When it comes to epic slow-motion videos captured by mobile smartphones, Sony currently reigns supreme via its revolutionary on-chip memory-equipped Motion Eye camera. The advanced camera system is currently on the Xperia XZ Premium and the Xperia XZs, with the company likely incorporating it into their upcoming XZ1 flagship. However, a new report from South Korea has revealed that Samsung may also be busy developing its own 1,000fps slow-motion camera system, which may be ready for production by the end of the year.
A unique approach from Samsung
Sony forever changed the mobile camera game when it introduced the world's first 3-layer stacked Cmos Image Sensor. The camera has an on-chip memory that is capable of shooting up to 960 frames per second for extremely Slow Motion videos. The significantly large amount of frames would otherwise overwhelm the onboard RAM on standard smartphones, which led the company to install separate RAM modules right into the image sensor simply.
Three chips in total are embedded into the sensor, each handling a specific task, namely control logic, memory, and pixels. The camera captures two separate video streams, namely one at normal speeds and one at 960 fps. The onboard chips allow processing of both streams, which results in the seamless integration of both normal and slow motion segments.
Check out a demo video of Sony's 3-layer CMOS image sensor shifting from 960fps to 15fps:
Samsung's strategy
To avoid any possible copyright infringement problems, Samsung has reportedly opted to use a two-layer design that utilized a DRAM chip bonded into the camera sensor. The system may not be as advanced as Sony's three-layer design, but Samsung has the advantage of being able to produce the necessary components in-house.
Sony currently has a standing partnership with Micron, which produces their 1-gigabit memory chips.
Completely in-house
If Samsung is successful in creating its own advanced camera system, it may soon opt to utilize an all-Samsung sensor setup as opposed to relying on third-party providers. The company does currently have a number of products that utilize Sony's sensors, which includes the Korean-version Galaxy S8 smartphone. If everything pans out, the upcoming samsung galaxy S9 may be using all-Samsung sensors that offer extreme slow motion capabilities that produce 1080p videos at 1,000 fps.
