 60D to the (working!) Multipurpose 4K concept, but the best goodies are of course the ones just a few steps outside of today's technological limits. One display in particular that caught our eye was the 2010 Image Creation set, featuring the bold Wonder Camera Concept from July. Nothing functional here, not even in sleight-of-hand video render form, but the models are quite the lookers. Joining the "SLR Style Concept" (as it was being called here, according to the accompanying placard) were the 3D Cam, Image Palette (display), Image Navi Cam (point and shoot), and MR HMD (helmet) -- all aesthetically Kubrick in nature. Not that we mind, of course; we find it best to go ahead and accept our future for the glossy white design motif that it'll assuredly become. Elsewhere, we happened upon the purported "world's largest CMOS sensor" -- not that we'd argue with what we saw -- and the more compact 120 megapixel CMOS, along with (separately) its panoramic camera prototype body. You can live vicariously through us in the photos below. %Gallery-101173%
Canon proudly intros 120 megapixel CMOS sensor, probably won't hit a DSLR in your lifetime
Oh sure, household names like Pentax are already producing cameras with 40 megapixel sensors, and we've seen quite a few gigapixel images crafted with a pinch of black magic, but Canon's newest innovation may take the mainstream megapixel race to its next logical level. Or should we say... illogical level. There's no two ways about it -- just trying to comprehend an APS-H-sized CMOS sensor with 120 megapixels is downright painful, and we're inclined to believe the company's claim that it's the world's highest resolution for its size. This new concoction has a pixel count of around 7.5 times larger than the company's highest-resolution commercial CMOS sensor of the same size (which is pegged at 16.1 megapixels), yet it still supports burst shooting of up to 9.5fps. Furthermore, it's fully capable of capturing 1080p video, but the one detail we're all eager to ingest isn't listed. For now, though, the plan is to let you know about the first camera to ship with it inside at Photokina 2030.
