Omnivision Expands its NIR-Enhanced Sensor Portfolio

PRNewswire: OmniVision announces the OS04A10, a 2.9um pixel sensor with 4MP resolution, the latest addition to its growing family of Nyxel NIR and ultra-low light (ULL) sensors. The OS04A10 with QE is 60% at 850nm and 40% at 940nm, said to be 3x to 5x better than sensors without this technology.

"In addition to requiring top performance in all lighting conditions, security and surveillance camera designers are demanding higher resolution for greater facial recognition accuracy with longer zoom range," said Brian Fang, business development director at OmniVision. "By combining our industry-leading NIR and ULL technologies with 4 MP resolution, the OS04A10 is designed to meet the evolving needs of security and surveillance systems."

The amount of NIR light that a sensor requires to capture high quality images can be quantified with a new metric called NIR SNR1, which takes into account the QE, pixel size and read noise. The OS04A10 is said to achieve industry leading SNR1850nm and SNR1940nm performance, which is 2x to 3x smaller when compared with the leading known available competitor sensors.

The OS04A10 is said to also achieve the industry's lowest SNR1 while producing 4 MP and 1080p images for video recording. Additionally, OmniVision's dual-conversion-gain pixel provides good ULL and HDR performance. The 3-frame staggered shutter also minimizes motion artifacts and enables an HDR of 120 dB.

This image sensor is available in an extremely small package enabled by PureCel-S die stacking technology. The PureCel-S technology also reduces power consumption.