Bring Back Super CCD Technology!

3Percent wrote:

Using my S5 recently, I was inspired. I mean, wow you can really get some DR with this camera. Images that pass off as negative film in terms of DR captured, without all the grain. Got me to thinking...

I'm really surprised Fujifilm hasn't brought out a modern version of the S5 Pro sensor. Although modern CMOS chips have great dynamic range, capable of capturing one shot high DR scenes in one file, I think a modern version of the Super CCD would do it much better with even higher quality images. And of course it would be CMOS, not CCD, so it would apply just as well for video as it does stills.

Essentially taking two images at the same time, one for highlights, one for shadows, with two different sized pixels, is genius stuff. Think about how good that would work for say, the new 100mp medium format sensors, or a the new high resolution APS-C sensor in the upcoming X-H2.

Anyways that's my double penny advice for Fujifilm today, I'm out! "Just do it".

Modern backside illuminated sensors made SuperCCD obsolete. The SuperCCD were made to overcome the limitations of frontside illumination issues. They also created issues as well, such as demosaicing the odd diagonal honeycomb structure of the individual photosites. And as you already pointed out, readout is faster for CMOS, and were cheaper to manufacture at the time.

If I remember correctly, Fujifilm had their own sensor manufacturing plant, but then sold it to Toshiba, which also effected Fujifilm's decision on what kind of sensors to use.