Mobile phones have more and more cameras and offer us more possibilities when it comes to taking pictures and making videos, but there is a specific sensor that often goes unnoticed and is even underestimated. It is the monochrome sensor that offers black and white images that, unlike what we may think, has great utilities.
Each manufacturer and even smartphone can give it a specific or varied use and so that you know how important it can be, we are going to show you everything it is capable of. Unlike the wide angle that captures a greater angle of view or the telephoto lens that allows us to see further away, in this case the advantages go unnoticed at least with the naked eye.
How the monochrome sensor works
The performance offered by this sensor is based on directly capturing the shapes, objects or people that appear in front of the camera by measuring the tones, as in their origins black and white cameras did from where the photograph comes. With the arrival of photosites in red, green and blue tones, this was relegated to second place. However, photography is nothing without light and different intensities.
For this reason, manufacturers began to integrate the black and white sensor that achieved a more precise measurement of the intensity of light, thus ensuring that there are no details where the color photosites cannot reach. The classic color photosites are capable of obtaining the level of light that the image needs in an ideal light situation, but decreases in other situations where the light does not accompany it. However, the photodiodes of the monochrome sensors manage to capture without any restriction the highest percentage of existing light since it is their main reason for acting for which it has been designed and you do not have to worry about the colors that act in the image.
Camera enhancements
Just as a telephoto sensor allows us to take better captures from a distance, a wide angle with a greater field of view or a bokeh sensor helps to better blur the background of our photos, the black and white sensor of the phone’s camera also affects the results obtained by pressing the shutter button.
Upgrade the lights
Through the monochrome sensor, the intensity of the lights and shadows are collected as we have been able to see, which does not work independently, since this information is what is going to be eaten together with the main sensor. Information that helps the HDR mode through artificial intelligence to raise shadows and reduce highlights without us not having to worry about exposure or other sections.
A lens that directly offers users more facilities and possibilities to get great photos without the need to start the professional mode of the cameras. Point and shoot is what most want to achieve and without this monochrome sensor, it is not always easy to get it. With this we obtain a dynamic range that is noticeably perceived and where not everything is relegated to the main sensor and the AI that could generate noise, as we will learn later.
A better portrait mode
Without having to have a sensor that measures depth, to which more expensive smartphones are relegated, this monochrome sensor can also achieve the best bokeh effect. Through light, the mobile’s black and white sensor is able to recognize an object or person in the foreground and apply the blur to the rest of the image. It is true that in some cases it can be more difficult, but when taking photos in good light, most of the time combining this with AI the result is more than acceptable for a lower cost.
Goodbye to noise in photos
Although the main lens of smartphones has a high level of detail and a good aperture, in difficult situations, the monochrome sensor will have to come into play very importantly. With the information it offers on the lights, however minimal it may be, much more information can be obtained than the colors give. Combining this with a high exposure through night mode, the two lenses and that smart mode offers us to enjoy night photos and in twilight with an acceptable level of detail.
Without this information it will be practically impossible to achieve a clear image without resorting to a higher ISO , since noise would appear when trying to raise the lights without the pixels having all the necessary information. To observe it sometimes it will be necessary to zoom, but in very complex light situations, we can see the noise with the naked eye, giving rise to a bad photo where we cannot distinguish details and even faces.
Lies about this sensor
Since this is not a relatively new sensor, we came across many claims that may not be entirely true or outright false and are going to tear them down. The first and most common is what most users think, that it is a sensor that really only serves to take black and white photos. This is not the case since the one in charge of doing this in mobiles without this sensor is any lens with a filter that applies the replacement of color by black and white tones.
This leads us to another of the classic lies that state that the 2 Mpx that the monochrome sensor of mobile phones usually has offers a bad result as it does not have the ability to give much detail. The truth is that the light sensor is only responsible for providing the information and never works indecently, since your data will always be combined with the rest of the mobile cameras. It always works as an extra that depends on the others to function properly.
And finally, the criticisms that this sensor has received are focused on the lack of usefulness, something that may be the case in higher-end smartphones in which it is not even incorporated since they have an improved focus sensor or where even the telephoto lens is in charge of doing this. But this sensor does make a lot of sense for those cheaper smartphones since the information obtained is very important for the final result.