Canon Patent: New Rear Screen Concept for DSLRs

Canon Rumors Guy

Canon EOS 40D
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Jul 20, 2010
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HTML:
A <a href="https://worldwide.espacenet.com/publicationDetails/biblio?CC=JP&NR=2017098728A&KC=A&FT=D&ND=4&date=20170601&DB=EPODOC&locale=en_EP">patent from Canon Japan</a> showing new rear screen designs has appeared, and it looks very interesting. I think a lot of us have always assumed eventually the entire back of a camera would be an LCD/OLED. Beyond just the size of the screen, the patent also covers a new way pivot mecanism for the LCD, you can see the images below.</p>
<p>What’s also interesting is the mode dial appearing from behind the screen when you move it.</p>
<p>A lot of us have called on Canon to put vari-angle LCD’s on professional cameras such as the EOS-1D X series, EOS 5D series and the EOS 7D series, and we’re still waiting. This would definitely be a big leap in a new direction for rear camera screens, but I suspect too big of a leap to see first in a flagship professional camera such as the EOS-1D X Mark III, but it could be introduced in a lower end camera such as the EOS 7D Mark III or a new videoc focused DSLR.</p>



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entoman

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May 8, 2015
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A really interesting concept.

With the monitor in the up position, you have full access to the rear thumbwheel etc, and you have all the shooting info displayed on the screen, which you can look down at, when the camera is hanging from your neck. This makes the little LCD panel on the top plate obsolete, making space for an improved button / dial layout.

And of course you can switch it into live view or replay mode, as well as use it to dspaly shooting info.

The screen then folds back down and reverses to protect it from damage when the camera is packed.

Brilliant. Innovation, at last.
 
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unfocused

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I kind of hate this.

You have to flip this screen up and out in order to have access to the controls on the back of the camera?

So, for everyone who complains about the supposed fragility of a flip screen, imagine having to have the screen always flipped out in order to have access to the controls on the back of the camera.

If cameras aren't big enough as they are, imagine now having this massive flip screen hanging out calling even more attention to you and your camera.

What about touch screen functionality -- the ergonomics of having to hold the camera and use a touch screen that is flapping about would be terrible, so you would have to flip this thing back in every time you wanted to use the touch screen.

It might be great for video, allowing a larger screen. But can't see this as a good solution for stills.

I'm hoping I'm missing something here, but this looks really clunky and impractical to me. If I have to choose between a fully functioning touch screen and a flip screen, I'll choose the touch screen every time.
 
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As a non video shooter (so if I'm wrong let me know), this to me looks best suited for video dedicated dslr rig which many assume would never happen. It looks to me like a dslr with a dedicated Atomos Ninja built in, minus the external recording function, assuming. Which would be neat, if the rear screen was big enough to house a 1TB ssd or something and removable. It makes little sense to me as a photography dedicated rig personally.
 
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jolyonralph

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The image showing the screen oriented towards the subject of the photo is interesting.

This either means:

a) the screen is being used as a big white light to illuminate. Which would be kind of cheap and nasty for a DSLR but, who knows...

or

b) the screen is being used to show the subject what the photographer is seeing. But wait, what then is the photographer seeing through the viewfinder? Therefore this has to be either a mirrorless or a hybrid ovf/evf device to use this technology.


ps. Ergonomics make or kill a camera. the system would have to be able to be comfortably used without moving the screen or it's dead.
 
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Jul 21, 2010
31,100
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jolyonralph said:
The image showing the screen oriented towards the subject of the photo is interesting.

This either means:

a) the screen is being used as a big white light to illuminate. Which would be kind of cheap and nasty for a DSLR but, who knows...

or

b) the screen is being used to show the subject what the photographer is seeing. But wait, what then is the photographer seeing through the viewfinder? Therefore this has to be either a mirrorless or a hybrid ovf/evf device to use this technology.

Or much more likely:

c) SELFIE MODE!
 
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ethanz

1DX II
CR Pro
Apr 12, 2016
1,194
510
ethanzentz.com
neuroanatomist said:
jolyonralph said:
The image showing the screen oriented towards the subject of the photo is interesting.

This either means:

a) the screen is being used as a big white light to illuminate. Which would be kind of cheap and nasty for a DSLR but, who knows...

or

b) the screen is being used to show the subject what the photographer is seeing. But wait, what then is the photographer seeing through the viewfinder? Therefore this has to be either a mirrorless or a hybrid ovf/evf device to use this technology.

Or much more likely:

c) SELFIE MODE!

lol. I love taking a selfie with my 1dx, so easy to hold and aim.
 
Upvote 0
Dec 13, 2010
4,932
1,608
unfocused said:
I kind of hate this.

You have to flip this screen up and out in order to have access to the controls on the back of the camera?

So, for everyone who complains about the supposed fragility of a flip screen, imagine having to have the screen always flipped out in order to have access to the controls on the back of the camera.

If cameras aren't big enough as they are, imagine now having this massive flip screen hanging out calling even more attention to you and your camera.

What about touch screen functionality -- the ergonomics of having to hold the camera and use a touch screen that is flapping about would be terrible, so you would have to flip this thing back in every time you wanted to use the touch screen.

It might be great for video, allowing a larger screen. But can't see this as a good solution for stills.

I'm hoping I'm missing something here, but this looks really clunky and impractical to me. If I have to choose between a fully functioning touch screen and a flip screen, I'll choose the touch screen every time.

+1
 
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Presumably, the camera is just to provide a sense of scale compared to existing products... surely Canon would not be daft enough to actually put key controls behind a flip out screen?

To be honest, I'd rather they just get on with fitting any of their existing designs of tilting screens across the whole range (perhaps with the exception of the 1D series).
 
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Feb 8, 2013
1,843
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I think this is the worst photography related idea I’ve ever seen.

Worse than selling century old lens designs, worse than Instagram filters, worse than a camera with no screen at all. I’m trying to think of equivalently bad and failed ideas, but I can’t think of anything that would be as bad as if Canon were to try to make this happen.
 
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Kinda sorta looks like the Samsung Galaxy NX.

galaxynx.jpg


That's a 4.77-inch multitouch screen.
 
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Mar 25, 2011
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I'd suggest that people navigate to the linked patent and read it, it answers most of the questions, and many assumptions are wrong. It is pretty confusing, so plan on spending time reading it. There are also a list of different implementations which work differently, just in case you aren't confused enough.

http://translationportal.epo.org/emtp/translate/?ACTION=description-retrieval&COUNTRY=JP&ENGINE=google&FORMAT=docdb&KIND=A&LOCALE=en_EP&NUMBER=2017098728&OPS=ops.epo.org/3.2&SRCLANG=ja&TRGLANG=en

The primary purpose of the patent is to providethe lcd panel the ability to move closer or further from the eye such that the effective diopter can match the ovf. This is so it can be in focus for people who switch from the OVF to the LCD and don't want to put on or take off their glasses in order to do so.


I've copied a few snipets from the patent, its a very long read.

PROBLEM TO BE SOLVED: To provide a digital camera capable of reducing a difference in diopter of an external monitor with respect to an optical viewfinder when an optical viewfinder and an external monitor are used in combination. SOLUTION: In a lens exchangeable digital camera comprising an optical viewfinder 2 having an eyepiece and an external display device 1 for live view, the external display device 1 is provided with an upward jumping and rotating mechanism, And the reversing mechanism, it is possible to arrange the screen center of the external display device 1 on the upper right side of the optical viewfinder 2 as viewed from the rear

In a single lens reflex digital camera capable of interchangeable lenses, live view function is becoming popular. Conventionally, a photographer formed a light beam from a photographic lens on a focusing plate using a quick return mirror, and observed through an eyepiece through a pentaprism. On the other hand, it has recently become common to mount a function of imaging light rays from a photographing lens directly on a sensor and displaying the image information converted into an electric signal on a liquid crystal monitor or the like in real time. It is what is called live view. [0003]
As the external monitor for the live view, a rear liquid crystal monitor of the camera is used, however, in order to improve the degree of freedom of the photographing angle and the visibility, a configuration in which the orientation of the external monitor is made variable has been proposed.

The screen center of the external monitor is located at about 167 mm from the right eye of the photographer, and the diopter at that time is 6 diopters. Consider this 6 diopters as a criterion of a distance that can not be focused closer than this, that is, a point of nearness. Individual differences are large in the neighborhood, and it moves away with age. The value of 6 diopters is a representative value for the sake of convenience only, but set the criteria for the near point for the following reasons. -------

Both the first and second embodiments, the external monitor 1 can have a touch panel function, and it is also possible to perform the operation by touch panel instead of the button related to the camera operation. At that time, it is preferable that the operation by the touch panel is limited to when the external monitor 1 is stored on the back of the camera. This is because the external monitor itself moves in the state where the external monitor 1 is deployed, since the external monitor has a foldable mechanism, which makes it difficult to operate the touch panel. [0058]
In the state where the external monitor is deployed, it is preferable to place alternative switches in the external monitor storage space on the back of the camera.
 
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Canon Rumors said:
... I think a lot of us have always assumed eventually the entire back of a camera would be an LCD/OLED..

I would suggest that particular route is a blind alley.

unless of course you have programmable contours otherwise you can't use it without looking at it. There's no tactile feedback. Which is the exact complaint I have with a few modern car systems.. on my ancient MB everything is tactile, which means I can do everything by touch without taking my eyes off the road. In that sense cameras should be the same.
 
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Mar 25, 2011
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rfdesigner said:
Canon Rumors said:
... I think a lot of us have always assumed eventually the entire back of a camera would be an LCD/OLED..

I would suggest that particular route is a blind alley.

unless of course you have programmable contours otherwise you can't use it without looking at it. There's no tactile feedback. Which is the exact complaint I have with a few modern car systems.. on my ancient MB everything is tactile, which means I can do everything by touch without taking my eyes off the road. In that sense cameras should be the same.

Although my gut feeling is the same as yours, in practice, I find myself using the touch interface on my 5D IV and SL2 almost exclusively, so in practice, my gut feeling is not panning out. I think that Canon has really done a fantastic job with the human interface on the touch screen, its very intuitive. So, young people who are used to touch on their smart phones are going to feel at home with Canon's touch in the future. There are so many things I like about the touch screen that they override the few things I don't like. I hated trying to push the zoom pution multiple times, now its just a pinch gesture to magnify the screen and move to the area I want to see, really fast and easy.
 
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Mt Spokane Photography said:
rfdesigner said:
Canon Rumors said:
... I think a lot of us have always assumed eventually the entire back of a camera would be an LCD/OLED..

I would suggest that particular route is a blind alley.

unless of course you have programmable contours otherwise you can't use it without looking at it. There's no tactile feedback. Which is the exact complaint I have with a few modern car systems.. on my ancient MB everything is tactile, which means I can do everything by touch without taking my eyes off the road. In that sense cameras should be the same.

Although my gut feeling is the same as yours, in practice, I find myself using the touch interface on my 5D IV and SL2 almost exclusively, so in practice, my gut feeling is not panning out. I think that Canon has really done a fantastic job with the human interface on the touch screen, its very intuitive. So, young people who are used to touch on their smart phones are going to feel at home with Canon's touch in the future. There are so many things I like about the touch screen that they override the few things I don't like. I hated trying to push the zoom pution multiple times, now its just a pinch gesture to magnify the screen and move to the area I want to see, really fast and easy.

intersting.

I have the mousepad on my laptop set to "plain vanilla", no pinch, no tap, just plain move the pointer. I find my fingers always judder across touch screens so they then think I'm clicking everything and go uttely bonkers...
 
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unfocused

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Mt Spokane Photography said:
rfdesigner said:
Canon Rumors said:
... I think a lot of us have always assumed eventually the entire back of a camera would be an LCD/OLED..

I would suggest that particular route is a blind alley.

unless of course you have programmable contours otherwise you can't use it without looking at it. There's no tactile feedback. Which is the exact complaint I have with a few modern car systems.. on my ancient MB everything is tactile, which means I can do everything by touch without taking my eyes off the road. In that sense cameras should be the same.

Although my gut feeling is the same as yours, in practice, I find myself using the touch interface on my 5D IV and SL2 almost exclusively, so in practice, my gut feeling is not panning out. I think that Canon has really done a fantastic job with the human interface on the touch screen, its very intuitive. So, young people who are used to touch on their smart phones are going to feel at home with Canon's touch in the future. There are so many things I like about the touch screen that they override the few things I don't like. I hated trying to push the zoom pution multiple times, now its just a pinch gesture to magnify the screen and move to the area I want to see, really fast and easy.

I think we are talking about apples and oranges.

A touch screen is very useful for reviewing images and for navigating through menus. Much more intuitive and easier than punching buttons.

Buttons, click wheels and joysticks are much more useful when one is shooting through an optical viewfinder. The tactile feedback is important when one can't take their eyes off the subject.
 
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