OV5647 Discontinued

[arm_design]

Now that all flavors of the OV5647 camera sensor have been discontinued
does anyone have any idea of what comes next?

reference: http://www.ovt.com/support/ July 31, 2014 EOL Notices

[jamesh]

There are still a fair number in the supply chain - what comes after that I don't know.

[6by9]

There are plans, but those are for the Foundation to announce at the appropriate time.
I won't be drawn further than that.

[gkreidl]

There are plans, but those are for the Foundation to announce at the appropriate time.
I won't be drawn further than that.

Hopefully something with autofocus or an adjustable lens ...

[gregeric]

Oh, a new game. Well, looking at phones using VC4, whichever 8MP module exists in the Samsung Galaxy Grand? OV8858?

Edit: or maybe whichever 8MP sensor is in the Lava Iris X1/X5 (these are 2014 models, whereas the SG Grand is from early 2013 so sensor maybe already, or soon to be, EOL'd)

Edit2: list of 2014 released phones with VC4 at gsmarena shows models with 5, 8 & 13MP cameras: http://www.gsmarena.com/results.php3?nY ... t=broadcom

[dchapma1]

It would be cool to go for a camera module that supported a Xenon type flash or could sync to a Nikon or Canon external flash.

[jamesh]

It would be cool to go for a camera module that supported a Xenon type flash or could sync to a Nikon or Canon external flash.

Most modules can do that. It's more a matter of designing the HW to take advantage of it.

My want would be the 42MP sensor in the Nokia 808!(Very expensive, not going to happen. But it would work!)

[6by9]

It would be cool to go for a camera module that supported a Xenon type flash or could sync to a Nikon or Canon external flash.

Most modules can do that. It's more a matter of designing the HW to take advantage of it.

Sure on that one James? Rolling shutter kills it for most sensors, so you generally need an external shutter with appropriate control, and global reset on the sensor.

My want would be the 42MP sensor in the Nokia 808!(Very expensive, not going to happen. But it would work!)

I know, that would be rather delicious. Sadly we probably can't get to the tree with the tuning and drivers on it (remember Perforce?!). Even if we could, then there would be copyright issues as they were written specifically for that customer. It's also 4 lane CSI-2, and quite possibly obsolete (808 was Summer 2012, and how long had we had it for at that point?).

[jamesh]

It would be cool to go for a camera module that supported a Xenon type flash or could sync to a Nikon or Canon external flash.

Most modules can do that. It's more a matter of designing the HW to take advantage of it.

Sure on that one James? Rolling shutter kills it for most sensors, so you generally need an external shutter with appropriate control, and global reset on the sensor.

My want would be the 42MP sensor in the Nokia 808!(Very expensive, not going to happen. But it would work!)

I know, that would be rather delicious. Sadly we probably can't get to the tree with the tuning and drivers on it (remember Perforce?!). Even if we could, then there would be copyright issues as they were written specifically for that customer. It's also 4 lane CSI-2, and quite possibly obsolete (808 was Summer 2012, and how long had we had it for at that point?).

Sorry, you are quite right, got my Galileo head on. I was really meaning that you can fire a flash off from the sensor with the right HW (which you can do anyway over GPIO now anyway). Must try harder.

I suspect the 808 is completely obsolete now, the one in the Lumia 1020 was a development of it, with I think it's own ISP, or certainly mods to make it work on less capable ISP's. Not sure though.

[tchiwam]

Bigger sized sensor and known frequency / channel response.
5Mp is already plenty for the educational side of things...

Bigger sensor allows crude spectrography and more complex lens arrangement on a home (cheap) made light table...

[jbeale]

If we're making a wish list, mine would be for higher dynamic range. In outdoor security-camera type applications, you often want to see light texture detail in direct sun and darker tones in shade, without manual intervention. The existing Pi cam has a good image (especially for the price!) but I find generally the exposure setting has to settle for either-or; it cannot record both direct sunlight & shade detail at once. I accept that available technology may not have an answer. What I want is DSLR performance in a tiny cheap sensor, and I'm unlikely to get it.

...actually, I can imagine an interleaved-frame HDR mode; that is to say, you expose every second frame with a much shorter shutter speed to capture the highlights. You could combine them in the GPU pre-compression, so the output video has half the frame rate, but capturing more overall range (perhaps with strange motion blur issues), or simply save two different video streams.

[Mettauk]

Wish list for updated camera module. (Probably too late)

1:Better night vision
2:Better resolution
3:Autofocus
4:IR Heat sensative
5:Changeable lenses
6:Smaller footprint
7:See round corners!

Given massive price drop of NOIR unit I'm guessing release of new module is iminant

[gordon77]

All for $5 ?

[Mettauk]

Well now, given a whole Pi0 computer is only £5 the updated camera module should only be around £3 but cut down on connectors, perhaps it will be missing a lens!

[rpdom]

Wish list for updated camera module. (Probably to late)

1:Better night vision
2:Better resolution
3:Autofocus
4:IR Heat sensative
5:Changeable lenses
6:Smaller footprint
7:See round corners!

Given massive price drop of NOIR unit I'm guessing release of new module is iminant

8. Sandwich maker
9. Autopony detect

Well now, given a whole Pi0 computer is only £5 the updated camera module should only be around £3 but cut down on connectors, perhaps it will be missing a lens!

[fruitoftheloom]

Wish list for updated camera module. (Probably to late)

1:Better night vision
2:Better resolution
3:Autofocus
4:IR Heat sensative
5:Changeable lenses
6:Smaller footprint
7:See round corners!

Given massive price drop of NOIR unit I'm guessing release of new module is iminant

The RPF were aware a long time ago about the eol of the OV, so your post is about a year too late