Researchers, students and engineers from Duke University and lens designers from the University of California San Diego, have come up with one monster of camera. The device is capable of capturing 1.4-gigapixels of RAW data at 10fps.
The 'AWARE-2' is constructed from 98, 14-megapixel, CMOS camera sensors and is currently sized at 0.75 x 0.75 x 0.5m, weighs in at 93kg and consumes 426W of power.
This may seem a little impractical, however, researchers claim that currently, only three per cent of the design is constructed from optical elements and, it's their hope that in five years, the technology will be small enough and fast enough to end up in the hands of consumers.
In the meantime, the group is being funded by DARPA with the aim of producing a scalable mass-production camera for military use. Their next project, the AWARE-10, should see the creation of a 5 to 10 gigapixel camera later this year.
Mind you, the quality isn't perfect and the camera certainly needs some work, head on over to the AWARE's website if you wish to judge for yourselves guys, it's still very impressive.
