Technology is advancing in leaps and bounds, Remembering the days when tube cameras were competing against the early CCD cameras. The sales pitch highlighted how little maintenance the CCD camera required, how they don’t have problems with tube burn. How smaller the package were; and in all other aspects how comparable to the Tube camera they were. With these merits it was so easy to sell and hence the demise of the tube camera. Then came the poor technician who found big white blotches on screen that looked like a bright light burnt the CCD. How is this so? They said that the”CCD doesn’t burn”. Its only a new camera it can’t be burnt. By accident he found as he sprayed a can of air to clean any dust on the CCD chip, a residue drop of moisture had magnified heat from the sunlight to burn some pixels. So now he learns you can burn CCD with extreme heat.
Then there was the technician who had setup the new replacement CCD cameras , only to hear the customer complain that the new cameras were not as sensitive as the old tube cameras he just replaced. So faster new lenses were being installed to help let more light in to compensate where higher sensitivity was required. As the lenses got smaller requiring less glass than their predecessor . They also got cheaper, the lens Replacement were feasible and sensitivity was not so much an issue. As the volumes were sold the packages were smaller the camera got cheaper to produce. The problems were better understood. The reality was smaller sizes lower prices and improved features.
Again and again new technologies push their way in, maybe slightly before time. With their acceptance follows promise to stand up to expectation. As with the CCD camera it may have seemed a bit gimmicky to have smaller cameras Now the board camera and even the chip camera is a reality. Because of this technology even manufacturing benefits. The new technology adds significance to the next. Each technology helps in the development of the next. Like the camera I saw with the ability for 8000 frames a second. You say what for, what a gimmick, you only need 24 frames a sec to get that illusion of motion. Well that was my first response, then I saw in slow motion as the frames were played back how it took forever to playback, a recording of part of a manufacturing process then it dawned on me , with such detail in playback it was possible to see a flaw in the process . Such high speed cameras can be thought of as an oscilloscope for mechanical motion, trying to analyze a high speed event. Without one is similar to designing and debugging a complex electronic circuit without an oscilloscope. Now that the analysis of a manufacturing process can be reviewed with such detail , the process of manufacture is assisted by an equipment at 1st thought to be a gimmick . It is now a tool in the manufacturing process. Chicken or the egg you think , well thats how amazing the leaps and bounds of technologies are moving. No sooner do we develop something and even before all the flaws are ironed out, that it becomes part of a system and you can’t tell how it was being done before without it.
As we admire the human body and we try to emulate and reproduce its functions. The camera is just like an eye, with no way the perfection the human eye has. Even with such complex designs we keep developing more features all in the persual of reproducing human nature. So with every new technology it needs to be accepted and nurtured . I know I’ve been known to be critical in the past . This can be healthy remember the CCD camera that doesn’ t burn. Well with healthy criticism at least we learn of what new heights we can reach and what limits there are at getting there. Today you just expose your problem or your objective and its only time and money between having a problem and having it resolved.
Go to the moon; why?, space travel ; what for? well as we explore these questions we raise others and resolve some more. Today it may seem unnecessary to have a camera surveilling the streets. Tomorrow it may be on a recording as evidence of a crime scene. Why not just have humans there , how many humans and how many is there?. We will always find resistance as someone feels threatened. Maybe their job is on the line or maybe their jobs worth is questioned. but normally their role only changes. So what next, maybe the parking camera? What for we can park with out them now! Well as the cities are overcrowded and the parking spots become smaller than a tin can then maybe the parking camera will not only be used in big trucks but also the average family car. It may double as a security camera with pictures being relayed via satellite of the culprit stealing the car. Maybe we will soon have someone develop the roving multiplexed view camera. Instead of multiplexing signals from different cameras all onto one recorder we will see the need to multiplex different views from the same camera. Or Maybe we will have such high definition cameras and scanning that we can utilise massive electronic zoom reducing costs by reducing the number of camera installations. Imagine one camera massive resolutions with massive digital zooms, 360 degree lenses and one digital recorder with massive resolution storage bandwidth. It may sound silly today but how will we accept it tomorrow.