Sony Xperia 1 IV: This is how its industry-unique continuous optical zoom works

Earlier this month, Sony announced its new generation of phones: Xperia 1 IV and Xperia 10 IV.

Sony Xperia 1 IV arrives with a high price of 1,399 euros, but also with unique features like continuous optical zoom.

The Japanese company introduced the concept of physically moving the lenses within the camera system with the Xperia 1 III, but it was only capable of switching between two fixed focal lengths. With the Xperia 1 IV, Sony has finally achieved true continuous zoom between 85mm and 125mm.

This is challenging as, in general, with the optical zoom lens system, depending on the position of the zoom unit (85-125 in the case of the Xperia 1 IV), the optical characteristics are different, such as shading lens distortion, aberration, etc.

In an interview with Phone Arena Hiroshi Takano, Product Marketing Department, Planning and Marketing Division, Mobile Communications Business Group, Sony Corporation, and Hiroki Takizawa, Planning and Marketing Department, Mobile Communications Business Group, Sony Corporation, provide details on how this system works.

Sony says that in its future strategy it strives to find solutions to user pain points and having continuous zoom is something they knew would be appreciated by customers. In the case of Xperia 1 IV, they have achieved a continuous zoom with high autofocus performance at all telephoto focal lengths.

In general, with the optical zoom lens system, depending on the position of the zoom lens unit (85-125 in the case of Xperia 1 IV), the optical characteristics are different, such as lens shading, distortion, aberration, etc. Therefore, it is necessary to apply a suitable compensation for those parameters at each position of the zoom lens.

In the Xperia 1 IV, for this to happen, two things are implemented: 1) the measurement of optical characteristics in camera module production and 2) the compensation in camera signal processing. They are quite complex procedures, as it is easy to imagine.

In addition to optical zoom, the Xperia 1 IV has achieved continuous zoom, which allows Enlarge the image from 16 to 24 mm, up to 375 mm, during movie recording. This also requires a complex process in the production of smartphones.

For this, 3 different lenses are used. The white point of each lens is calibrated in the production of the camera module, but these may have a slight deviation.

If that deviation holds, the color will change when lenses are changed by zooming between them. To avoid this phenomenon, Xperia 1 IV applies white point calibration together for all 3 cameras at the factory to eliminate drift. With this, Xperia 1 IV achieves consistent colors between targets.

The focal length of about 85mm-125mm is often used in videography and portrait photography at ILCs. The Xperia’s strong point is adjusting the AF to humans and animals and it adapts very well to those focal lengths.

On the Xperia 1IV, mechanical actuators are used to move the zoom lens unit, the focus lens unit, and the optical image stabilization unit. It doesn’t affect the battery life as much, since it doesn’t move all the time.

As with all systems that have moving parts, wear and tear could be a long-term problem. Sony has not wanted to reveal how many cycles of zooming in and out (or hours of work) the Xperia 1 IV camera system can withstand.

Finally, Sony confirms that it will create products that connect creators and users, and will continue to evolve as its most trusted and loved brand.