While the Motorola X Phone still remains a phone known only by rumours, speculation and innuendo, just when you thought every single specification had been covered by the rumours another new one arrives. This one involves the camera the X-Phone is said to be sporting. Taylor Wimberly of Android And Me fame has made a statement on Google+ that “Moto X will feature a Clear Pixel Camera with gesture controls.”
The X-Phone is rumoured to have a 10MP camera which many of us thought is be strange considering most manufacturers have gone from 8MP to 13MP cameras, with nothing in between. The weird resolution may be due to this Clear Pixel technology.
Clear Pixel technology is not a new technology. A patent for it was filed by Kodak back in 2005 but as yet hasn’t been used in smartphones. Standard cameras detect the incoming light using an array of red, green and blue pixels, with each pixel only being able to see their respective coloured light. This results in two thirds of the incoming light being undetected. Clear Pixel involves a new sensor which adds a pixel (a “Clear” or “Panchromatic”) that can detect all colours of light thus making it more sensitive to the incoming light. By using a mixture of Clear and standard pixels the camera is theoretically much more sensitive to low light conditions. The HTC Ones uses their Ultra Pixel technology to help with pictures taken in low light but at the expense of resolution. If this Clear Pixel technology works well then we may have the best of both worlds.
The good news is that this Kodak patent may have been among those recently purchased by Google so we shouldn’t see any lawsuits come out of it. The bad news is that we doubt it will be available in Australia.
Would you buy a phone specifically for this technology? Will you be importing the X-Phone if it is not released here in Australia?
I’m guessing I’d recommend this to some family member who doesn’t know or care about technology but wants to take pictures with their phone. Ok inexpensive product for them, limited tech support for me.
I just want a reasonably priced mid spec nexus phone with uSD and USB OTG.
I think this is exactly what this phone will be. The processor and screen resolution point towards a mid range phone, cheap. I doubt it will support au lte frequencies though….
I really hope the Moto X is a great phone, being mid range is good for the average consumer and keeps cost low, but I’d love to see a flagship from them. Not to mention the design of the phone featured in the article looks top notch.
I agree. I am no longer hyped for this phone. Give my something similar with cutting edge specs and I’d definitely import one. But not for a mid range phone.
Agreed. If it’s mid range, no thanks.