This Startup Wants to Make Smartphone Cameras Much Better in Low Light

Smartphone cameras keep getting better at handling difficult lighting, but their image sensors still throw away a significant amount of incoming light during color capture. Metalenz thinks it has a way around that limitation. The company has acquired Israeli startup PxE Imaging, whose Holocoder technology aims to capture more light while recording color and depth information through a single camera.

The acquisition could eventually have implications for mobile photography, particularly in low light, where every bit of available light matters. However, Metalenz has not announced a smartphone launch or named any device makers planning to use the technology.

Replacing the Bayer filter with a different approach

Most digital cameras, including those in smartphones, use a Bayer filter over the image sensor to capture color. The filter separates incoming light into red, green, and blue components, allowing the camera to reconstruct a full color image. But this process also absorbs a substantial amount of light.

According to PxE, its Holocoder technology eliminates the need for the Bayer filter by using the wave properties of light to sort incoming information without absorbing it in the same way. The company claims this can deliver 2.5 times more light to a standard image sensor.

If that performance translates into consumer cameras, it could help improve image capture in dim environments and give camera systems more usable information in challenging lighting conditions. The technology could also benefit scenes with very bright and dark areas, although the announcement does not provide independent image quality tests or comparisons with existing smartphone sensors.

One camera for color and depth

The Holocoder is designed to capture depth information alongside color in the same image. It does this through a hardware layer patterned directly onto the image sensor, rather than relying on a separate depth camera or reconstructing all the information through software.

That could be useful for smartphones, which often combine data from multiple cameras and computational photography algorithms to produce portrait effects, estimate subject distance, and process images. Capturing color and depth together could reduce the need for additional hardware and some of the processing involved in combining separate sensor data.

Metalenz says the technology also produces spatial information that is already aligned with the visible image. This could make it useful beyond photography, including robotics, drones, and other devices that need to interpret their surroundings.

What Metalenz brings to the deal

The acquisition adds PxE’s visible light sensing technology to Metalenz’s existing work in metasurface optics and polarization sensing. The company says it has shipped more than 300 million metasurface optics in consumer devices.

Its PolarEyes platform captures polarization information, allowing systems to distinguish materials based on how they interact with light. One application is Polar ID, a facial authentication system designed for consumer devices.

Combining these capabilities with PxE’s Holocoder could give cameras access to several kinds of information through compact hardware. Metalenz says this could also help AI systems operate more efficiently by reducing the amount of information that must be reconstructed through software.

Better smartphone photos, but not just yet

The potential benefits for mobile photography are clear, particularly if the claimed light sensitivity gains hold up in actual camera systems. More light reaching a sensor could give manufacturers additional room to improve low light performance without relying entirely on larger sensors or more complex image processing.

Still, the announcement does not confirm a smartphone camera product, a release date, or any specific performance improvements in finished devices. The acquisition terms were also not disclosed.

For now, the Holocoder remains a promising sensor technology rather than a feature consumers can expect in their next phone. But if it delivers on its claims, future smartphone cameras could gain something beyond another megapixel upgrade: the ability to capture more of the light and depth information they currently miss.

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