Imaging

All previous records absolutely pale in comparison to the new record holder for the world’s fastest camera, boasting a mind-boggling rate of 70 trillion frames per second. That’s fast enough to capture light waves in movement.

Searching for sources of potentially harmful radiation isn't a job that most people would want – so why not get a drone to do it? Well, a team of Czech engineers is currently developing just such an aircraft.

Google's wizardry with computational imaging is at the heart of what makes its Pixel phones such impressive photography tools despite the fact that they only have single 12.2-megapixel cameras. A new paper reveals some of the magic behind the impressive Night Sight and Super-Res Zoom features.

It has been years since Google’s influential Street View left the roads and began to map everything from shopping centers to hiking trails. The device that made this happen was called the Street View Trekker, and Google just revealed an updated model.

​​Hyperspectral cameras allow us to see what's invisible to the human eye, and even determine what things are made of. Unfortunately, the devices have tended to be big and cumbersome, limiting them to use in labs. Now, however, there's a portable model on the market.​

Researchers from NEC and the Tokyo Institute of Technology have used Artificial Intelligence to automatically combine visible and non-visible images, dramatically improving image clarity and visibility under severe conditions.

​We think of Wi-Fi as bathing us in a comfy, invisible blanket of data and internet access, but just as a blanket can take on the shapes of the bodies it covers, the microwave radiation sent out from a hotspot can be used to generate a three-dimensional image of the surrounding environment.

The SmartUV is a ultraviolet-imaging camera that can be plugged into a smartphone, allowing users to see beneath the surface of their skin.​

Scientists have used a mix of MRI, ultrasound and VR to produce 3D models of fetuses, a technology that could be used to avoid complications when it comes time to welcome them into the real world. ​

From a jagged low-res jpeg to a sharper, larger image file, Google researchers have found a way to use machine learning to upscale images to higher resolutions at lightning speed, and it works so fast it could one day be built into your smartphone.

The Microsoft Kinect may be facing some competition. The Motion Contrast 3D Scanning (MC3D) camera should also be economical, while offering higher-quality imaging and the ability to operate in sunlight.

A research team at Harvard University has made a major leap forward with its ultra-thin flat lens which could revolutionize the bulky equipment used in photography, astronomy and microscopy. The new flat lens can focus multiple wavelengths of light at the same point.