The
sensor
in a digital camera is called a
Charge-Coupled-Device (CCD). This device reacts to
different intensities of light that are reflected
onto it by the mirror inside the camera housing
and assigns a binary value to it that is then
turned into an image. Color DSLRs can have up to 3
CCD’s in them that analyze the values for the
three primary colors red, blue, and green and then
combine this information into a color image. The
points on the sensor that measure the intensity of
the light rays is called a capacitor, the amount
of capacitors, otherwise known as pixels, on the
sensor determines the quality of the image. One of
the first CCD sensors, designed by George Smith
and Willard Boyle, was only 100x100 pixels
(Coffman). This early sensor had 10 000 pixels,
which in modern terminology translates into 0.01
megapixels. Modern SLR cameras can have up to 36
megapixels, over 3600 times as many as the very
first CCD.
