Foveon: A digital revolution

Most consumers probably don’t understand or care how their digital camera works. However many of them do care about the quality of the images it produces. The quality difference produced with Foveon’s X3 technology is clearly illustrated in the photo of the monarch butterfly and the magnified insets from three different cameras in Figure 1. The Sigma SD9 has the X3 chip, the Nikon Coolpix 2500 is a 2.5 Megapixel traditional digital camera and the Nikon F-Series is a high-end 35mm film camera. The Foveon X3 chip is the first digital imaging sensor that has the potential to produce better images than film. Dr. Carver Mead, professor emeritus at CalTech, is the man behind Foveon. He received his BS, MS and PhD from Caltech and was a professor there for 40 years. He had over 50 patents granted during his 40 years as a researcher. His inventions have spawned more than twenty start-up companies, including Intel. He is the man responsible for creating the concept of VLSI (Very Large Scale Integrated Circuits) that revolutionized electronics. He envisioned ways to deal with millions of transistors on a single chip before it was even possible to create such a chip.

Vision is the most important human sense so this technology has the potential to have a tremendous impact on people. There are also applications in science where medical imaging or microscopes could be enhanced with X3 technology. Military satellites could be built with better imaging capabilities so instead of getting blurred letters they would get crisp, sharp detail. It is probably possible to use the layered technology to produce sensors that also measure UV and infrared wavelengths of light which would be useful for military applications. U2 spy planes and un-manned surveillance drones like the Predator could also benefit from sharper images.

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