OPPO was mainly known in 2018 for the OPPO Find X, the first telephone with a motor for the camera module. In 2017 there was something else that put OPPO on the map, at that time the company showed a smartphone camera with five times optical zoom – optical zoom was then still very scarce, and was in most cases limited to 2x ‘lossless zoom’. Huawei last year, came up with the Huawei Mate 20 Pro the second phone with three times optical zoom. OPPO shows, confirmed the Chinese smartphone manufacturer on Wednesday, during MWC a smartphone camera with ten times optical zoom – the company does not want to tell whether it is just a separate demo, or whether it will be exhibited in a commercial product. OPPO does, however, know that the technology is ready for production.
OPPO has given the smartphone camera an effective zoom range between 15.9 to 159mm, which means the maximum zoom range of the smartphone camera is 10x. For this technique, OPPO uses three prime lenses in a periscopic setup.
Furthermore, the manufacturer didn’t reveal much about the cameras; however, it is known that OIS will be present, but the diaphragm of the camera is not made known. The diaphragm is usually the biggest damper for smartphones with optical zoom, photos taken with optical zoom of smartphones are often disappointing, especially in dark situations. One manufacturer already presented OPPO with the ‘optical zoom trend’, but it turned out not to be a success for Asus. The camera had a diaphragm that would make it impossible to take photos in the evening (f / 2.7-f / 4.8).
For now, we have to wait until the Mobile World Congress for more information about the new camera, the event will take place between 25 and 28 February in Barcelona. OPPO may already hold a presentation about the camera before the fair starts, although nothing is known about it.
It does not stop there, the manufacturer said to The Verge. As a follow-up of the current in-display fingerprint scanners, the Chinese smartphone manufacturer, according to its own statements, will show a fingerprint scanner with an active area that would be fifteen times larger compared to the current in-display fingerprint scanners. Last year, Vivo already showed a demo on the Vivo Apex, a phone that is now sold as the Vivo Nex. It is not known whether the scanner will use optical technology or the ultrasonic technology expected in 2019.
