Patent for Moving Sensor Switch?

[AvTvM]

This is merely Canon planning for one possible future direction of the industry.

I agree 100% with you. Only a company as ingenious and innovative as Canon can plan for the mirrorless future with a ... Triple-Slapper! Canon has found such a magnisifecent way around the Fuji X1-Pro hybrid viewfinder patents! And to avoid that dreaded, simple rougly 3cm wide aluminum ring wit electrical wire-through to bridge the different flange distance between mirrorslappers and mirrorless cameras ... called "adapter" for 10 bucks production cost and 120 bucks sales price.

Oh and yes, as someone here has already aptly oted, the genial patented Canon design has room to further evolve: Canon could possibly put a couple more moving elements smack dab in the middle of the lightpath ... on hinges ... powered by mighty motors, coils and springs and braced by 5D mirror dampers that fall off ever so often! Maybe the viewfinder prism itself could tilt and/or rotate also by 180 degrees around the rear LCD in perfect sync with the sensor flipper and the focus screen flapper?

Canon Multi-Slappers will rule the future of photography, that's for sure! I am all excited! I'll buy the first one with serial number 000001. It will be auctioned off at Westlicht next to some cludgy old Leicas for a gazillion bucks only a 100 years from now. My great-grandchildren shall bring toasts to my amazing foresight!

P.S. The ill-conceived and ill-received Pentax K-01 was an almost sane concept in comparison.

 

[jd7]

Your suggestion allows MILC integration with current dSLR lenses without the need for an adapter. The patent describes a solution that allows integration with MILC lenses.

But without the 'one key advantage of mirrorless, thinner body due to short flange focal distance lenses.'

Obviously. But right now, long flange lenses are the majority, and those wanting to use them on a mirrorless body must use an adapter. What about if short flange lenses become the majority? Those wanting a TTL option can't use an adapter (at least, not one without optics and the probably negative consequences associated with that). As is often the case, those in the minority need to make compromises.

Currently, the present invention has no real place in the Canon system. But in several years, if there is a shift such that the market is dominated by MILCs instead of dSLRs, this patent becomes a way for people to maintain one key advantage of dSLRs, the ability to look directly through the lens.

I suspect that any advantage of looking directly through the lens will be eaten up by whatever lag is involved in moving the sensor to shooting position after framing and focusing. Shrug.

It's a dog, and I'll eat the diagram if it ever comes to market.

Presumably everything would be yoked together and driven by one motor, the lag would likely be no different from that of most current dSLRs (although I wouldn't expect a 12 fps version!).

But I agree, this is pretty unlikely to ever see the light of day as a product.

I have no idea how practical it would be to implement the patent, but perhaps there is another way of looking at the goal ...

What if there were not many EF-M lenses, or cameras to use them on, but you wanted to give people the option of EF-M cameras as well as EF-S/EF cameras and at the same time you wanted to be able to concentrate on developing one line of lenses in future, or you even wanted to gradually switch people over to EF-M cameras altogether without requiring them to immediately buy new lenses?

I see other posts doubting you could implement the patent with an APS-C sensor, but if you could, this might be a sensible way for Canon to avoid developing EF-S lenses in future - just develop EF-M lenses which can be used on any APS-C camera (EOS M line and APS-C DSLRs). The APS-C DSLR line cameras (using the patent) could use EF-M lenses, EF-S lenses and EF lenses (but "cropped" as now, given the sensor size), while the EOS M line could remain mirrorless for those wanting the smallest/thinnest/lightest option.

 

[Loswr]

If I really wanted mirrorless, and I do want mirrorless....I want it for the benefits it has to offer. Smaller bodies, potentially smaller lenses, etc.

That's fine, but I suspect Canon believes there might be consumers out there who have a different opinion than you...and that seems like a reasonable belief.

At the moment, Canon believes the concept has merit. A patent isn't a product on a shelf. I suspect the idea will evolve before it actually becomes a product, because I think a lot of people would have issues with the design as currently done.

Agreed, and there seems to be general agreement that this design would not make a viable product.