Last edited by Wayne_ASUS on 2016/11/8 16:40
The 2016 Rio Olympics are now over. But what if you want to relive the thrilling swimming, archery, or track and field events? One option would be to rewatch the competitions on your phone. And yet, the colors and resolutions on your current handset may be inferior to your television, and the videos may even suffer from lag.
ZenFone 3 Ultra solves all these problems in one fell swoop. “Every new generation of product addresses issues associated with the previous generation, and introduces new technology. But we wanted more than that, we wanted to bring disruptive innovation to the industry as a whole,” said CL.Y., senior manager at the ASUS Display Technology Department / Human Interface Technology Division (HIT-Display). His research showed that while many people do watch live video on their smartphones, most people consider the image quality on their phones to be inferior to television.
Breakthrough One: Dedicated 4K image-processing chip optimizes 120-million pixels every second
Current smartphone display technologies generally use system-on-a-chip (SoC) solutions (meaning, a main processor and graphics processor combined into one piece of silicon). Consequently, the displayed image is affected only by the quality of the video and the screen’s resolution. In contrast, ZenFone 3 Ultra is the world’s first smartphone with a dedicated image-processing chip — Tru2Life+. The exclusive Tru2Life+ chip is equivalent to the image processor found in many high-end 4K televisions, thus allowing the image quality found in the best TV sets to be brought to a 6.8-inch smartphone screen. Image processing is generally done by having the SoC analyze and then display each frame, one at a time. The Tru2Life+ display chip, on the other hand, processes and optimizes each frame. Take a frame from a Full HD (FHD) video as an example — each frame has a resolution of 1920 x 1080, or 2,073,600 pixels. So, at 60 frames a second (fps), the Tru2Life+ chip is optimizing well over 120 million pixels each and every second. This enables ZenFone 3 Ultra to deliver color and image quality that is unmatched by any other phone.
Breakthrough Two: Improved contrast and sharpness for super-realistic images
Traditional smartphone display technology is limited by the brightness and contrast of each individual image. The Tru2Life+ chip in ZenFone 3 Ultra, however, analyzes and optimizes 120 million pixels a second. Coupled with proprietary ASUS algorithms, ZenFone 3 Ultra is capable of making adjustments on the fly to individual parts of the screen that are too bright or dim, offering up to 200%-better contrast in any given area. As a result, the screen provides the most logical, harmonious, and realistic color distributions possible.
The sharpness of the image also undergoes a similar degree of calculation and improvement, where every pixel is analyzed and optimized so that slight adjustments between pixels can be made, to achieve the best possible picture. Every detail, down to each individual hair, can be flawlessly presented. This effect is most prominent when images and text both appear on screen at the same time. Traditional image processing would handle the entire picture as one entity, without separating the text from the picture; consequently, when the quality of the picture is improved, the text becomes blurrier. The pixel analysis offered by Tru2Life+ enables the phone to distinguish between pictures and text, and perform calculations on them separately. The picture becomes clearer, while the text remains perfectly legible.
However, the optimization of static images was not enough to satisfy the ZenFone team, because they knew most users cared more about their video-watching experience.
Breakthrough Three: Blur-free motion
“ZenFone 3 Ultra, at 6.8 inches, offers an outstanding visual experience that can be held in the palm of just one hand. Our research showed that users are becoming increasingly demanding towards the audio-visual experiences they get from their phones. They’re also watching videos for longer periods of time. As a result, we decided to bring television technology to smartphones,” said CL.Y.
The question, then, was how the ZenFone development team could bring the high-resolution images of television to a smartphone. As CL.Y. explained, television content is filmed and broadcast at 24 frames per second, but phones use 60 frames per second. “The gap between 24 and 60 would lead to jerky, unnatural movements when you watch the video on your phone.”
To address this issue, the ZenFone team implemented the Tru2Life+ chip in the phone. The motion-estimation and motion-compensation technologies paired with a special algorithm would analyze the video’s motion and compensate for the missing frames. “If you know where everything is in one frame, and you know where everything is in a second frame, then you can extrapolate any missing frames using an algorithm. That way, the image progresses smoothly from the first frame to the second.” CL.Y. pointed out that, regardless of whether the user is watching a local file or a streaming video, as long as the phone has two frames to work with, then anything that moves between the two frames can be calculated with the algorithm. “We’re the first manufacturer in the world to be capable of doing this on a smartphone.”
Breakthrough Four: A wide color gamut for brighter hues
“Apart from the smoother video provided by our motion-estimation and motion-compensation technologies, and the algorithm, we also wanted to add something extra special to our next-generation product. In the end we decided to use a wide color gamut in the phone, which would offer unprecedented clarity and contrast to the phone’s pixels,” CL.Y. noted.
“In 1998, a few major players in the industry came up with a unified definition for ‘color’ with the sRGB color space. The vast majority of devices nowadays still use this standard.” However, there have also been many advances in color technology over the years. Consequently, both ZenFone 3 Deluxe and ZenFone 3 Ultra use a wide color gamut and the Tru2Life+ chip for their displays, which means that the video data provided by the SoC can be intelligently adjusted to provide a crisp and vibrant picture. Of course, this standard far exceeds the definitions delineated by sRGB, so what happens when the phone encounters situations where it still needs to follow the sRGB framework?
“This was a tough nut to crack. It took a lot of time, but in the end we came up with the algorithm to address this issue,” CL.Y. revealed. If the wide color gamut was simply applied without any further processing, it would lead to color distortions for the user, because of inconsistencies with the previous standard. “So if you encounter a situation where your phone needs to follow the sRGB standard, then the algorithm would allow the screen to emulate a traditional display device.”
Breakthrough Five: Outdoor readable and blue-light filter
In addition to pursuing technological breakthroughs and creating new paradigms for the smartphone industry, the ZenFone team also refined their new phone based on past customer feedback. “Some users said that the ZenFone’s screen was a bit too bright in dark environments. Other users said that the screen wasn’t dark enough in very bright environments," CL.Y. said.
Most smartphone users are familiar with the phenomenon where bright sunlight makes their screen appear too dark to be visible. The ZenFone 3 Ultra’s Tru2Life+ chip adjusts the contrast of the screen based on data from the phone’s light sensor, thus ensuring that images remain clearly visible regardless of environmental lighting conditions.
ASUS developed a proprietary blue-light filter feature analyzes the color distribution on the screen based on RGB values, and optimizes it by reducing the blue light by 30% while leaving other colors unaffected. Thus, ZenFone 3 Ultra’s blue-light filter may help reduce eye fatigue for users that look at their screens for long periods or under dim light.
This feature means that users can clearly see their screens in all environments,whether they’re browsing on their phones before bed or playing Pokémon Go in blazing sunshine.
However, the improvements to display quality also brought with them an array of challenges regarding battery life. “When we decided to bring television-level qualit to smartphones, we ran into a problem. Televisions are plugged in all day, which means their power consumption isn’t a major issue. Not so for smartphones. It’s not feasible to have to charge your phone several times a day just to watch videos,” CL.Y. pointed out.
Breakthrough Six: Optimizing power consumption
The ZenFone team ended up implementing advanced process technologies for their new smartphone in order to reduce power consumption. The Tru2Life+ chip stretches battery life by reducing CPU and GPU loads, and by establishing a series of usage scenarios, each with its own assortment of customized settings. For example, according to CL.Y., generally speaking gaming represents the biggest drain on a smartphone’s battery, but mobile gaming usually doesn’t require further graphical enhancements. Consequently, when the user is playing a game, the Tru2Life+ chip’s parameters can be optimized in order to extend battery life. By contrast, viewing photos on a smartphone generally doesn’t have a high power cost, which means the image can be improved for a better viewing experience without suffering excessive power drain. “We would make adjustments based on how the phone’s being used. This means that the viewing experience can be optimized without increasing the overall power use.
” Bob Iger, the CEO of Disney, once said, “The heart and soul of the company is creativity and innovation.” The third-generation ZenFone does not simply correct flaws based on customer feedback, instead it treads fresh ground by introducing new technologies. ZenFone 3’s improved features and better quality demonstrate the determination of ASUS to rewrite the rules of the smartphone industry, and show our ambition to create a brighter and more technologically-innovative future for all humankind.
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