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Panasonic`s Revolutionary New `Micro Color Splitter` Sensor Filter Doubles Light Sensitivity
Baku, February 12 (AZERTAC). The most common way we get color images with digital cameras is with a Bayer pattern CMOS sensor, but there are plenty of variations on that design being used today. The upcoming Aaton Penelope Delta uses a Bayer pattern over a Dalsa CCD, for example, while the RED EPIC-M Monochrome uses the MX CMOS sensor foregoing colour filtration entirely. By their very nature, though, colour filters of any kind cut down the amount of light transmitted to the sensor. That`s why Panasonic is developing a brand new type of colour filter that will employ diffraction to split up the colour spectrum, instead of filtration, and thus will be capable of doubling the light sensitivity of the sensor.
Panasonic Corporation has developed unique “micro color splitters”, which separate the light that falls on image sensors by exploiting light`s wavelike properties. Applying them to actual image sensors allows bright colour images to be achieved even under low-light conditions. This development makes colour filters unnecessary by using the micro colour splitters that control the diffraction of light at a microscopic level. Panasonic has achieved approximately double the colour sensitivity in comparison with conventional sensors that use colour filters.
The Sigma/Foveon X3 sensor actually uses three stacked photodiode layers so that each pixel has its own complete RGB information (pictured right, courtesy Sigma). This is possible due to something called `wavelength-dependent absorption depth` [PDF] meaning each layer only absorbs part of the spectrum. Used in the SD1 Merrill and other Sigma stills camera models.