American Cinematographer - December 2015 - 92

New Products & Services
Canon Expo Touts Company's Current,
Future Technologies
By Stephen Pizzello
Every five years, the ambitious Canon Expo is mounted in key
cities to offer attendees a detailed overview of the company's
emerging technologies and corporate strategies. Earlier this year,
Canon unveiled its offerings at the Jacob Javits Convention Center
in New York (Sept. 10-11) and at the Grande Halle de la Villette in
Paris (Oct. 13-15), with follow-up exhibitions planned for Tokyo and
Shanghai.
AC was on the show floor at the New York event, where the
company's technologies were organized into zones: Film Production,
where the company spotlighted its production tools for creative
storytelling via photography, motion imaging and post; Imaging
Journey, which traced the evolution of imaging, including the
ongoing development of a 4K
projector capable of 8K projection;
Stadium, which featured a small-scale
re-creation of Yankee Stadium where
visitors could find information on the
cameras and lenses used by professionals shooting sports; Professional
Printing, which offered information
on a range of large-format printers;
Home, which gave visitors a look at
modern home-imaging tools; Enterprise,
spotlighting Canon's business-oriented technologies; University,
where visitors could review the company's technologies for science,
medicine and other disciplines; Advanced Industry, detailing products for the manufacturing world; Canon Central Park, which
outlined the company's global ambitions; and Customer Experience,
touting Canon's commitment to customer service. (To experience a
virtual tour of these zones online, visit Expo2015NY.com/virtualtour.)
Cinematographers attending the show prioritized the Film
Production Zone, where they could spend time examining the
Cinema EOS C300 Mark II, which is designed for cinema, documentary and ENG use. The PL-mount camera, upgraded to 4K for NAB
2015, features a new 8.85-megapixel Super 35mm Canon CMOS
Sensor and new Dual DIGIC DV5 image processors, as well as
improved Dual Pixel CMOS Autofocus and a new Canon XF-AVC
codec that allows the capture of internal 10-bit 4:2:2 4K files. The
Mark II also employs Canon Log 2, which expands its latitude to 15
stops from the 12 stops offered by the original C300.
Other cameras on display included the XC10, an affordable
4K camcorder ($2,499) with a fixed 10x optical zoom lens (27.3273mm) with a 2x digital teleconverter, a 1" 12-megapixel CMOS
92

December 2015

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sensor, optical image stabilization, and the new DIGIC DV5 image
processor.
Visitors to the Film Production Zone could also examine
Canon's plans for an 8K future. Still in development is an 8K Cinema
EOS camera, lens and reference display. Specs for the camera touted
its Super 35mm Sensor, offering 8192x4320 resolution (approximately 35.39 million effective pixels) up to frame rates of 60 fps, a
dynamic range of 13 stops, and a wide color gamut.
The ultra-high-resolution Canon 8K reference display
currently in development aims to achieve high brightness, high
contrast (high dynamic
range) and a wide color
gamut. The company
maintains that the monitor's pixel density, which
exceeds 300 pixels per
inch, approaches the
upper limits of human
vision and will allow
ultra-realistic imaging that can
reproduce even subtle changes in light.
Also in development is a 120-megapixel SLR camera that will
incorporate a Canon-developed high-pixel-density CMOS sensor
within the current EOS camera-series platform, making it compatible with most of the company's interchangeable EF lenses. According to Canon, "The high-resolution images that the camera is being
designed to be capable of producing can re-create the three-dimensional texture, feel and presence of subjects, making them appear
as if they are really before one's eyes." Furthermore, the future SLR
"is being designed to facilitate a level of resolution more than sufficient for large-format printing and extensive cropping capability
while maintaining fantastic image quality."
Canon also announced its plans for an LCOS projector capable of displaying video and still images at a resolution up to
4096x2400 pixels with 5,000 lumens of brightness, a level of definition surpassing the 4096x2160-pixel resolution of 4K digital
cinema.
Perhaps the most eye-opening news, however, was Canon's
announcement that it has developed a new CMOS sensor incorporating approximately 250 million pixels (19,580x12,600 pixels) -
the highest number of pixels for a CMOS sensor smaller than the
size of a 35mm full-frame sensor.
The company maintains that the new APS-H-size sensor
(29.2x20.2mm), when installed in one of Canon's prototype
cameras, "was able to capture images enabling the distinguishing
of lettering on the side of an airplane flying at a distance of approximately 11 miles (18km) from the shooting location." Canon further
claims that advancements such as circuit miniaturization and

American Cinematographer
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American Cinematographer - December 2015

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