Aptina CX-Sized Sensor Named Finalist of 2012 Electronics Creativity Award

PR Newswire: UBM announced the finalists for the 2012 UBM Electronics ACE Awards. The new awards program brings together the EE Times ACE (Annual Creativity in Electronics) Awards and EDN's Innovation Awards into one program. The awards program honors the people and companies behind the technologies and products that are changing the world of electronics. The awards ceremony will take place on Tuesday, March 27 at The Fairmont San Jose, during DESIGN West - a new conference and expo.

The only image sensor in the finalists list is Aptina AR1010 high-speed sensor. It appears to be quite similar to one used in Nikon J1/V1 mirrorless interchangable lens camera (Chipworks report). EDN explains why this sensor was selected:

"Aptina’s AR1010 is a high-speed, CX-format, 10-MP CMOS image sensor that is enabling a new class of consumer digital still camera. Traditional compact digital still cameras (DSCs) have the benefits of being reasonably priced and easy to use but are slow and use small-format sensors that provide a less than optimal imaging performance. The alternative has been for consumers to upgrade to DSLR cameras that are bulkier, more expensive, and not so easy to use, yet use larger-format sensors that allow the capture of quite high-quality images. The new MILC segment is taking the best from DSCs and DSLRs to provide a camera that is reasonable in size and price, yet uses a larger-format sensor for high-performance imaging. The AR1010 targets this MILC segment and does so with a unique high-speed sensor design to further advance the speed of image capture and eliminate the slow camera response. The AR1010 has enabled a leading camera manufacturer to introduce an innovative camera in the MILC segment and highlights the performance benefits and advanced features the sensor enables. Key benefits/features of this particular camera enabled by the AR1010 sensor are a large CX-format imaging array with high sensitivity (ISO100 to ISO6400); small and light interchangeable lens digital cameras; full HD video, 1080p; fast autofocus system; focal plane phase-detection AF + contrast-detect AF; 10fps continuous shooting, with AF tracking; and 60fps full resolution shooting."