Motorola has been hyping up the 10.5-megapixel Clear Pixel camera inside the Moto X, but it's been shy on the sensor's technical details and origins. We now have both: it's the OmniVision OV10820, a 1/2.6-inch sensor with a video-friendly 16:9 aspect ratio and large 1.4-micron pixels. Its strong low-light performance comes through a two-chip approach. The sensor captures RAW images using a sensitive RGBC (red / green / blue / clear) color filter, and a companion chip automatically converts the resulting shots into the Bayer format that most imaging processors expect. The result is a high-performance camera that slots inside the Moto X without requiring any special effort. Whether or not we see the OV10820 used outside of Motorola is another matter. OmniVision can't comment on the sensor's exclusivity, but it does note that RGBC is an "extremely viable option" for the future.
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Filed under: Cellphones, Cameras, Mobile, Google
Source: OmniVision