Xiaomi Mi 10 Youth Edition 50x Periscope Zoom Lens
Xiaomi 10 Youth has a quad-camera module with four lenses – a 48-megapixel super-clear main camera, an 8-megapixel telephoto, an 8-megapixel ultra-wide and a 2-megapixel macro lens, covering an ultra-wide focal range of 15-122mm. The 8-megapixel telephoto lens features a periscope construction that allows for 5x lossless optical zoom and up to 50x digital zoom. After deep dive into Honor 30 series periscope lens, now ita time for Xiaomi Mi 10 Youth Edition 50x Periscope Zoom Lens evolution.
Periscope lens construction is relatively complex and is generally used only for flagship models. Xiaomi is constantly exploring in terms of imaging technology, this time bringing the periscope lens to the Xiaomi 10 Youth Edition, which starts at just 2099 yuan about ₹22,500.
Why use a periscope lens?
It goes even further than the conventional 3x Optical Zoom limit. Telephoto lenses are not uncommon in mobile phones, most of the current 3 and 4 camera phones will come with a telephoto lens for lossless telephoto shooting. But in terms of zoom magnification, the 3X is already the limit. How to achieve greater zoom magnification? How to see it further?
The longer the focal length of the lens, the greater the magnification, which means you can shoot farther. But for longer focal lengths to be achieved, the lens length must also be longer.
This is a schematic of how far the focal length is from the shooting distance (the actual lens set is much more complicated than the above picture). For a higher magnification zoom, the distance between the lens and the CMOS is also longer, which means the camera module is thicker. The ever-thickening camera module has been challenging the limits of space inside the phone. Thus, the periscope emerges.
How is the periscope lens implemented?
Right-angle prisms change the direction of the optical path so that the lens can be positioned horizontally. From the name, the periscope in the submarine is the one that comes to mind almost immediately. That’s right, the periscope head in the phone is borrowed from the periscope structure.
The Xiaomi 10 Youth Edition Periscope combination lens includes a right-angle prism that changes the direction of the light path and a set of aspheric 5P lenses for imaging. The right-angle prism plays a key role in this.
The light undergoes refraction, changes path, passes through a 5P lens, and is finally injected into a CMOS device for imaging. Right-angle prismatic processing can take dozens of passes to accurately refract light into the imaging lens. Their relatively high cost is the main reason why periscope heads are generally only used in flagships.
Telephoto stabilization is essential. How is it done?
Separate OIS control system to eliminate subtle image deflection. Optical anti-shake technology, which is relatively popular in high-end phones, works by using the reverse movement of a certain set of lenses or light-sensitive components in the lens to offset the effects of vibration. With a telephoto lens, the slightest bit of jitter is infinitely magnified and extremely blurry. Therefore, there is a greater need for optical anti-shake to ensure the rate of film formation. The Xiaomi 10 Youth Edition’s periscope combo lens features a split OIS control system.
The reason why it is called split OIS anti-shake is that the vertical OIS of the right-angle prism part and the lateral OIS of the 5P lens group part are independent structures (as shown above). The XY axis is independent of each other, without crosstalk, which physically ensures the picture stability and does not cause minor image deflection.
Periscope lens set because of the longer optical path, complex structure, but also to ensure that other devices within the optical path do not affect the light. Xiaomi 10 Youth Edition adopts an extinction motor treatment, which turns the reflected light from the inner wall of the motor from orderly to diffuse, eliminating a lot of unwanted specular reflected light, ensuring neat and transparent photos.
How to use the periscope structure to achieve the whole machine thinning?
D-Cut technology 7.6% lower than conventional periscope thickness. It achieves non-destructive zoom at a higher magnification without increasing the thickness of the body. This is the biggest structural advantage of the periscope lens.
Moreover, the Xiaomi 10 Youth periscope head also uses D-Cut technology to provide a compressor to the thickness while ensuring that the light path is not affected, which further reduces the thickness by 7.6 percent compared to regular periscopes.
According to Xiaomi, compared to mainstream products on the market, the Xiaomi 10 Youth Edition is probably the thinnest periscope zoom phone available.
Source (In Chinese)