Open Mike: News of the Day

Well, you'll never believe this! "Open Mike" is a day late. That never happens.

Here are a few more things you might find it hard to believe. These things are as improbable as Ronald MacDonald getting arrested for robbing a Wendy's!

• In the future, lenses might be flat. No, not flat like a fresnel. Flat as a piece of paper.

• Department of Advice Most of Us Don't Need: "Definitely do not spend your money thinking asteroids are coming." That's a quote from a fellow who, with his wife, squandered their entire $10 million fortune in anticipation of the Mayan apocalypse in 2012. 

• Sony will be soon be developing a 150-megapixel camera sensor. All right then, that one's a bit rote. You'd never fall for a fake story that's as obvious as this, right?

• "Froot Loops," the kids' breakfast cereal, are all different colors, but all exactly the same flavor.

• A photography blogger has been named to a high-level post at Hasselblad!

  The German arm wrestling champion?!? Wink, wink

• Unhappy with declining profits, Panasonic is scaling back its camera divisions.

Okay, okay. For the real stories, click past the break.

1. Lenses might be flat: Er, this one's true. Applied Engineering laboratories from Caltech to Harvard have been reporting on their work with lenses made of metasurfaces, which use silicon nanoposts to bend light like traditional lenses do.
2. True as well. Spencer Pratt and his wife Heidi Montag—they're both actors—ran through their entire fortune, alleged to be more than $10 million (but probably considerably less), because they believed in predictions of the Mayan apocalypse, and they wanted to enjoy their money before the world ended. Or so they claimed—it's possible they were having money problems because of profligate spending and just invented a good story as an excuse. One hopes it is true, though, and, if it is, one devoutly hopes the pair are still poor today, as in a just Universe they would certainly remain.
3. Sensing a theme? The 150-megapixel camera sensor story is true also.
4. True. Just like M&Ms.
5. Ming Thein announced last Wednesday that he has been named Chief of Strategy for Hasselblad.
6. The photo is not Photoshopped, nor is it an optical illusion. The right arm of Matthias Schlitte, the German arm wrestling champion, really is much larger than his left arm. Having a large arm on a regular-sized body allows him to dominate his weight class.
7. The last is, sadly, true, although we don't know the extent—or the effect—of the changes. DPReview has summarized what is known.

Oh, and one more thing: in 2005, a 22-year-old man named Ronald MacDonald—no affiliation with McDonalds, and not wearing a clown suit, but apparently possessed of a rich sense of irony all the same—was arrested in Manchester, New Hampshire, for stealing money from a safe at the Wendy's where he worked.

Still and all, it is April Fool's Day—so be careful out there. ;-)

Have a nice weekend. See you safe and sound on Monday.

Mike
(Thanks to Kevin Purcell and several others)

Original contents copyright 2017 by Michael C. Johnston and/or the bylined author. All Rights Reserved. Links in this post may be to our affiliates; sales through affiliate links may benefit this site.

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Comments

[marcin wuu]

The flat lenses one is actually quite plausible.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-36438686

[David Zivic]

There is a fellow in Cabo San Lucas who plays a guitar with a Mariachi band. He has an enlarged arm and hand exactly like this one pictured, even the irregular hand. He often arm wrestles. He makes his living off tips from his guitar and side bets on arm wrestles challenges. If you're in CSL don't take the bet ! It was some sort of genetic thing.

[Nigel]

Actually, in the future you're not going to,need lenses at all...
https://phys.org/news/2017-03-faster-single-pixel-camera-technique-greatly.html

[Michael Perini]

I wish Ming Thein the best, he is a talented and exacting photographer with a formal background in corporate strategy.
I commend Hasselblad for being the only camera company to choose an actual photographer for a position of influence.
Hasselblad obviously had the right idea with the X1D, bit I fear that their success will be more determined by Capital and manufacturing capacity.
I wish them well .

[hugh crawford]

They will still be optical things that focus light, but the word lens refers to the shape not the function, lens coming from the latin lens (genitive lentis) "a lentil"
In other words, will the magic beans still be called beans when they aren't bean shaped?

Actually, the flatness is the least interesting thing about them. Things like negative index of refraction, no actual aperture, and cool compound lens tricks are a lot more interesting. That and the fact that the cost of manufacturing one of a kind "lenses" will be really low.

Eventually the model of a lens and film will be replaced by a monolithic thing that functions as both sensor and optics. We are now in a weird transition stage with photographic tools, sort of like the horseless carriage period between the age of the horse and the automobile.

And I only see a 100megapixel sony at that link. I'll still need to stitch my photos for the foreseeable future.

[Mike Fewster]

Flat lenses? Sort of. I have been forecasting this for a while and it is starting to happen. Check the iphone with two small lenses that assembles the images to give dof. I think we are going to get much more of this with something like a panel of small lenses that will collect info at different focal lengths and f stops and then allow these to be assembled either in camera or PP in different ways. Advantages? Lower cost, greater dynamic range, pp selective of focus point and dof, controlled pattern of bokeh (ie, you will be able to choose the kind of creamy or otherwise bokeh that takes your fancy.) Some of this is already being done of course with sequences of shots. Having the lenses on a panel is better because all the images are taken at the same moment.

[Speed]

150 Mega Pixels! I'm gonna have to add a room to store all the pictures.

[Daniel]

http://www.nearbycafe.com/artandphoto/photocritic/

You want an excellent April Fool's post try the link above for A.D. Coleman. Well done.

[Nigli]

I went to a tonnelliere in France once. All the workers hammer arms looked similarly outsized.

[R. Edelman]

My father was an anesthesiologist. Today's anesthesia ventilators offer comprehensive automation. My father's career in anesthesia started in the early 1950's, and the more simple ventilators that were available in those early years required the anesthesiologist to do a lot of "bagging", a term used to describe the act of squeezing the gas bag on the ventilator to breathe for the patient while the patient is under general anesthesia. My father "bagged" with his left hand, and charted the patient's vital signs with his right hand. As a consequence, he had an extremely powerful left arm. No one, not even my gym teacher cousin who was half my father's age, could beat my father at left arm wrestling. And I never heard one complaint from my father about repetitive stress injury or carpal tunnel syndrome.

[Dan Khong]

Mike
I was actually wondering if the blogger named to a high position at Hasselblad might be somebody linked to TOP.

[Kevin Purcell]

For the "medium format" 100Mpx and 150Mpx sensors

http://image-sensors-world.blogspot.com/2017/04/sony-to-introduce-100mp-and-150mp-large.html

has a screengrab from the video. You can see a bigger version of the screencapped image from the video here

https://4.bp.blogspot.com/-v7s_VlUUSeE/WN68xxkotZI/AAAAAAAARhU/1v6nLpPBsN45dIsqnb2xdvnBldeKQOu1ACLcB/s1600/Sony%2BLarge%2BFormat%2BLineup.JPG

I'm not sure at what conference this video was recorded: perhaps the just finished CeBIT 2017?

The type 3.6 inch sensors (43.8mm x 32.9mm) include the current IMX161 50Mpx which is almost certainly used in the Fuji GFX 50S and Hasselblad X1D medium format cameras.

In 2018 there will be a 100Mpx type 3.6 inch backside illuminated IMX461 (so a higher pixel count). Fuji did hint that their lenses are designed for at least a 100Mpx sensor so we might expect that sensor in future version of the Fuji medium format camera (a GFX 100S?).

The type 4.2 inch sensors are even bigger (53.7mm x 40.4mm). The 100Mpx IMX211 is in the Phase One XF 100Mpx camera and Hasselblad H6D and looks like it will now go to all OEMs.

There will also be a monochrome version of the IMX211 this year! I presume they must have some camera manufacturers with an interest in it: from still camera makers? Perhaps. More likely from scientific instrument makers or airborne photomapping/reconnaissance camera makers. I might guess the latter one might be more likely especially given the cost of the sensors (they won't be cheap -- the Phase One XF retails for about $50,000).

In 2018 there will be a 150Mpx type 4.2" backside illuminated IMX411 in both color and monochrome versions.

In all of these sensors backside illumination will improve acceptance angle fro the lenses (allowing older less telecentric designs for film to be used with fewer issues) and improving the quantum efficiency of the smaller pixels. I suspect this also means we'll see 24x36mm back illuminated sensors being sold openly (currently they only appear in Sony made cameras).

All are 4:3 aspect ratio.

Note: the shape of the boxes on the diagram means nothing -- initially I though they were showing the shapes of the sensors (but the IMX161 is clearly wrong).

[Kevin Purcell]

More details of Sony medium format sensor in

http://www.sony-semicon.co.jp/products_en/news/detail/170301.pdf

This also includes overviews of their other new sensors in the Starvis (starlight/low-light illumination) and Pregius (global shutter) ranges. Both available in type 4/3 inch with reduced pixel counts. I don't think you'll see them in a mainstream camera though.