Sixteen lens compact camera with performance of an SLR

Light L16 camera – 40+ megapixels, 35-150 mm zoom¹
Credit: Light/Wired

5 x 35mm smartphone cameras¹
+  5 x 70mm cameras with smartphone sensors¹
+  6 x 150mm cameras with smartphone sensors¹
+  clever software

=  40+ megapixel, 35-150mm optical zoom¹ camera about the size of a smartphone, about twice as thick, with no protruding lens.

Full-frame-equivalent images are synthesised by stitching together, & overlapping, the images from the individual cameras. E.g., a 70mm photo uses all 5 of the 70mm cameras, one each for the upper left, upper right, lower left & lower right quadrants. Overlapping the fifth camera on the centre improves detail there. This mimics the behaviour of a conventional single lens, which is typically sharpest at the centre.

Two times digital zoom, either in-camera, or by cropping after-the-fact, would yield the same effect as a 300mm lens in a 10 megapixel image. This is enough for an A3 print.²

A wide angle variant, with around 18-80mm zoom,¹ could fit into a smartphone with little size penalty.

http://www.wired.com/2015/10/light-l16-camera/
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¹ full frame 35mm equivalent

² "How many megapixels do I need for a specific print size?", http://www.disturbancesinthewash.net/journal/how-many-megapixels-do-i-need / multiple lenses unique Light L16 four spiders 16 cameras arranged haphazard fashion tiny mirrors thin sheet glass shoot pictures bizarre multi-camera Light executives fully operational version camera develop developing development software editing tools custom circuitry put camera in the hands of the masses performs as advertised sample gallery images taken L16 impressive revolutionary new type professional-level camera high-resolution images adjust depth of field your pictures after take shot excels low light nothing bigger smartphone sensor expensive plastic lens embedded phone-like face no moving parts optical zoom range 35mm 150mm front L16 flat multiple lenses embedded behind transparent glass pane panel optical porthole feeds light separate 13-megapixel sensor camera capture images three discrete focal lengths five sensors five 35mm lenses point straight out 11 cameras lens arrangement Light team folded optics like periscopes sensors tucked behind five 70mm lenses six 150mm lenses perpendicular front camera little robotic mirrors visible through front L16 deflect photons right angles toward sensors long-zoom lens barrels positioned sideways ample room pack more lens elements in each barrel Light co-founder CEO Dave Grannan extra room makes huge difference camera’s optical oomph big heavy lenses conventional camera 15 glass elements flourite element some exotic material spherical elements slight asphere aspherical very expensive process glass lens molded-plastic technology cellphones been perfected lenses so good diffraction limited aspherical on each surface five both sides 10 aspherical surfaces incremental cost aspherical zero plastic mold punch them out glass very expensive five barrel Android iPhone at volume costs dollar camera need 16 sensors 16 multi-element lenses 11 mirrors take photograph holy grail Light L16 slim compact camera performs like bulky DSLR without expensive interchangeable lenses large sensor success camera’s internal infrastructure change the way smartphones take pictures today’s smartphone cameras already excellent small sensors poor performance low light pleasantly shallow depth of field bokeh DSLR larger-sensor camera optical-zoom lens zoom digital zoom image negatively impact detail image quality definition smartphone cameras creative solutions Nokia Lumia 1020 crammed 41 megapixels sensor crop and digitally zoom without destroying image detail. Panasonic’s Lumix CM1 larger sensor smartphone body image capabilities dedicated compact camera more megapixels small sensor better image quality large sensor optically zoom multi-camera multi-lens approach complex computational imaging Light big-sensor image quality very high resolution big-lens zoom flat-fronted futuristic brick power 16 smartphone sensors Light co-founder CEO Dr. Rajiv Laroia sensors Light camera tandem mimic benefits very large sensor sensors Light relatively cheap amount computational magic unites them all small sensors very unpredictable pixel level cramming tiny sensor full pixels size of those pixels smaller number of photons pixel level accuracy image bucket collects photons pixels sensors modern cellphone sensors 5,000 photons Laroia explains pixel sensing on/off signal sensing shades construct image sense shades photons light energy quantum mechanics level light energy statistical probabilistic small sensors record grain noise low-light settings DSLRs more detailed pictures dark larger sensors Light L16 distributed array smaller sensors spread out the work mimic much bigger pixel using multiple sensors Laroia says effective sensor area becomes lot larger noise goes down significantly dynamic range increases significantly dynamic range increases tenfold how many sensors take a photo L16 photo depending focal length cameras capturing shots stitching together create single high-resolution image 35mm widest-angle field of view five 35mm cameras fire images captured sensors slightly overlap camera stitch together seamless image lining up shots additional five-camera capture 70mm 35mm shot 150mm one quarter 70mm slightly overlapping geometry parallax mirrors deflecting photons 70mm 150mm aren’t static actuators slightly tilt adjust each photo mirrors seated front 70mm lenses quickly adjust capture image more detail 52 megapixels detail file size between 30 and 50MB 70mm pointed center image upper left quadrant 13-megapixel picture quarter scene upper right quadrant one stays middle image quality best there 13 megapixel sensors one 52-megapixel image 70mm 150mm modules camera takes 70mm photo 150mm 52 megapixels image resolution room crop digitally retain detail dynamic range crop light energy edges tradeoff 70mm 52 megapixels 40 megapixels DSLRs cameras capturing so much data different aperture values focal lengths post-shot retouching options groundbreaking time exposure set at the time take picture depth of field ISO dynamic range adjusted after the fact 11 PhDs computational optics depth map great 3D information developer write indoor mapping app leverages that information facial recognition precise information 3D-printing app non-removable battery 128GB fixed internal storage touchscreen manual controls While Light ship L16 earliest pre-orders response camera slimmer versions camera in the works smartphones smartphone Light’s imaging technology internal components can get slimmer design modified eliminate 150mm lenses 18mm focal length DSLR quality low-light performance shallow depth of field zoom /