Samsung's new Vizion 33D ToF sensor can track objects at 120 fps at up to 5m distance

05 November 2020
It's a time of flight sensor that benefits from the ISOCELL technology. It can be used for video bokeh on the rear camera or face ID on the front.

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  • r39
  • 06 Nov 2020

AnonD-909757, 06 Nov 2020You are so dense you refuse to understand the fricking diff... moreThe truth you speak is crystal clear to anyone who really cares about the state of art in smartphone photography.

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    • AnonD-909757
    • pZQ
    • 06 Nov 2020

    6ix, 06 Nov 2020You just made no sense lmaoTranslation : You didn't understood.

    How hard is it to understand that an industrial type use that serve to map an area like typical survey LiDAR who literally only do it a dot at the time for many of them :
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1lDO1UevAJI
    Is totally different from the requirement for fine details fixing needed for artistic type (photography) use ?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K0QDp6umxy0
    Isn't it a no brainer and totally intuitive that to properly have details processing on a higher resolution image, you need a high resolution depth map ?
    Exactly like you wouldn't do a layer from a low resolution image to create a layer used on a high resolution image on PS otherwise you just selected big pixels and have tons of aliasing...

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      • 6ix
      • r3H
      • 06 Nov 2020

      AnonD-909757, 06 Nov 2020You are so dense you refuse to understand the fricking diff... moreYou just made no sense lmao

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        • AnonD-909757
        • pZQ
        • 06 Nov 2020

        Anonymous, 06 Nov 2020stop saying tof needs 12MP, if it was any necessary sony an... moreYou are so dense you refuse to understand the fricking difference I wrote you an essaye about, about the difference between industrial and photography use of depth data and the issues a low resolution depth map resolution come with.

        There are TONS of things that are required and that no smartphone manufacturers make, don't forget that Sony smartphone division is TOTALLY UNRELATED to the rest, hence why Sony don't use any of the IMX686 or even IMX689 monster on their latest flagships.
        And their ToF/LiDAR department have even LESS to do with smartphones, they are for INDUSTRIAL use, google any Sony ToF sensor and I challenge you to find any proven Smartphone related use, you'll be dawned in a sea of industrial applications for those sensors, so much that it will be hard to find any smartphone related use of their ToF sensor.
        ToF on Smartphones is like how the early watercooling for PC were done with car's radiators, it is using something totally not made for that but that still kinda work, and the difference between INDUSTRIAL and ARTISTIC (photography) sensor is the same as the difference between a monitor specially made for graphic designer and one specially made for gamers, they have totally different set of specialty, and right now, we are using INDUSTRIAL ToF for PHOTOGRAPHY, because there is no one who make COMPUTATIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY MADE ToF, and the market is new and isn't justified.

        So YES, to properly work we need a 12Mp 3D ToF/LiDAR.

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          • AnonD-909757
          • pZQ
          • 06 Nov 2020

          Anonymous, 06 Nov 2020Why do you keep insisting in being wrong? Except samsun... moreWhy do you want to be so dense ?

          Find me a single place where it said which manufacturer made the front and the back ToF of the Huawei P40 Pro and Huawei Mate 40 Pro Plus, despite using Sony sensors for camera, there is NOT A SINGLE evidence of the manufacturer of the ToF used in those phones, yet here you are making that bold claim about an informations that can't be verified and pretend I am wrong...Sure !
          And we know for a FACT that Huawei flagships use ToF (which is why I take them as exemple), as shown here :
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0OX5QaK7YY
          There are many similar exemples available.

          Where did I insisted that this isn't the case ?
          Where did I said that it was on all or no phones ?
          I don't know what point you are trying to make here, it is like if I said "Goat can climb near vertical surfaces" and you tried to prove a point saying "Insects can walk on the ceiling", how is that invalidating or my point ?
          I never said we don't need to keep it external, I even told you that there are back illuminated sensors, like the Sony IMX556PLR, and yes I know "back illuminated" doesn't mean the light source come from behind, but those sensor are typically capable of receiving with every of their pixels, meaning an illumination ring can be put around the inner lens (still inside the front element) looking like a regular camera lens from the outside, this is a good use of full pixel receiver type sensor who can work with various type/shape/field of diffusion light sources.

          It still have nothing to do with the FACT that there are way more ToF and LiDAR manufacturers than Sony and Samsung, and some do sensors for specific applications that have way more resolution than the VGA Sony typically do.

            TRIUMPH765OWNER, 05 Nov 2020“Our cameras are 5 years behind, our music players are 12 y... moreMy argument was in favour of user privacy. That was my point, even if I explained worse. Read my other post before this one.

              Qimchi, 05 Nov 2020Maybe you live in the past. Here's what happened in 20... moreEverything is just bigger, better or faster in all of the above things.
              No feature by itself is new, is what my point is. Watches, yes, you got that right, I stand corrected. But my point was not that.

              My argument is about privacy & human values. Why does all sensing stuff come to mobile phones only? Think.
              Somehow mobile phone industry finds newer ways to recognise us better, whether its under display cameras or inability to remove battery or fingerprint sensors (which are no longer chip level protected as promised by Mi few years ago), or this object distance calculator.
              I mean, isn't this something an architect should be using. How fast do you need your AF to be? Its already blazing fast since S7 days!
              And its a rat race that's not even ending... now we'll have next generations of AI as well, that won't even require human beings so well, hello mass unemployment.

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                • Anonymous
                • JT5
                • 06 Nov 2020

                AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020I could say the exact same thing to you about how you compl... morestop saying tof needs 12MP, if it was any necessary sony and samsung would be doing already.

                  • ?
                  • Anonymous
                  • JT5
                  • 06 Nov 2020

                  AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020Wait until you discover single beam 3D Flash LiDAR which ha... moreWhy do you keep insisting in being wrong?

                  Except samsung 2020 flagships, all other phones use sony ToF. They are all equal.
                  Even s10 series.

                  You do not need to keep it external design showing both like Sony and LG do.
                  All other cover both emitter/receiver with same glass.

                  Look at this photo. ipad ToF, emitter/receiver . Inside same circle.
                  www.cultofmac.com/693611/lidar-scanner-2020-ipad-pro-augmented-reality-3d-scanner/

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                    • AnonD-909757
                    • pZQ
                    • 05 Nov 2020

                    Lasuto, 05 Nov 2020"so even 2Mp depth camera that gather depth from an AI... moreI could say the exact same thing to you about how you completely ignore and underestimate how AI can make incredibly accurate depth map from a picture :
                    Even on the really popular AI channel, those last 4 month were full of news more or less related to AI being able to AI requiring to compute depth :
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSVrKK_uHoU
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MrIbQ0pIFOg
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ICr6xi9wA94
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qeZMKgKJLX4
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T29O-MhYALw
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=86QU7_SF16Q
                    * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Jy_VZQnZqGk

                    And I literally said a bazillion times, for most typical industrial applications, those are indeed the best, but NOT the highest resolution, as there are MANY, MANY, MANY implementations, there is probably even more TYPES of implementations than models of smartphones with depth camera/sensor.
                    And yes for making a point cloud model allowing to make a 3D scan of an object or a scene or allow 3D spatial navigation those are great, but they are NOT AT ALL adapter for computational photography who would need a depth map resolution as high as the main sensor (post binning) resolution, meaning around 12Mp.
                    This is obviously not faisable by typical dot matrices, but other methods of Flash LiDAR can allow this, and note that they wouldn't necessarily give you a high depth accuracy nor a long range depending on the implementation, which would be bad for INDUSTRIAL implementation, but more than satisfactory for computational photography.
                    The typical exemple is fake bokeh effect, if you want to avoid blurred edges of the subject, mainly the hairs edges, depth distance precision in't what you need, you need high depth resolution, and this apply for everything else in computational photography, and the vast majority of use of depth sensor/camera on smartphone is for computational photography, it is only since few month that other, Augmented Reality related applications started to really become a thing, but before that, it always only served for computational photography.

                    Considering that in term of image quality and those Bokeh effect, smartphones without any kind of depth camera/sensor were able to outperform any other phones that had those, we can't really say it have been the most useful thing, Samsung even considered removing it :
                    https://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_galaxy_s21_tof_sensor_dropped-news-44758.php
                    Simply because those are basically useless for pictures who require higher depth map resolution.
                    With a 0.3Mp resolution you need upscalling, which would bring as much artifacts as using directly a dedicated camera and an AI to compute depth from it, and this is because all those is basically useless because of how it lack precision that a LOT of effects, like those shown in the videos, some existing since a while and only requiring depth map (and no other AI computation) to be done aren't a thing on smartphones, simply because, while, those sensor are great for industrial and could perform well for AR effects, as the latest iPad and iPhone shown, they are not nearly enough for photography.

                    Also, Samsung and Sony are the best YOU KNOW OF, because there are a LOT of niche applications that require more specialized sensors, many having way better capabilities, simple exemples are technologies in the military, or aerospace ones, like the LiDAR on satellites.
                    Just a random exemple, did you know this one :
                    https://asc3d.com/our-technology/
                    Or the difference between typical, single photon and Geiger mode LiDAR ?
                    Phased array and mechanical LiDAR ?
                    The difference between Flash, 2D Raster and 1D Line scan LiDAR ?

                    "LiDAR" isn't just a single sensor or a single type or implementation, it is a word engulfing a whole category of things, and there are a lot of different types.
                    This : https://nmgroup.com/en/file/large/132fffbe6e53546c92511b9924b9a73a.jpeg
                    Is totally different from this : https://cdn.trendhunterstatic.com/thumbs/lidar-sensors.jpeg
                    Which is totally different from this : https://miro.medium.com/max/1100/1*r5vZ7w7LOLqky2aOjNd67A.png
                    And is totally different from this : https://img.oemoffhighway.com/files/base/acbm/ooh/image/2019/12/16x9/Continental_HFL110_3D_Flash_LIDAR.5de52f8b97e44.png
                    The application are different, what they are for is different, how they work is different, so how two companies that make a single type of LiDAR can be considered "the best" ?

                    An exemple of how brands are distributed in the LiDAR for car industry :
                    https://www.knowmade.com/wp-content/uploads/edd/2018/05/Main-IP-players-involved-in-promising-LIDAR-technologies.jpg
                    I don't see any Samsung or Sony here...
                    And except big names like Intel, Toshiba, Bosch and Philips, is there any non-car brand name you know about here ?
                    This image goes along with this one :
                    https://www.eetimes.com/wp-content/uploads/media-1304429-automotivelidarplayers-yole.jpg
                    Same deal here except Panasonic.

                    I am not pretending to be a LiDAR or ToF expert, far from that, but I DON'T think that all I know is all there is to know nor that because I know a single thing mean there isn't anything else, which is why I speak up about the subject, because I go further than just the typical ToF/LiDAR on Smartphones while almost everybody else don't and talk as if those were the only ones that exist.

                      Samsung always looking for a chance to beat apple

                        AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020That's where things are complicated, because if you us... more"so even 2Mp depth camera that gather depth from an AI would be more useful than a true depth sensor who only have 0.3Mp"

                        If you knew what and how ToF sensor works and what they can produce, you wouldn't type like that. A VGA resolution ToF sensor like this Vizion 33D from Samsung and IMX556PLR from Sony are considered high end although industrial ToF cameras prefer using Sony.

                        2MP or even 7MP depth camera doesn't produce even the closest images the 0.3MP ToF produces because they're not dedicated to mapping 3D objects. They're just "sensing" depths.

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                          • AnonD-909757
                          • pZQ
                          • 05 Nov 2020

                          jAYR, 05 Nov 2020Too Long, I Did Read.Awesome and underrated comment !

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                            • AnonD-909757
                            • pZQ
                            • 05 Nov 2020

                            Anonymous, 05 Nov 2020Tof sensor on Samsung has always been 0.3mp.That's the issue, they don't move forward and improve things, its like the 3D Sonic FPS they use since the S10 despite is bigger brother the 3D Sonic Max that was ready for the S20 and was waited for both the S20 and Note20 but never came, just because Qualcomm refused to exclusively see this sensor to Samsung...
                            Many peoples don't realize that there are LOTS of depth sensing technology that fall into ToF and LiDAR, some have way greater depth resolution than other, and as many things in the smartphone industry, those used on Smartphones aren't the type they should have used.

                            And when I mean, a lot, I really mean a lot :
                            *Type of sensors (general simplification ignoring more niche and sub-variants) : https://cf-images.us-east-1.prod.boltdns.net/v1/static/689254975001/73bdd167-8fdc-48c0-a050-ce838a47ac03/fdc0a992-8e9f-4b47-bf62-ba276f2a8d4f/1280x720/match/image.jpg
                            *Different implementation of the technology : https://www.eetimes.com/wp-content/uploads/media-1304430-tworootsoflidar-nu.jpg
                            *Exemple on automotive industry alone of the different types of LiDAR methods : https://www.eetimes.com/wp-content/uploads/media-1304429-automotivelidarplayers-yole.jpg

                            So, the most popular LiDAR/ToF indeed are quite close to what Samsung and Sony typically do, but so many peoples ignore that those are a small part of the tips of the iceberg who hide a frozen underground lake...

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                              • Anonymous
                              • Ni0
                              • 05 Nov 2020

                              This is much better and useful than the LIDAR Gimmick by Apple

                                • ?
                                • Anonymous
                                • sUw
                                • 05 Nov 2020

                                AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020640 x 480 🤣 The typical 0.3Mp of Samsung depth sensors when... moreTof sensor on Samsung has always been 0.3mp.

                                  • j
                                  • jAYR
                                  • t7W
                                  • 05 Nov 2020

                                  AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020TL;DR :Yes and no, it is all about naming, and the issue is... moreToo Long, I Did Read.

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                                    • AnonD-909757
                                    • pZQ
                                    • 05 Nov 2020

                                    Anonymous, 05 Nov 2020No, they are not ToF. There is no ToF above 0,5MP. Not ... moreWait until you discover single beam 3D Flash LiDAR which have a depth resolution going as high as the sensor you use and are purposefully made for higher depth resolution.
                                    Peoples tend to forget there is a huge difference between industrial/mapping/detecting ToF and computational photography/imaging ToF, most phone use the former as it is the most common and also the least adapted for Smartphones.

                                    There are back illuminated ToF who only require the front element to cover the sensor area.

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                                      • Anonymous
                                      • JT5
                                      • 05 Nov 2020

                                      Anonymous, 05 Nov 2020Samsung LIES'!!!!!!! Just like SPACEZOOM 100X Samsung advertises 100x digital zoom.
                                      They have never promissed usable quality.
                                      Everyone knows digital zoom sucks and decreases quality.

                                        • ?
                                        • Anonymous
                                        • JT5
                                        • 05 Nov 2020

                                        AnonD-909757, 05 Nov 2020That's where things are complicated, because if you us... moreNo, they are not ToF.
                                        There is no ToF above 0,5MP.
                                        Not from Sony nor Samsung.

                                        Those 5Mp are regular 1/5" sensors low ends and many midranges use just for bokeh mode while main camera takes the photo. You can clearly see theses are seen on phones that do not have a camera for 2x, 3x or 5x zoom. But just on phones with wide, ultra wide and macro.

                                        They would all advertise as ToF, not depth.
                                        Also through the glass/plastic that covers camera, it is easy to see there is no emitter/receiver like you see on ipad/iphone.


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