The tsunami of digital photos people are snapping today is dramatically reshaping the entire digital imaging ecosystem. Social networking Websites such as MySpace and YouTube have driven enormous increases in image uploading, while the availability of photo- and video-sharing sites ranging from Flickr to iMovies have spurred additional volumes of downloading. And today, uploading and downloading of photos and video occurs not just to and from PCs, but among a wide range of devices – PCs, laptops, PDAs and camera phones.

Designed for quick and efficient color tuning, the new Toshiba ImaTuning™ image sensor calibration tool consists of both hardware and software for rapid color calibration and tuning of Toshiba CMOS image sensors for cellular handsets and other mobile applications.
 Press Release

Designed for quick and efficient color tuning, the new Toshiba ImaTuning™ image sensor calibration tool consists of both hardware and software for rapid color calibration and tuning of Toshiba CMOS image sensors for cellular handsets and other mobile applications.
 Press Release

The camera phone is the most disruptive of these devices. Analyst firm Gartner notes that camera phones accounted for 48 percent of total worldwide mobile phones sales in 2006 and will jump to 81 percent by 2010.1 Unit sales of phones will grow from 460 million handsets sold in 2006 to one billion phones sold by 2010.2

Poor picture quality, limited camera phone memory and lack of an "ecosystem " to move pictures out of the phone and onto PCs or other storage devices might have made camera phones little more than a fad. But, a new wave of emerging technologies have both encouraged early adopters to use their camera phones more and attracted a new set of users that would not have purchased a camera phone when features were so limited. As a result, just as digital still cameras dramatically shrunk market demand for film cameras, new and improved camera phones are now impacting sales of digital still cameras.

As late as 2005, many industry experts predicted that camera phones would never replace digital still cameras as the primary photography device for consumers, citing "fuzzy" images, low resolution and a host of other issues. Many of these experts are the same people who predicted that digital cameras would never replace film cameras.

Camera Sales

Today, camera phone sales are surging as digital camera sales are stalling. Among the reasons: digital camera sales are reaching a saturation point with current technology. Multiple studies have shown that the average U.S. family of four already owns two or more digital cameras. On the other hand, improved camera phone technology, analyst firm Strategy Analytics notes will result in camera phones capturing 15 percent of the low-end digital still camera market by 2010.³

A recent survey by German optics firm Schneider Kreuznach polled 1,000 users in the U.S., Germany, China and India regarding their usage patterns, highlights of their findings include:

• One out of four respondents indicated that in the future they would exclusively use cell phones for picture-taking (early adopters), provided the quality matched that of today's upper mid-range digital cameras with approximately 6 million pixels.
• Under certain circumstances, 43 percent would be willing to replace their digital camera with a suitable cell phone. At present, only 32 percent would still prefer a digital camera.
• Users in India and China were particularly open-minded towards cell phone photography: In these countries, eight out of ten of those questioned (79 percent) could imagine using only cell phones for picture-taking in future.
• While in India and China more than half of all respondents (60 and 52 percent respectively) already take pictures with their cell phones several times per week and in the USA more than a quarter (26 percent), Germany has the lowest number of so-called 'power users' (12 percent) and at the same time the highest number of non-users (59 percent).⁴

It is not a matter of if, but of when camera phones will become the primary photography device for consumers. Toshiba sums up this trend with the chart below:

Camera Phone Trends

As digital still cameras proliferate, film cameras have been relegated to some professionals and hobbyists. This trend will repeat itself with digital cameras as camera phone features improve.

One key trend in camera phone image sensors is the shrinkage in pixel size. A standard pixel in a digital still camera has an area of 36µ² . The typical camera phone pixel consumes an area of 5µ². On the one hand, the smaller pixels in a camera phone enables higher resolution; on the other, smaller pixels capture less light resulting in poorer picture quality, especially in low light conditions.

Another key trend is the need for extended depth of field. A normal feature of most digital still cameras, this has been a feature that's been missing in camera phones until recently.

In optics, particularly film and photography, the depth of field (DOF) is the distance in front of and beyond the subject that appears to be in focus. There is only one distance at which a subject is precisely in focus, but focus falls off gradually on either side of that distance, and there is a region in which the blurring is imperceptible under normal viewing conditions.⁵

New solutions, such as the Toshiba Wide Dynamic Range technology, provide enhanced tonal quality at all ranges. As image sensor developers addressed low light condition issues, their solutions created problems with well-lit situations - images would often bleach out.

While previous solutions only provided a CMOS image sensor dynamic range of up to 60 dB, the new Toshiba Wide Dynamic Range technology extends this to 92 dB. Camera phones can now capture high-quality images in both low-light and bright-light situations.

Improvements in image sensors combined with new features such as auto focus and zoom within the camera phone are combining with other advancements to create a complete camera phone "ecosystem" that consumers are using to share, store and print camera phone images as easily as they do digital still camera images. Among these:

• Advancements in cellular networks in the form of both upgrading 2G networks with technologies such as EV-DO, as well as the spread of 3G networks (in several flavors, such as GSM, GPRS and UMTS), makes it easier and faster for consumers to send their photos.
• Camera phone memory capacity is increasing rapidly and shrinking in size to accommodate the storage of more images.
• Camera phone display quality is improving. While VGA screens are too expensive today, prices are coming down.
• Handset manufacturers are designing a new breed of phone that includes a larger screen. For example, certain new models pivot 90° vs. flipping up to provide a screen with an aspect ratio much closer to today's 4:3 or 16:9. As a result, the screen size is nearly the same as the footprint for the entire phone.
• Manufacturers are also integrating additional radios into phones, such as Bluetooth, WiFi and soon WiMax to give consumers additional options for their photos, sharing with friends, moving onto a PC or storage device, etc.

Lyra Research notes that by late 2008 or early 2009, "The cumulative number of camera phones shipped will surpass the cumulative number of both conventional and digital cameras shipped in the entire history of photography – and camera phones will have been on the market for less than a decade." ⁶ As the march of new technologies continues, even today's camera phones will give way to "intelligent" phones that include features such as image recognition – where the camera will "recognize" a person or scene being photographed and group like photos together. New features are limited only by manufacturers' imaginations.

¹ iT Wire, "Every Cell Phone a Camera-Phone Soon, Says Gartner," November 6, 2006.
² iT Wire, "Every Cell Phone a Camera-Phone Soon, Says Gartner," November 6, 2006.
³ Digital Camera Info.com, "Camera Phones Outsell Digital Cameras," by Emily Raymond.
⁴ Let's Go Digital.com, "Cell Phones Replace Digital Cameras," by Ralf Jurrien, February 11, 2007.
⁵ www.wikipedia.org.
⁶ Lyra Research, "Pictures at Hand: 2006 Worldwide Camera Phone Market Report," Introduction, October 4, 2006.

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Toshiba is a pioneer and world leader in image sensor technology both for charged-coupled devices (CCDs) and complementary metal oxide semiconductor (CMOS) image sensors.

Toshiba's leadership advancement and technology refinement during 20 years of designing, developing and manufacturing image sensors, includes over 10 years in the specific development of CMOS image sensors, the heart of the camera phone. As a result, Toshiba holds a significant share of the market and now ranks as #4 in CMOS image sensors according to a report on the CCD/CMOS image sensor market, published in June 2010 by Techno Systems Research.

Why corner yourself? See why Toshiba is preferred by world-leading mobile phone makers.

Why corner yourself? See why Toshiba is preferred by world-leading mobile phone makers. more

Toshiba's market strength in image sensor-based camera applications is based on superior image quality, consistently innovative products and on the strong relationships forged with top-tier mobile phone manufacturers. Tight engineering and procurement team relationships, as well as superior "Benchmark" customer service have become the hallmark of Toshiba.

The Toshiba portfolio encompasses a family of CMOS image sensors from VGA and above for predominately high-end, camera-enabled mobile phone handset applications, including Smart-phones.

Toshiba CMOS image sensors employ a unique pixel design that enable high-quality images with both high sensitivity and signal-to-noise ratio, even in low-light conditions. Based on TAEC evaluation, CMOS image sensors have proven their superiority in image quality comparisons by offering demonstrably better colorrepresentation and low-light performance compared to other leading CMOS image sensor products. Toshiba image sensors deliver best-in-class image quality through continued innovations in:

1. Unique pixel structure development
2. Proprietary semiconductor process technology
3. Advanced micro lens and color filter technology
4. Proprietary image pipeline technology

Toshiba is dedicated to the development and application engineering of imaging products. Two of the company's wafer fabs, located in Iwate and Oita, Japan, are focused on CCD and CMOS image sensor manufacturing. A large number of module partners design, develop and deliver camera and sensor modules using Toshiba image sensor wafers.

To stay current with the latest technology developments, emerging applications and standards, Toshiba plans a multi-billion dollar investment in Capex and R&D over the next several years.