Technology - Google News

North will stop making its Focals glasses to focus on its second generation - The Verge
Everything Sony Announced At Today's State of Play - Kotaku
Samsung Galaxy S11 108MP camera: How good will the new sensor be? - Android Authority

North will stop making its Focals glasses to focus on its second generation - The Verge

Posted: 10 Dec 2019 05:00 AM PST

North, the company behind the augmented reality Focals glasses, is no longer selling its current glasses and is instead focusing on a second-generation set that'll be available next year.

The company wouldn't provide details on the new glasses and instead would only say the device will be 40 percent lighter and sleeker. It'll also incorporate a higher-resolution display. The team also released a teaser image of frames with a more mainstream look.

North operates two showrooms for the Focals, and for now, the one in Brooklyn, New York, will be open only by request. The Canadian location will remain open during its existing hours.

Although North launched its Focals in January 2019, it hasn't been the most successful launch. Within less than a month, the company cut the price of the glasses nearly in half, down to $599.99 from $999. Around that same time, the company laid off 150 employees, potentially in the manufacturing department. Even with the price drop and layoffs, the company maintained at the time that it had a "great few months" at the company's start. CEO and co-founder Stephen Lake said the layoffs were necessary to keep developing its smart glasses.

"We decided to lay off a number of employees yesterday in order to focus our resources and ensure we have sufficient runway to execute on our upcoming milestones over the next 18-24 months," he said at the time. "This was a difficult decision, but a necessary one to ensure long-term success."

The company wouldn't comment on how many units it has shipped of the first-generation Focals glasses.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Everything Sony Announced At Today's State of Play - Kotaku

Posted: 10 Dec 2019 06:24 AM PST

Here's everything Sony announced during today's State of Play.

A Resident Evil 3 remake will come to PlayStation 4 on April 3, 2020, along with Project Resistance, an online survival game with its own campaign mode.

The Kingdom Hearts III DLC expansion is coming with new characters and battles on January 23, 2020.

Untitled Goose Game's goose malarky and honking havoc are coming to PlayStation 4 on December 17.

Dreams will be available for PlayStation 4 on February 14, 2020.

Spellbreak, a new battle royale game combining role-play and magical combat from Proletariat, is starting a closed beta.

Also featured were Paper Beast, a VR sandbox game where you explore an ecosystem full of strange beasts, coming out in the first quarter of 2020. A new Predator game is coming out on April 24, 2020. From Square Enix and Platinum, new footage of Babylon's Fall, an action game that mixes a medieval/fantasy setting with a sci-fi feel for the combat. Superliminal, a perspective- and physics-based puzzle game where you move through dreamlike landscapes, is coming to PS4 on an undisclosed date.

Finally, Sucker Punch's Ghost of Tsushima... will have a more complete trailer at the Game Awards. Cool.

Correction: 12/10/19, 9:56 a.m. ET: A previous version of this post listed the incorrect release date for Dreams on PlayStation 4.

Let's block ads! (Why?)

Samsung Galaxy S11 108MP camera: How good will the new sensor be? - Android Authority

Posted: 10 Dec 2019 03:55 AM PST

Samsung Galaxy S11 108MP camera- samsung galaxy s11 render

91mobiles/@OnLeaks

Opinion post by

Hadlee Simons

The Galaxy S11 series is expected to offer a 108MP main camera, but instead of repurposing the 108MP Samsung ISOCELL Bright HMX sensor that turned heads on the Xiaomi Mi Note 10, frequent leaker Ice Universe says the new Samsung phones will actually use an all-new 108MP camera.

The tipster also says the new sensor is the same size as the old one (presumably having the same 0.8 micron pixels), but added that the new camera will be both more expensive and better — though how exactly it'll be better remains a mystery.

While the current camera sensor is nothing to scoff, Samsung certainly has room to improve its tech. Here are just a few ways that an all-new, advanced 108MP sensor could help turn the Galaxy S11 series into a photography powerhouse.

8K/30fps support

Samsung's Isocell Bright HMX is a pretty full-featured 108MP camera sensor, but there is one glaring omission. The camera doesn't actually support 8K recording, topping out at 6K/30fps instead.

Read: What the Snapdragon 865 means for your next smartphone

It stands to reason then that the new Samsung camera sensor will offer 8K/30fps video recording. This is especially likely when you consider that the Snapdragon 865 and the Exynos 990 — both expected to feature in the Galaxy S11 series — will offer 8K recording capabilities as well.

Improved pixel isolation

Samsung

It's also possible Samsung is implementing better ISOCELL technology in the new camera sensor to reduce light bleed between tiny pixels, therefore ensuring colors and details are captured accurately.

Samsung's current ISOCELL Plus tech on the ISOCELL Bright HMX and other sensors sees pixels being isolated from each other with a barrier, reducing light bleed between them. It's akin to a box of wine with cardboard separating the bottles (i.e. pixels) from each other, preventing spillage (i.e. light leaking) in the process.

We asked, you told us: Most people think the Galaxy S11 line is hot

I'll be honest: I don't love the look of the Samsung Galaxy S11, or the Galaxy S11 Plus, or the Galaxy S11e. Now, I don't 100% know what the devices will end up looking like, …

This is particularly important for ultra high resolution cameras with tiny pixels. Smaller pixels are already hamstrung when it comes to light-capturing capabilities compared to sensors with larger pixels, so the last thing you want is for the little light you've captured to be inaccurate.

The company has previously used a metal barrier between pixels, but said metal would reflect or absorb some incoming light. Samsung then switched to a new material developed by Fujifilm in 2018. The next step, if coming with this new sensor, could be an evolution over the Fujifilm material to further increase light sensitivity.

Eight-in-one pixel binning?

The Xiaomi Mi Note 10 is the first 108MP phone, and it apparently won't be the last.

Today's high resolution cameras all sport four-in-one pixel binning, combining data from four neighboring pixels into one. For example, 48MP 0.8 micron pixel cameras are usually capable of taking a pixel-binned shot comparable to a 12MP 1.6 micron camera.

Dive deeper: What is pixel binning? Everything you should know about this photographic technique

Qualcomm mooted the possibility of pixel binning going a step forward in the future. In fact, the firm's Judd Heape told Android Authority that we could see eight-in-one or even 16-in-one pixel binning as the next step. The eight-in-one approach means a 108MP camera could combine eight pixels in one. This would then spit out a 13.5MP image with improved low-light capabilities, in theory.

108MP cameras: What else could Samsung bring to the table?

Cash Karo/@Onleaks

Hardware is only part of the equation, as image processing is arguably more important. Samsung is a top-tier player when it comes to image processing though, joining the likes of Google, Huawei, and Apple when it comes to great all-round performance. Leaks suggest Samsung is bringing plenty of camera-related features next year, such as automatically capturing photos/video and a night hyperlapse option, but hopefully it doesn't forget about overall image quality.

If any manufacturer can extract plenty of goodness out of a 108MP camera, it's Samsung.

Another big question is super slow-motion 960fps support, as Samsung has traditionally used flagship camera sensors paired with super-fast DRAM for this feature. But Qualcomm's Snapdragon 865 is fast enough to deliver 960fps recording without dedicated memory attached to the camera sensor. It's unclear if the Exynos 990 supports this feature though, but if it doesn't and Samsung still wants to retain super-slow mo, then the supposed Galaxy S11 108MP sensor will need dedicated DRAM (which the current 108MP sensor lacks).

What would you like to see from the Samsung Galaxy S11's 108MP camera? Let us know in the comments!

Let's block ads! (Why?)