Samsung’s 100x zooming smartphone camera requires a fancy lens and impossibly steady hands
Samsung uses clever tech to cram a big zoom lens into its skinny Galaxy S20 phone. (Samsung/)Yesterday, Samsung threw a big party on the west coast to debut its new smartphones. The flashy Galaxy Z Fold with its flexible glass screen stole most of the spotlight, but the company also announced new flagship phones. The Galaxy S20 comes in three versions, all of which have fancy new 120 Hz refresh rate screens and even 5G connectivity. Of those, the S20 Ultra boasts the burliest camera in the bunch. The wide-angle lens funnels light into a 108-megapixel sensor, while the built-in telephoto lens promises the equivalent of a 100x zoom. That’s an impressive number, but it comes with a few caveats. The term “zoom” has taken on two different meanings in the digital camera era. The traditional version of zooming involves physically moving around glass elements within the lens itself to...