SmartSens' second-generation global shutter image sensor series targets a wider range of machine vision applications

On May 17, at the "14th Songshan Lake China IC Innovation Summit Forum" hosted by VeriSilicon, SmartSens Sales Director Zong Xiang introduced the company's latest second-generation global shutter technology CMOS image sensor.

The global shutter is different from the rolling shutter. The global shutter starts and ends the exposure of all pixels on the entire image sensor at the same time to ensure that the exposure of the entire picture is consistent. The rolling shutter, on the other hand, exposes the image line by line in a scanning manner from the top to the bottom of the sensor, and the exposure time of each line may be different.

For this reason, the global shutter can capture very clear and sharp images, avoiding image distortion and aberration, because all pixels are exposed at the same time. However, the rolling shutter is prone to image distortion and aberration when the shutter speed is slow, especially when shooting dynamic scenes.

The rolling shutter can provide better details and clarity due to the line-by-line exposure. However, unlike photography for human eyes, machine vision does not pursue color excessively, but needs to ensure that the picture does not produce any deformation or artifacts.

As smart machines become more and more diverse, the application areas of global shutter are becoming more and more diverse. Whether it is for spatial positioning, navigation or obstacle avoidance, global shutter is a better choice. SmartSens products are also widely used in drones, sweeping robots, barcode scanning, face recognition, 3D structured light, etc. For sweeping robots alone, Ecovacs, Dreame and Whale Cloud are all customers of the company.

Zong Xiang introduced that SmartSens began to deploy global shutter technology in 2017 and launched the first SmartGS series in 2018, combining BSI with global shutter technology and supporting near-infrared enhancement technology and single-frame HDR, thus enabling machine vision applications to cope with ultra-low light and complex light challenges. SmartGS has currently launched three product lines and nearly 20 products, covering different resolutions and frame rates, to meet more market segments.

SmartSens' latest global shutter products are SC038HGS and SC020HGS. SC038HGS is used in 6DOF robots, VR positioning, etc. It can support 240 frames at VGA resolution and consumes only 48.6mW.

SC020HGS is a chip suitable for AR/VR smart wearable devices, such as iris recognition, blink detection, eye tracking, motion recognition and other face capture functions, and can reach 240 frames at a resolution of 400×400. Its chip size is only 1.8mm x 1.8mm, which is fully adapted to the micro camera module. The maximum size is 2mm x 2mm, and it can be directly placed on the frame of AR glasses. The power consumption is also only 48.4mW.

Zong Xiang also reviewed SmartSens' layout in other industries. SmartSens started in the security field, then entered the machine vision industry, and only started to get involved in automotive and mobile phone applications in 2021. At present, the company is far ahead in the security market with a market share of 33.3%, and the drone industry occupies more than 80% of the market share. In the automotive industry, it has become the second largest in-vehicle CIS supplier in China and the fourth largest in the world, and the mobile phone industry has also ranked fifth.

Song Xiang finally mentioned a blue ocean industry - live broadcast applications. Currently, most people still use mobile phones, and the remaining 20% ​​use SLR or micro-single-lens cameras for live broadcasting. Currently, SmartSens is working with manufacturers to launch high-performance products between micro-single-lens cameras and mobile phones to fill the gap in the live broadcast industry.