Casio EX-F 1, 1200 fps "monster"

20 17 May, Sony Semiconductor introduced the image sensor ""『IMX382』 "". This kind of sensor adopts laminated structure (Japanese characters: laminated type), which represents the advanced manufacturing technology with high development in the times.

The sensor has only 1.27 million pixels, the resolution is 1304x976, the specification size is 1/3.2 inches, and the single pixel size is 3.5x3.5 μ m. ..

"The biggest feature of' 『IMX382』' is a number with advertising effect-1000 fps. In the mode of 640x470 4bit, images can be read at such a speed.

However, in 2008, nine years ago, Casio produced a civil positioning machine with the highest speed of 1200fps, which is actually higher than the sensor's 1000fps.

That is, the protagonist of this paper, the machine whose full name is EXILIM Pro EX-F 1.

This machine was released in early 2008.

2008 is a great year for cameras. This year, Canon, Nikon and Sony released their digital SLR products in Quan Huafu.

And now the popular irreversibility was also announced in this year with the establishment of MFT system.

In such a passionate pow generation year,

Casio, with a camera EX-F 1, handed in his own answer sheet.

EX-F 1 is a bridge camera, which looks like a SLR.

This kind of camera, with the launch of Sony R 1 in 2005 as the climax, flourished and declined.

F 1 still insists on making this kind of camera, but it adds a new point of view to this slightly declining model.

In the model design, it is worth mentioning the flash structure.

In the pop-up flash structure, in addition to the common xenon lamp, LED is also configured.

This is a strategy that xenon flash can't keep up with the dial-back speed when shooting at high speed, but especially uses always-on LED to fill the light. At the same time, it can also take care of the needs of video fill light.

Many years later, under the trend of VDSLR and non-anti-popularization, LED began to be added to the design of flash.

By the way, because Casio has no large-scale system, there is only a single connection at the hot shoe.

Casio is an interesting manufacturer.

The so-called old-fashioned glasses enterprise we are talking about today does not have Casio.

But it plays an important role in the development of digital photography.

For example, in Casio's internal meeting, it must be called QV- 1995+00.

This machine is the first digital camera in the world to realize real-time viewing.

At the same time, perhaps as a non-optical manufacturer, Casio didn't have so many constraints, and almost immediately realized that LV framing can bring great freedom, and QV 10 was designed with rotation function-in the following years, other manufacturers were greatly influenced by this design, and even in the late 1990s, every family had this design.

In 2002, Casio threw another wave of bombs on the appearance.

The thickness of EX-S 1 is 1 1.3mm, which is quite square.

A new series of "『EXILIM cards" was formed, and it was expanded into the exclusive title of "card machine" in Chinese later.

You can read another article if you are interested. ...

In the manufacture of digital cameras, Casio is more like an integrator than an all-round manufacturer.

And it also clearly recognizes this, so it will be more clear in selling points and positioning.

It is not a shame for Casio to seek help from other manufacturers in the design and manufacture of optical lenses, but the only way to serve a larger and overall goal.

In 2004, Exilim Pro series was made into P600, and the camera showed that Canon was very frank.

This advantage is that you can choose the most suitable raw materials as freely as possible without being restricted by the products of the same company or group.

-Samsung, who made cameras many years later, seems to have not bypassed this threshold-

Focus more on making ideal models.

It also depends on how far the ideal is.

Perhaps, somehow, it is decided that only Casio is the most suitable for this kind of high-speed machine.

Why can this camera achieve high speed?

There are three factors that limit high speed:

The team of DP evaluation made a guess, that is to say, EX-F 1 used the "Xianimx017CQE" sensor DPR actually produced by Sony in early 2007. This speculation is quite common. The news of IMX0 17 production is that at the beginning of 2007, Casio put forward the design concept of high-speed aircraft in the second half of 2007, and has provided a prototype, which has also been visited by some Japanese media.

Finally, the 60fps reading of F 1 is also consistent with the parameters of IMX0 17.

Two addresses about IMX0 17CQE published at that time:

They all failed. Now Sony Semiconductor's website has been moved to sony-semicon.co.jp, and there seems to be no product information before the EXMOR brand.

Incidentally, in 2007, IMX02 1 of Sony SLR α700 was the first batch of Exmor brand image sensors-α 700 was released in September 2007, while IMX 02 1 was disclosed in July 2007, and the two products seemed to match each other. However, IMX0 17 was released in February 2007 and could not be listed in EXMOR, so it missed the spotlight and big tiger skin.

The first EXMOR is IMX035, a 1/3 inch safety sensor.

As background knowledge, if you need to inquire about Exmor brand product information: industrial use, mobile platform, camera.

The following is the information specification of EXMOR sensor in production for comparison.

Therefore, the possibility of using official information to query sensor information is eliminated.

There is a very detailed article about Chipworks, but unfortunately I can't afford it.

I can't afford to buy articles about TechInsights.

So according to the existing information, IMX0 17 is as follows:

IMX0 17, compared with the previous sensor products, can achieve high speed, and the secret lies in the above-mentioned aggravating part. Each column has an independent AD converter, which brings two effects: ADC is like CPU, and the processing power scattered in each column is small, so the natural frequency does not need to be too high; The starting point of digital transmission is ahead of time, so it is not easy to be disturbed-finally, the image quality is enhanced because the noise is reduced.

ADC, analog-to-digital converter; Our world is continuous macroscopically, but if we want to express it by numbers, we need to deal with it, specifically the role of ADC.

This structure of putting ADC in each column is logically called "built-in". Compared with other sensor manufacturers, Sony did this a little later-but still ahead of Canon.

IMX0 17, as the first sensor with progressive ADC, is somewhat cost-free, and many indicators are incredibly high. It looks a bit like showing off your skills today.

Of course, IMX 02 1 is still the focus. ...

It is said that the modified IMX02 1 has become IMX038 on Nikon D90. After all, there is still the task of high-definition camera shooting, and it is probably useless without modification.

DPR also has some words about IMX0 17 on its own forum, in an article entitled "Time is up! Is Sony sleeping? ) "(It's time, Sony still? Sleep? ) is discussed in the hot blood post.

After the information about IMX0 17 was fruitless, I turned to the report about EX-F 1 at that time.

DC Watch Impression was created in 2004, but there seems to be no interview about the development of EX-F 1.

The DP review doesn't seem to cut too deep into machines like F 1.

Fortunately, however, NikkeiBP has an article about the disassembly of F 1, which shows the inside story of EX-F 1.

EX-F 1 does not adopt cost-saving design in raw materials, but tries to arrange them for the purpose of "realization".

For example, on the processor, two products of Sony and Casio are used. Sony is responsible for the first-hand data of image sensors, which may be the special demand of high-speed chips, and Casio chips are post-processing.

The picture shows the substrate of Casio EX-F 1, which is a 10 PCB.

The Buff area of 5 12MB is quite amazing. Perhaps as a contrast,

20 17 Leica M 10 is equipped with 2GB Buff, which still makes people feel "mysterious"-partly because M 10 is a manual focusing machine.

In 2007, due to the overcapacity of DDR2, it didn't cost much to add a large cache.

It is also worth mentioning Sony's "CXD 4 109 AGG", which is an ARM-based chip and has been active ever since. For example, in 2009, Sony introduced three X-generation models, HX 1, WX 1 and TX 1, presumably by assembling image processing chips. The latter two models are also equipped with a new back-illuminated Exmor R sensor.

Of course, the name that appears is not a cold article number, but a "BIONZ" with a commercial name.

Compared with BIONZ's predecessors who debuted in the α700 era, X-generation models have obviously added some unprecedented functions: panoramic shooting, hand-held night scene, multi-image noise reduction, HDR synthesis, etc. These are almost all extensions of continuous shooting/multi-frame utilization, which requires the processing chip to have strong ability to correct multiple shot images (these functions emphasize that users can hold them without tripod), and then quickly process a large amount of data of multiple images.

The power of "CXD 4 109 agg"-of course, it should be an improved version, extended to larger format models, such as the α550, which was also born in 2009, and the α55, which is 20 10, is faster in multi-shot application performance. The capability of multi-Zhang Hecheng HDR has reached 6Ev expansion; This function also appeared on the NEX-5, which is also a 20 10 model, and was configured in the subsequent E-mount model.

Sony, in the war, changed the war.

Turn the original optical magic garden into a semiconductor racetrack.

Here, please match your brain with uncle's smile. The file extension of encoded image stored in jpeg file exchange format.

Technically published in Nikkei News, the interview title written by Da Zhiyang is "Ben Dang はカメラにシャッターなんて〭"

In the realization of high-speed shooting, after removing the difficulty of the sensor, what remains is the myth of mechanical shutter.

At least in the generation of 2000 ~ 20 15, most of the middle and high-end positioning machines, even the relatively new non-reflex models for real-time shooting, mostly used electrically controlled vertical blinds shutters.

This shutter structure adapts to the imaging mode of film age.

In the early days of the image sensor, this design was adopted because the problems such as charge removal have not been solved perfectly.

With the continuous upgrading of image sensors, the necessity of this physical shutter structure is declining, on the other hand, it is an obstacle to high-speed shooting.

For example, the aforementioned α700 using IMX02 1 sensor can realize the reading of 10FPS, but due to the limitation of mirror and physical shutter curtain, only 5fps shooting can be realized.

In the developer interview of Casio F 1, it has been mentioned that the necessity of the existing physical shutter structure has been shaken;

Moreover, its obstacle to high-speed shooting of still photos is objective.

Electronic shutter has become a necessity for high-speed shooting.

Of course, the electronic shutter actually has its own technical obstacles. Rolling shutter is a term used to describe the unsynchronized picture. The opposite word is Global Shutter, which translates to global shutter. The opposite roller shutter seems to have no corresponding translation, which is called non-global shutter according to the corresponding relationship.

For some shutter types, a photo is not completely exposed in the whole picture at the same time, but gradually exposed in one direction with the passage of time-in most cases, there will be no problem, but it will often be distorted when encountering high-speed moving objects.

Limited to space, the issue of electronic shutter should be written in another article. Let's look at DPR's article from the source of the picture.

Therefore, although F 1 looks like the previous digital bridge machine, it is only "still using the electronic shutter", but behind it is a conscious choice and judgment.

The realization of high speed is like a firefly lit in the dark.

EX-F 1 became the new favorite of Youtube after its birth.

About it, and the video shot with it, filled the period from 08 to 09, even 20 10.

For example, in golf swing, we can find that the jelly effect of high-speed moving objects in the video is not obvious, thanks to high-speed sensors and processors supporting high speed.

STEM, besides mathematics, other foundations still depend on concrete and perceptual experiments to verify ideas.

However, some reactions that occur in a short time are not easy to see clearly, which makes it difficult to "observe".

F 1, as a relatively low-cost machine (in fact, it is not cheap, almost two D40X prices, but it is the fastest in civil consumption), which gives a window to science teaching.

Naturally, when it is used in slow shooting in sports, its slow shooting can help athletes analyze the movement process and improve their posture.

In addition to the application of Japanese native memorial archway playback published by Casio, I also found a paper on the application of EX-F 1 in sports data collection in Chinese mainland Sports Science Society (research on the influence of golf players' explosive training on hip joint rotation speed); And in [Bao Dao Mobile0 1] (Need for speed! Casio EX-F 1 high-speed cameras can participate! ), there are also replies that it is very valuable for golf interaction.

In the later development, Casio also took the route of golf customization ... See below for details.

The "decisive moment" is called "decisive moment" in Japanese characters. The earliest usage, you may think of the legendary photographer Bresson. The name comes from his book Images à la Sauvette, but the French name has little to do with this concept. The English version of The Decisive Moment created this concept which was repeatedly mentioned by later generations.

"The second moment of shooting is a creative moment. What you build and express is what life itself provides for you. You must intuitively judge when to press the shutter. The moment you press the shutter, it is created by the photographer. Oh ... yes, this is the moment! Once you miss it, it no longer exists. " -1957, Bresson's speech in an interview with Washington post.

The 60FPS continuous shooting of EX-F 1 also brings a problem, that is, if the photographer foresees the arrival of "that moment" and uses the machine gun continuous shooting to fight, what impact will it have on such a system.

In fact, every modern SLR camera has a Pellix in its body. Without a translucent mirror, it is impossible to realize today's rear mirror metering (TTL) and autofocus on a single-lens reflex camera.

It is obvious that the high-level machine function undoubtedly reduces the necessity of experienced photographers-this influence has already appeared when the translucent mirror was born in the last century. On the other hand, although the current sports/business/war photography has high-level continuous shooting weapons, it seems that people have not lowered their evaluation of senior photographers and photo editors.

Everything is behind, but people may stop asking.

The story is like the collision and crystallization of several characters when they meet, and then they have their own different experiences:

Compared with the rotating lens design of QV- 10 of Casio and the ultra-thin card shape of EX-S 1, the impact of high speed is not so obvious.

Casio divided himself into a series, high speed, high speed, as a selling point.

The high-speed model is integrated in a smaller card-type body.

In the previous discussion, it was also mentioned that this type of aircraft actually has a natural area of expertise-sports.

Casio has also specially launched a high-speed model for golf, which is deeply loved by senior Japanese people. In addition to high speed as the basic selling point, it also adds the function of motion-assisted analysis and correction-Casio is really different from traditional camera manufacturers in packaging "application".

It is rare to see a model like FC500S designed specifically for golf and sold in Japan. In 20 16, Casio also launched the product "∈EX-sa 10 GSET", which is simply a repackaged product of FR 100-this time with special app support. ...

However, the hot TR system completely covers these things, and the average player will not explore these threads at all. ...

In 20 17, Sony released its flagship product ILCE-9.

For users who are confused and unwilling to understand the complex product system, they prefer to call it α9.

This camera challenges the speed of the flagship SLR produced by traditional manufacturers, such as Canon EOS 1 series and Nikon's odd model, and uses a large number of electronic shutters, bringing a full pixel shooting speed of 20FPS.

Behind it is the unremitting efforts of Sony Semiconductor.

But perhaps no one would have thought of Dr. Sun Yat-sen's discussion on the necessity of shutter after the introduction of F 1.

Some manufacturers have also begun to play the idea of higher and higher resolution video-in 2065438+04, many years after EX-F 1, with the birth of GH4, Panasonic equipped their machines with 4K video function, and by the way, developed a small function called "4K photo", which specifically called the video function to record 4K still pictures, with 30FPS frames per second, just right.

The resolution of 4K, with the size of 3840x2 160, is converted into the resolution of still images, and the expression is almost 8.29 million pixels, which should be enough for screen browsing of common specifications for printing and recording purposes.

In 20 17, Panasonic introduced GH5, which has the capability of 6k@30fps, and this function has also evolved to "Xian6k Photo".

6K is 9 times of the specification of 1080p, which is almost the specification of 18MP. Even if you need to cut or reduce the resolution later, it still has a margin.

Loosely speaking, Sony's semiconductor department contributes more than the camera business department; Admittedly, the latter also introduced transitional SLT design, convenient pocket computer and E/FE system accepted by most users today. However, we should also see that the advantages of semiconductor products are almost crushed, which lays the foundation for the smooth promotion of these camera designs.

For example, in the last five years, mobile phone manufacturers in China seem to rely more and more on claiming that their products adopt Sony's ""『IMX』 ""as the brand-which is not common in general product marketing.

This is quite dangerous because Sony also makes mobile phones. ...

The semiconductor department regards CIS image sensor and processor as a whole.

For example, the HDR function of multi-frame synthesis has now become DOL-HDR, and the digital overlap has a high dynamic range. The literal translation may be "digital overlap/composite high dynamic image".

The demand for this technology may have originated in the field of security monitoring (like WDR in security), but it seems to have been realized in the consumer market in 2009.

In addition to still images, Sony also realized HDR moving images. This technology, SME-HDR (Space Multiplication Exposure HDR), is based on its own stacked sensor structure (stacked CMOS, trade name Exmor RS), such as IMX378, 20 16 years on Google Pixel and Xiaomi 5S.

This method is different from the Dole -HDR mentioned above, and it is also inconsistent with the implementation of dual ISO introduced before. From the results, SMR-HDR will not lead to resolution reduction (loss is halved in double ISO style) or frame rate reduction (merging two consecutive frames into one frame).

However, Sony did not disclose this realization method, and Shree K. Nayar gave a possible guess in the paper, which was considered to be close to such technical realization.

High frame rate video recording has also become a hot spot in the market. There is a milestone, that is, the iPhone 6 product released by Apple in September 20 14.

It is worth mentioning that with the development of smart phones for many years, the proportion of camera assembly in various evaluations ... or the proportion of eyeballs is increasing.

IPhone6 supports 240fps sampling at 720p resolution, which is actually about equivalent to the computing speed of most 4k@30fps models today, but Apple chose the leg that took the lead, and then added 4k camera specification support to iPhone6S.

IPhone has a high influence in the smart phone industry. As a by-product of 4k support, many mobile phones and even cameras have added slow-motion support. This is not only influenced by the simple "whole generation hardware maturity", but also inseparable from the promotion of individual benchmark products.

At the other end of the story, Panasonic LUMIX DMC-FZ 1000 was released in June (earlier than iPhone6) and sold in July. Although it supports the "standard" 4k specification of 3840x2 160 @30fps, it is only open to full HD @ in slow motion.

In fact, 4k products can be traced back to GH4 at the beginning of 20 14, but Panasonic only offered the option of 96fps. Panasonic later pushed a large number of its own non-reverse products to 4k specifications, even entry-level products, which can be said to be quite pioneering.

On the other hand, Sony RX 100 series, which has become a new benchmark for interchangeable lens digital cameras, has maintained a "golden resolution" of 20mp in previous iterations. Although the resolution is unchanged, the sensor update is undercurrent.

The RX 100 M3 produced in May of 20 14 failed to catch up with the schedule, which may also be due to the market positioning, and the 4K specification was not increased. The following year's IV, with the upgrade of the sensor, 4K support was added, which naturally brought slow motion. The highest sampling rate is 960fps (800x270 resolution), that is, 1 136x384 images can be obtained at 480fps, and 1824x 1026 @240fps is close to the full HD specification. At two extreme sampling rates, such as Casio's F 1, a long and narrow picture ratio is adopted.

1 "sensor is more like Sony's own willful proving ground, which has made Sony's idea of image sensor. After the stacked structure was realized, in 20 17, Sony also began to develop 3-layer stacked CMOS with 3-layer stacked structure to manufacture DRAMを.

But if we want to talk about the challenge of "1200FPS", we may have to look at Nikon's 1 series products. This series adopts 1 inch sensor, and chooses exchange lens design, but the market feedback is flat.

But excluding these factors, there are high specifications in some indicators, such as embedded phase point focusing (this technology just appeared at 20 10, and Nikon was assembled on the interchangeable lens system at 201/. In contrast, Sony 20 12 is deployed on NEX-6, and the focusing speed is average), 60fps continuous shooting.

On the other hand, in 20 17, Sony's flagship models "『Xperia XZ Premium』" and "『Xperia XZs』" also reached the goal of 960fps.

Look back at the industrial sensors mentioned at the beginning and feel the speed of this era.

1 0,000 seconds; 12524; ームで〾のとをするヒととと𞎁𞎁𞎁𞎁 123777

/articles/6924593847/casiof 1

Sony11.8 inch high-speed CMOS sensor-DPReview

/articles/6589529003/sonyhighspeedcmos

Sony IMX0 17CQE News in 2007

EXMOR sensor in production:

Industry, mobile platforms, cameras

Some models, such as those equipped with α9, are not listed, which may be an exclusive supply relationship.

"This should be ӗカメラにシャッターなんてぃらなぃ"

http://techon . nikkeibp . co . jp/article/NEWS/20080 124/ 146 109/

"This should be ӗカメラにシャッターなんてぃらなぃ"

http://techon . nikkeibp . co . jp/article/NEWS/20080 128/ 146298/

Ex-F 1 decomposition, DRAM "extraordinary"

Ota Zhiyang

http://techon . nikkeibp . co . jp/article/NEWS/2008 05 02/ 15 1302/

Replication of materials near volcanoes