Camera System

Rebecca Reilly
Period G

New Camera System Inspired by Animal Vision

Scientists were looking for new ways to improve the quality of what you can see when you look through a camera lens. With this being said, scientists have been inspired by how animal eyes work. 

How It Works: 

             Researchers have found a way to instruct cameras to prioritize objects using a method that is similar to the way that human brains make decisions. The eyes and brains of humans and animals work to prioritize specific areas of their perspective. For example, visual attention is focused on the speaker while listening to someone during a conversation and takes time for the brain to process peripheral details. The scientists use one light-sensitive pixel to build up moving images of objects placed in front of it. An analogy of the light-sensitive camera is to the vision of animals who hunt because these single pixel cameras are capable of constructing images at wavelengths. These pixels are also cheaper. 
             The images that the single pixel camera constructs has a resolution of 1,000 pixels. In conventional cameras, the 1,000 pixels would be spread in a grid across the image. The scientists new system can choose to distribute the pixels to prioritize the most important areas within the frame, placing higher resolution pixels in the important locations. This pixel distribution can be changed from one frame to the next which is similar to the way biological vision works. An example of this is when a human's look is redirected from one person to another person. 

Lead Researcher:

            The lead researcher is Dr. David Phillips, Royal Academy of Engineering Research Fellow at the University of Glasgow's School of Physics and Astronomy. He said, "Initially, the problem I was trying to solve was how to maximise the frame rate of the single-pixel system to make the video output as smooth as possible." He later on goes on to explain how he started to think about how vision works in living things. He then realized that building a program which could interpret the data from their single-pixel sensor could be the solution. He also explained that by channeling the pixel budget into areas where high resolutions were needed, a system that would pay less attention to the other areas of the frame could be built. 

Accomplishments:

            The team of scientists have been able to produce images at an improved frame rate by researching animal vision. This has taught researchers and scientists a valuable new skill. This research is the latest single-pixel imaging breakthrough from the University's Optics Group which include creating 3D images, imaging gas leaks, and seeing through opaque surfaces. 

Source:

David B. Phillips et al. Adaptive foveated single-pixel imaging with dynamic supersampling, Science Advances (2017).