Volvo's EX90 lidar damaged the iPhone 16 Pro Max camera
A video of the Volvo EX90 crossover's lidar damaging the camera of an iPhone 16 Pro Max smartphone while filming is gaining popularity on the web. The video, published by user u/Jeguetelli in the r/Volvo community on Reddit, shows how a pulsating laser beam from the roof of the electric car literally burns out the pixels of the sensor when the image is zoomed in.
Here's What We Know
LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) is used to build a three-dimensional map of a car's surroundings with an automated driving system. It emits laser pulses in the infrared range and measures the time of their reflection from objects. Such systems are considered eye-safe and are classified as Class I lasers. However, this is not always the case for CMOS sensors with teleoptics.
Modern smartphones, including the iPhone 16 Pro Max, have multiple lenses with different focal lengths. When you zoom in on an image, the device automatically switches to a telephoto lens with a shorter aperture. It is this module that turned out to be vulnerable.
The video shows that the sensor damage appears at the moment when the telephoto lens is activated. When returning to the wide-angle camera, the artefacts disappear. This is due to the fact that the smartphone focuses the laser beam on a smaller area of the matrix, causing local overheating and burnout of pixels. The main module is less susceptible to this effect: its lens does not concentrate the light so strongly, and the risk of damage is lower, especially at a distance.
Conclusion: if you are shooting cars with lidar, avoid zooming in on smartphones with telephoto lenses. Otherwise, you could face costly repairs to your device.
Source: Caranddriver
