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Canon publishes patents for a very compact 28-70mm f/2.8 zoom lens

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Canon has published a patent for two new zoom lens in the 28-70mm f/2.8 and 28-60mm f/2.8 focal length ranges. What makes them particularly interesting, though, is how tiny they are, for zooms with such wide aperture zooms, with both coming in at a little over 105mm long at the shorter end of their focal length limit of ~28mm. Even at their maximum zooms of 60mm and 67.9mm, they still only hit 132.38mm and 138.40mm respectively, making them very compact indeed.

The “Problem to be solved”, according to the Asobinet’s quote from the patent is “to provide a zoom lens having a short total length and a small size but having high optical performance”. And it suggests that thanks to recent development in cameras – namely, Canon’s gone mirrorless – it’s now possible to create a zoom lens of this focal length range and wide aperture that meets these parameters.

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Apple submits patents for ‘a watch with a camera’

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Who says the wristwatch is dead? Not Apple at any rate as they have just filed a patent application for a “watch having a camera” Yep, we have camera-phones, but now it looks like we may get a camera-watch in future. But don’t worry, it will probably be more James Bond than Flight of the Concords. Apple isn’t planning to actually glue a point and shoot onto a watch, they’ve come up with several different ideas for how to execute it.

One of the designs depicts the camera placed in the digital crown part of the watch (that’s the side button for the uninitiated), where it can operate whilst the wristwatch is being worn, which does seem logical to keep it out of the way.

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RED sues Nikon for infringement on video compression patent

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High-end video camera brand RED is suing Nikon for illegally copying their video compression patent. Nikon introduced the system in their new firmware 2.0 update for the Z9 mirrorless camera. With the 2.0 update, the Z9 can capture 8.3K RAW video at up to 60 frames per second in Nikon’s new “N-RAW format” or up to 4.1K at 60 frames per second ProRes RAW HQ.

The lawsuit was filed in a southern California federal court and asserts that the Japanese camera manufacturer and its United States subsidiaries have illegally infringed on seven patents that deal with “a video camera that can be configured to highly compress video data in a visually lossless manner.”

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Canon patents drone gimbal but this one might be for us photographers and filmmakers

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Canon isn’t a name we normally associate with drones, but a new drone gimbal camera patent suggests they might be starting to try to take on the consumer drone market. If they are planning to tackle the likes of DJI and Autel, Canon does have some experience with drones. This isn’t their first one, having released the PD6E2000-AW-CJ1 drone (doesn’t that name just roll right off the tongue?) back in 2017.

But that 2017 drone wasn’t focused towards general consumers or even higher-end working photographers and filmmakers at all. That $20,000 drone (along with the $20,000 camera you need to bolt onto it) was designed specifically for activities like search and rescue. This new patent, though, looks like they might be targeting the consumer market.

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Patent suggests GoPro wants to take on DJI with a modular “Pocket” camera

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While GoPro is still sort of the leader when it comes to action cameras, it’s been a while since they’ve really done anything different. Sure, there’s the now-abandoned (for some reason) GoPro Hero Session, but other than that each generation of regular GoPro Hero has just been an incremental update on the previous one ever since the Hero 5. Of course, there was that whole Karma business but that’s also gone.

It looks like part of the Karma idea might be coming back, though, at least in spirit. Along with the Karma drone itself, GoPro released a Karma Grip, that could be used either inside the drone or handheld with the GoPro Hero action camera. Now, new patents suggest that GoPro might be looking to tackle that handheld gimbal market again to try and take on DJI again.

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Canon patents new electromagnetic shutter design to minimise “shutter shock” vibrations

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In the days of DSLRs, even when your camera was on a tripod, it was possible to get a little motion blur in your shots due to what we called “mirror slap”. In these mirrorless days, mirror slap isn’t really a thing anymore, but there is a chance that the vibrations from the shutter can cause the tiniest of motion blur. With lower resolution cameras, it’s not much of an issue, but with cameras getting higher and higher resolution with each new generation, it may become one.

There’s also the hope that Canon expected to announce a high-resolution monster soon, which would make any potential blur from the shutter moving quickly more noticeable. So, Canon has patented a new mechanical shutter design to help minimise the “shutter shock” vibrations caused by fast-moving shutters suddenly reaching their end limits.

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Panasonic patents new 70-200mm, 70-300mm and 100-400mm full-frame zoom lenses

If there’s one thing Panasonic’s famous for, it’s inexpensive full-frame lenses. Oh, wait, no, the other one. They’re not famous for inexpensive full-frame lenses. The L mount has proven popular, but when we look at something as ubiquitous as a 50mm f/1.8, the Panasonic Lumix S 50mm f/1.8 costs more than double the Canon RF 50mm f/1.8 STM and almost double that of the Sony E mount 50mm f/1.8.

But it looks like Panasonic might actually be starting to focus a little more on less expensive lenses. Not less expensive than their 50mm f/1.8, no, but new patents suggest that we might see some low budget alternatives to their 70-200mm f/2.8 and f/4 offerings, a potential replacement for their 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 Macro and maybe even a new 100-400mm.

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New Sigma patent shows design for a 28-70mm f/2 full-frame mirrorless lens

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A new patent suggests that Sigma might have a few new exciting lenses on the way soon for mirrorless cameras. The patent describes six lenses, including 28-70mm f/2 and 14-30mm f/4 DG DN lenses for full-frame and 20mm f/1.4, 23mm f/1.4, 28mm f/1.4 and 33mm f/1.4 DC DN lenses for APS-C. While a patent doesn’t always indicate that an item is definitely on the way, all of these focal lengths would fill holes in Sigma’s current mirrorless lens lineup.

With Sigma’s recent expansion into the Fuji X mount APS-C system, releasing a bunch of new APS-C format lenses designed specifically for mirrorless cameras would not only be inside the realm of possibility but it’d be a damn good idea, too. Sigma currently has only four lenses in its DC DN lineup, leaving a lot of room for growth.

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New patent shows Canon still working on Quad Pixel Autofocus

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Since the announcement of Canon’s Dual Pixel Autofocus system, introduced with the Canon EOS 70D, we kind of knew that Quad Pixel Autofocus would be inevitable eventually. Several new patents have been released over the last few years, including this one from 2020 suggesting that it might come with the EOS R1. Now a new patent from Canon about Quad Pixel AF adds more fuel to that EOS R1 fire.

Dual Pixel AF is pretty awesome, as evidenced by the significant lack of auto-backfocus jokes we used to regularly hear about Canon DSLRs. And while it’s not perfect, it seems to be leading the way lately in some respects. But Quad Pixel AF should help to make Canon’s EF more reliable and accurate than it has already become, posing a serious threat to the competition.

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