Canon's new 202-by-205mm CMOS sensor design
Canon Inc., Tokyo, Japan, successfully developed a 202-by-205mm CMOS image sensor, which the company says is capable of capturing images in 1/100th the amount of light required by a professional-model digital SLR camera.
At 202-by-205 mm, the newly developed CMOS sensor is among the largest chips that can be produced from a 12-inch (300 mm) wafer, and is approximately 40 times the size of Canon’s largest commercial CMOS sensor, the company says.
In the past, enlarging the size of the sensor resulted in an increase in the amount of time required between the receiving and transmission of data signals, which posed a challenge to achieving high-speed readout. Canon, however, solved this problem through an innovative circuit design, making possible the realization of a massive video-compatible CMOS sensor.
Because the increased size of the new CMOS sensor allows more light to be gathered, it enables shooting in low-light environments. The sensor makes possible the image capture in 1/100th the amount of light required by a 35 mm full-frame CMOS sensor, facilitating the shooting of 60 frame-per-second video with a mere 0.3 lux of illumination, according to the company.
