This Modular Phone Concept Is Xiaomi’s Plan to Kill the Camera Bump
This Modular Phone Concept Is Xiaomi’s Plan to Kill the Camera Bump
If you hate the big camera bump of today’s smartphones, you’ll love the detachable lens of Xiaomi’s Modular Optical System.
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lol, Sony came up with that idea 10 years ago, and it flopped hard https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DSC-QX100
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I saw this too and I really wanted it. The Sony shop/showroom assistant (in Japan) told me it was discontinued and just there for show.
I think the Japanese just preferred the old school SLR. I can see the Chinese getting pretty excited about this one though.
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Maybe they should have called it something besides DSC-QX100
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There's zero chance this catches on, nobody wants to get rid of a camera bump badly enough to carry around a second device.
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Might as well just buy a DSLR
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Looks like this:
Key to its success is Xiaomi’s LaserLink technology. This is a proprietary optical communication module, apparent as a small dot on the back of the phone and the lens where data is transferred as light (near-infrared laser) at speeds of up to 10 Gbps.
The lens has two pins that connect on the back to draw power from the phone
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Now with flash bump!
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I think there is a niche this would fit into. But I think it needs to be three things
- optional
- securely fashioned
- high quality
I'm picturing a normal flat back phone that that this attaches to with strong magnets, would appeal to people who want a better camera but not quite spend the money on a dlsr. And if its optional then I'd be able to finally sit my phone flat on the table with or without a fat case again.
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This will only succeed if they open it up to other developers.
A 10Gb link with power, there are a lot of applications that could work here.
Camera/projector/docking station.... These are the first few I came up with, I'm sure others will have great ideas.
But if they try to keep it proprietary, it will go nowhere.
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He heard y'all line bumps, so we put an optional bump on your bump!
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I like the idea of it, but I wouldn't trust a camera from Xiaomi. I've got a Xiaomi Mi 10t Lite 5g phone, and the camera is a pain to use. There's about a 50/50 chance of a photo taken using the zoom to have random artifacts over the image. I've had some great photos ruined by it. It happened with my wife's Mi 10t Lite too, so it's not just my phone.
They removed features from the software too. One of the reasons that I chose this phone was because it had a burst mode on the camera, and I had a young child. After the phone was out of warranty, one of the updates removed the burst function. It also resets the settings if you switch apps or lock the screen. I was using the star trails mode last night, and switched to an astrophotography app to check I was pointing the phone the right way, and when I switched back, the camera was back to the default settings. Not great if you want to use one of the other modes.
