Inexpensive Design Aims To Improve Photography, Security
South Korean researchers have designed and built
an inexpensive optical lens that collects light from a large area and produces a
virtually distortion-free wide-angle image.
South Korean researchers have designed and built an inexpensive optical lens that collects light from a large area and produces a virtually distortion-free wide-angle image. Standing in contrast to commonly known “fisheye” lenses, which produce significant amounts of visual distortion, low-distortion wide-angle lenses can potentially improve image-based applications such as security-camera systems and robot navigation.
The new wide-angle lens is lighter, smaller and more affordable than commercially available “rectilinear” lenses, which also produce low-distortion views.
Made of inexpensive components and available for little more than $100, the new wide-angle lens has been designed specifically to improve indoor security.
“For spacious places with high ceilings such as factories, hotels, theaters, resorts, and auditoriums, the lens can capture the entire floor and this will help security personnel to easily monitor those places,” says lead author Gyeong-il Kweon of Homan University in South Korea. In this scenario, the lens would be attached to inexpensive, commercially available bullet cameras, he says.
The new lens is relatively small and commercially available through a South Korean company called Nanophotonics that Kweon has started up.
When I worked with CCTV security systems, we hated fisheye cameras. They distorted images so much you couldn’t count on security employees to watch the silly images.
This critter looks like coming in cheap enough to use for webcams and observing wildlife in an unobtrusive way.
Posted: Sat - December 2, 2006 at 02:32 PM