In a 5G terminal consumption trend report released by China Mobile at the beginning of this year, it was pointed out that the survey found that among the key factors for users to buy mobile phones, hardware configuration, price and appearance accounted for the top three. Among them, in terms of hardware configuration, the first three items that users pay the most attention to are processors, memory and cameras, especially in the 3K to 6K price segment, and processors are regarded as the top priority.
The reason why the processor or core SoC is so important is that it is related to all aspects of the user experience, including the smoothness of daily operation, camera recording, mobile games, map navigation, etc. As the "heart" of mobile phones, processors also determine the boundaries of hardware potential such as memory and cameras.
Not long ago, Qualcomm released the latest generation of flagship mobile platform product Snapdragon 8 Gen 1, and officially summarized its technical pillars into six aspects: connectivity, imaging, AI, gaming, audio and security. It is not difficult to find that in terms of these six points alone, terminal manufacturers are best at differentiating to attract users is the image strength.
So what upgrades has the new generation of Snapdragon 8 made in terms of imaging, and how to empower manufacturers?
Launched 18bit ISP
First of all, from the paper specifications, snapdragon 8 supported Snapdragon Sight Snapdragon imaging technology, in collaboration with Qualcomm artificial intelligence engine AI Engine, Snapdragon Elite Gaming game technology, Snapdragon Sound Snapdragon listening technology, etc., constitute the Snapdragon technology matrix universe.
Among them, on the "brain" ISP unit of image processing, snapdragon 8 was upgraded from the snapdragon 888/888 Plus era to the first 14-bit three ISP to 18bit triple ISP, which is not only the first 18-bit ISP for commercial mobile devices, but also achieved a dynamic range data volume increase of 4096 times, can process 3.2 Gigiapixels (3.2 billion) pixels per second, dynamic mode can increase by up to 4 stops, night mode increased by 5 times.
We know that taking pictures is a game of light and shadow, and the richer the image information captured in a unit of time, the final effect of the film can be guaranteed. Moreover, taking pictures has now evolved into the core function of mobile phones, because of the progress of hardware and software, but also derived more and more professional gameplay, such as and SLR support RAW format, convenient for later stages and so on. Undoubtedly, with a strong 18-bit triple ISP guarantee, the manufacturer can have more space for tuning cameras, and ultimately allow users to get an experience upgrade from quantitative to qualitative changes.
Grab beach 8K HDR
Since it is a flagship platform, it must have a considerable technical foresight, this time Snapdragon 8 for the first time supports 8K HDR (30FPS) video recording, supporting video shooting in more than 1 billion colors hdR10+ format, highlighting the powerful computing performance of the chip.
For consumers, 8K is no longer a conceptual product. The domestic head video website Bilibili has launched 8K ultra-high-definition video quality, and supports Up to upload 8K video, with the empowerment of Snapdragon 8, the future video creation will undoubtedly leap again in clarity.
Of course, clarity is one aspect, in terms of what you see is what you get, the new bokeh engine on the Snapdragon 8 cooperates with Rainbow Soft, which can add a beautiful soft background to the video, presenting a more stunning effect, which is like turning on the portrait mode when the video is shot.
Triple concurrent shooting and super multi-frame engine
The so-called triple concurrent shooting is to support three cameras to take pictures and videos together, after the Qualcomm algorithm optimization and strong computing power support, users can get a smooth lens switching experience while using three cameras to shoot together, which well avoids a series of problems such as video jump and white balance generated in the past zoom process.
In order to improve the film rate and ensure the film effect, the Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 platform can achieve hundreds of multi-frame composite capabilities in a short period of time, which can identify and distinguish dynamic and static objects, for example, in the future, a hand can easily get a large film that retains both a clear portrait of the foreground and a gorgeous traffic or light rail as the background.
4th ISP
In addition to the 18-bit triple ISP, the new generation of Snapdragon 8 platform also adds a new low-power smart perception ISP, which can support the camera to run at a very low power consumption, so that users can feel the convenience of the face unlock function that is always on and the high privacy of the lock screen is always maintained when there is no face exposed.
Allowing the phone lens to be active all the time without increasing power consumption allows developers to use the phone lens to be online at any time and develop new features, such as helping to achieve faster code scanning, smart screen or lock screen to save power or protect privacy (such as someone looking over the user's shoulder at the screen, the screen will show a black screen, hide personal content or lock the phone screen) and so on.
4 times THE AI hashrate unlocks the image for more gameplay
At the data level, the seventh-generation Qualcomm AI engine integrated by Snapdragon 8 has four times the performance of the previous generation of Snapdragon 888, and the energy efficiency ratio has reached 1.7 times that of Snapdragon 888. In addition to parameters, at a deeper level, Snapdragon 8 has penetrated into various AI applications in advance and created more visible AI functions. Taking mobile phone photography as an example, behind the above-mentioned bokeh engine, super multi-frame synthesis, triple concurrent shooting, etc., there is a strong computing power support of the new Snapdragon AI engine.
It is worth mentioning that this time Qualcomm also cooperated with Leica to achieve Leica Leitz style filter, relying on the support of the AI engine of the Snapdragon platform, so that you can also take Photos of Leica M10 with Noctilux 50mm, Summilux 35mm/28mm lens with Leica flavor.
From the above introduction, it can be seen that Snapdragon 8 provides a strong enough software and hardware guarantee at the image level, but this only lays a solid foundation, and finally personalizes the definition of camera and video functions, style presentation, etc., and also needs to examine the OEM manufacturer's ability to eat through the chip, the tuning strategy of the camera and the definition of the target user. From another point of view, terminal manufacturers have their own magic, which also means that the market is full of flowers.