http://www.amateurphotographer.co.uk 11Samsung talks smartphones and AI
Samsung’s latest
Galaxy S21 Ultra
5G employs four
camera unitsIN JANUARY, Samsung
released its latest agship
smartphone, the Galaxy S
Ultra 5G. Costing from £1,149,
it features no fewer than four
camera modules: ultra-wideangle,
wideangle, 3x telephoto, and 10x
telephoto. Technical editor Andy
Westlake spoke via video link
with Joshua Sung dae Cho, Vice
President and Head of Visual
Software R&D for Samsung
Mobile (pictured above), about
some of the technologies used
in the device.What new camera features are
in the S21 series?
We always focus on two main
points: to democratise the
experience of professional
photography, and to provide
Galaxy as a tool for professional
photographers. We have added a
lot of new features to serve those
purposes. For example, in our
portrait mode we can add
studio-like lighting effects.
Another feature that we’re proud
to introduce is that when you
take a picture of a landscape
using our single take mode, AI
can process it to show how the
lighting will change through the
day, like a 24-hour hyperlapse.What was the most difficult part
of the camera design?
We have used two folded
telephoto lenses to give a 10x
optical zoom, and tting them
into a device this small was a
challenge for the hardware
design. In terms of software, our
concern was how much zoom
power we can provide. Our
solution was to use AI technology
in the form of super-resolution,
so we take a lot of data from the
10x zoom lens, and then use
synthesisation to provide our
ultimate output of 100x
maximum.Could you give more detail on
how this works?
We take multiple frames, maybe
20 or more depending on how
bright or dark it is. While theseframes are being taken, your
hands can shake, so the next
step is to align them. What’s
really important here is to select
the right reference frame, which
is done by AI. Then you have the
synthesisisation step [of
combining all the frames],
followed by AI restoration to
enhance the details and pictures
even further.
Another example of super-
resolution technology is in
night-time pictures. For example,
when you have a neon sign in the
dark, you often see excessively
high brightness so that it’s
dif cult to distinguish the form. In
our S21 series, AI will detect the
sign and make the necessary
adjustments including using
multiple exposure levels both
high and low, so that brightnesscan be optimised and the sign
becomes very clear and crisp.Do you use this technology for
every picture?
Think of a swan oating on the
water, it may look very graceful
and peaceful but underneath
there is a lot going on. This is
happening with our camera
experience as well, because we
have so many different scenarios
for super-resolution technology.
The user may only think they are
clicking the button and that’s it,
but there’s super-resolution,
bokeh effects and multiple AI
processing going on in order to
produce the optimum output.What features might we expect
in future, thanks to AI?
I would like to talk about
personalisation of the camera
experience. In the future, I think
AI will analyse and learn each
user’s preference in terms of
colour, resolution and so on, so
that the output is customised to
each individual. So when ten
people take a picture of the same
landscape from the same angle,
all ten pictures will look different
because each individual’s
preferences are analysed and
understood by AI. I think one day
this could come true.Input 10Frames (Blurred) Picking Reference ImageSuper Resolution
Alignment & Registration Solution OutputSuper resolution combines multiple exposures to give an image with more detail than any individual frame11 NewsInterview Mar6 AW JP.indd 11 22/02/2021 13: