Photogram, Alice Camera: AI-Powered Camera for Smartphones

The Alice Camera is designed to streamline the creation of high-quality social media content for creators, businesses, and everyday users. It aims to bridge the gap between mirrorless cameras and smartphones, allowing users to capture content with interchangeable lenses, a smartphone-like user interface, and on-camera AI-driven computational photography.

As an official partner of the Micro Four Thirds system, Photogram has developed the Alice Camera to meet the standard’s specifications and requirements. The camera uses the Micro Four Thirds lens mount and a Sony 4/3″ HDR, dual-native ISO CMOS sensor. What sets the Alice Camera apart from other mirrorless cameras is its use of Qualcomm Snapdragon and Google Edge TPU chips as its primary processing units. These processors enhance the calculations required to run Photogram’s proprietary AI-driven computational photography algorithms and software-based image signal processing (ISP) pipeline directly on the camera. Unlike hardware-based ISPs in traditional mirrorless cameras, Photogram’s software-based ISP allows for additional AI features and improvements to be added to existing cameras over time. In 2023, Photogram joined Google Cloud’s AI startup program in London, receiving credits and mentorship to further train and develop their pipeline, which automates essential functions like white balance, exposure, and color grading.

Smartphone App and OS

The Alice Camera smartphone app offers an intuitive design for camera control, file management, and content sharing. The camera operates on Alice Camera OS, a Linux-based operating system, which allows for over-the-air software updates and open-access development, creating new creative possibilities. Developers and businesses interested in building their own AI algorithms and custom apps on the Alice Camera platform are encouraged to contact the team.

CEO Statement

“We’re incredibly excited to finally bring the Alice Camera to the world,” said Vishal Kumar, CEO of Photogram. “We set out to build the Alice Camera because we wanted to offer our customers a new type of mirrorless camera built specifically for a new era of content. We’ve developed a fundamentally new engineering paradigm for mirrorless cameras, with significant innovations in hardware, software, and AI algorithms. Alice Camera represents a significant step forward in how mirrorless cameras are designed and how our users will process, capture, and share their experiences. We can’t wait to see the amazing content created with the Alice Camera.”

Challenges and Perseverance

The journey to launch faced several challenges. The COVID-19 pandemic and global lockdowns in 2021 and 2022 caused severe chip shortages, affecting Alice Camera’s manufacturing. Additional delays occurred in 2023 due to rigorous consumer electronics regulatory testing. Despite these hurdles, Photogram persevered with the support of its backers and investors. “We are deeply grateful for the belief and patience our community has shown throughout this journey,” added Vishal Kumar. “As a new entrant in the camera industry, we hope to bring fresh perspectives. All the difficult development work over the last three years is now done. Now, we’re ready to deliver and start to scale manufacturing. Our journey begins from today… We’re just getting started.”

Proposed Delivery Dates

• Cameras for the UK will begin shipping from 15th July 2024.
• Cameras for the US, Japan, EU, and Australia are scheduled to start shipping from 15th August 2024.
• Cameras for Canada, France, and the rest of the world are scheduled to start shipping from September 2024.