It is not the first time that we see a mobile with a camera that comes out from the inside out, and it seems that the subject will be a trend, if we let ourselves be carried away by the new Xiaomi patent.
The company is working on a new way to increase screen size with a sliding camera module on the back, placing the front and rear cameras on the back of the phone. The idea, essentially, is to increase the size of the screen and have a greater screen-to-body ratio.
The patent shows a vertical strip on the back, containing three chambers. Two of these are the rear cameras, while the last one is the front. The photos in the patent suggest that there will be two camera modules visible on the back. In the designs we can also see that the rear module slides up over the edge of the phone.
In this way we will have a front camera looking from the top of the phone, which will eliminate the notch and allow to have a full screen.
Xiaomi has already put proximity sensors and microphones under the screen, so the trend of hiding everything to give a better experience seems to be the new black.
There is no data that indicates whether in this way resolution would be gained in the cameras. It must be remembered that Xiaomi has been using a 108MP camera on the back in its latest phones, with 64 and 48MP sensors on a regular basis. Using this system it is possible that they achieve this quality also for the front camera.
The concept has already been used by companies like Oppo and Samsung, who have used slide modules for months now, but on those phones the entire back plate will slide up and use the rear cameras for the selfie. We have also seen phones like the Asus Zenfone 6, where the rear camera module rotates to be used as a selfie.
