What is a 500W HD camera and how can it be 500 million pixels?

[NiHaoMike]

I wish there was an easy way to use a flatbed scanner as a camera. ~150 megapixels for everybody!

There was a project about converting a scanner into a camera, the biggest catch is that the subject has to stay still for the whole scan. It would be easier to just pan/tilt a normal camera and make a panorama.

[edy]

While on the topic of scanners and camera, does anyone remember Lytro and whatever happened to them? I'm still trying to wrap my head around how it worked exactly, and how some algorithm was able to take a 2D image and "reconstitute" sharpness but only of specific areas based on "focus". Whatever image was captured must have been a blurred mess viewed "raw", but under the surface the information was all there and somehow software was able to figure out based on the pixels maybe doing some integration of adjacent pixels (closer or further pixel distance depending on focal depth desired) bring the image into sharpness.

My *naive* understanding initially was that the camera just recorded a short "video" burst (at some enormously high speed) while simultaneously running the focus from 0 to infinity at the same time. So the first frame would be close focus, then last frame would be infinite focus. Then when you view your image you would really just be picking the frame corresponding to the focal depth you were interested in. This is kind of like the "Live" video options in the iPhone except with focus varied, and would not be good for fast moving objects.... However such a system may be a simple "cheap" option that produces similar effects (provided shooting burst is fast enough and focal system can be made to change at that fast rate). 

[TimFox]

Lytro sold out to Google in 2018.  https://www.theverge.com/2018/3/27/17166038/lytro-light-field-camera-company-shuts-down-google-hiring

[Hartmut]

Is the camera made in China? Then perhaps 500W = 500WAN, which means 5 megapixels in Chinese.

[soldar]

Sounds like Chinese bullshittery to me, a quick Google of "500W HD camera" confirms it.

Using 10000 "Wan" unit is a common unit in China for everything, money, etc. so it is "Chinese bullshittery" in the same sense that using inches is "American bullshittery"

[magic]

Is the camera made in China? Then perhaps 500W = 500WAN, which means 5 megapixels in Chinese.

This could be it, but a quick search shows that cameras advertised as "500W" vary in supposed resolution at least from 1080p to 4K (i.e. 2Mpx to 8Mpx)
And some of them are things like USB endoscopes, which rarely even reach 1080p due to extreme size constraints.

It's best to always demand very concrete specs, like "maximum video resolution is X×Y at Z fps". All else is marketing wank.

Sometimes useful information is only found in buyer feedback...

[TimFox]

Sounds like Chinese bullshittery to me, a quick Google of "500W HD camera" confirms it.

Using 10000 "Wan" unit is a common unit in China for everything, money, etc. so it is "Chinese bullshittery" in the same sense that using inches is "American bullshittery"

I assume that is related to the Japanese word "man", which also means 10,000.