Canon Hybrid IS

[Jarhead5811]

Since I don't think many of us saw this coming, I suspect Nikon will have a big challenge to catch up. Since there's likely a need to have a gyroscopic sensor along the axis of stabilization, I suspect Sony won't be able to catch up without releasing new bodies.
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<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"]<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: black; font-family: Verdana;"]Has anyone else wondered if optical image stabilization could possibly be used in conjunction with sensor shift image stabilization?
<p style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;" class="MsoNormal"]<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: black; font-family: Verdana;"](I mean other than admitting that the competing technology has its merits.)<o></o>

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[Mark Elberson]

<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: #000000; font-family: Verdana;"]Has anyone else wondered if optical image stabilization could possibly be used in conjunction with sensor shift image stabilization?




<p class="MsoNormal"]<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: #000000; font-family: Verdana;"](I mean other than admitting that the competing technology has its merits.)

I have no idea but I would like to add that everything I have read up to this point states that with the current technology, in-lens stabilization exceeds in-camera stablilization. It gives you more "stops" of stablilization and a "clear" view-finder. It sure would be nice though if we didn't have to clammer for a IS version of the 24-70mm f/2.8 or if I didn't have to spend an additional $500to getthe IS version of the 70-200mm f/2.8 [:P]

[Chuck Lee]

<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: #000000; font-family: Verdana;"]
<p class="MsoNormal"]<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: #000000; font-family: Verdana;"]Has anyone else wondered if optical image stabilization could possibly be used in conjunction with sensor shift image stabilization?
<p class="MsoNormal"]<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: #000000; font-family: Verdana;"](I mean other than admitting that the competing technology has its merits.)

Yes it could.....but...........the lens and camera body would have to do some serious communicating.


We'd have a 6 stop IS system. But then what? I still don't get it and I don't think I ever will.


I'll be able to handhold a shot for 1 sec? That's great if your a night/landscape photographer but that can be accomplished with sensor based stabilization (2-3 stops currently, it will get better, MMW) So what else can you do with it? Oh, I can pan a shot for 1/2 sec with a 500 f4L. That'd be great. How many a year are of those are you going to take. Nate might benefit but for me and what I shoot, what difference does it make?


I've said it before and I'll say it again.IS is not necessary whenclean high ISO is available except for those few people who need to "pan" their shot. It'd be like buying a tilt-shift. It's a specialty lens that a Laforet will create works of art with. For the general masses like me, stop making better IS lenses, make better lenses for less $$ and create a 16MP FF sensor that is clean up to 6400. I mean as clean as ISO 100 is today. I could then take 256000 ISO action shots in a gym at f8 1/500th that'd look like the 800 ISO shots I take today. Also, I want a flash sync of 1/500th so why don't you spendsome R&amp;D on curtain design?


In the mean time, we keep begging for a 24-70 IS and are over-zealous to spend the extra coin on it. This is the demand that is drivng this IS deal forward.Please Stop!! Rather, why don't we collectively ask for some truly practical improvements.


I would like in the new 3D/7D the ability to set the aperature then limit the shutter speed. I would like an AI modethat could set the proper ISO when that shutter speed limit is breached. So, I get to the shoot, I set the camera on Av/AI mode. I set the Aperture to f4, the ISO to 400 and shutter speed low limit to 1/125th and the upper limit to 1/500th. I head in to start shooting. Light changes and I find myself in a not-so well lit place. I raise the camera to take a shot but the shutter speed needs to be 1/60th for proper exposure. Well the camera sees that I've set the lower limit to 1/125th so it bumps the ISO to 800. I get the shot. Eveything is beautiful. I now head outside while chasing the bride and groom. Bang!! bright light baby!! I go to take the shot, but wait, the shutter speed needed is 1/2000th to expose correctly. That's OK because the camera sees the upper limit of 1/500th and sets the ISO to 50. Wow!! I love this new 3D and it's AvAI mode. This thing has saved me so many times now.


Am I the only one dreaming realisticallyhere?


Sorry for the rant,


Chuck

[Mark Elberson]

I would like in the new 3D/7D the ability to set the aperature then limit the shutter speed. I would like an AI modethat could set the proper ISO when that shutter speed limit is breached. So, I get to the shoot, I set the camera on Av/AI mode. I set the Aperture to f4, the ISO to 400 and shutter speed low limit to 1/125th and the upper limit to 1/500th. I head in to start shooting. Light changes and I find myself in a not-so well lit place. I raise the camera to take a shot but the shutter speed needs to be 1/60th for proper exposure. Well the camera sees that I've set the lower limit to 1/125th so it bumps the ISO to 800. I get the shot. Eveything is beautiful. I now head outside while chasing the bride and groom. Bang!! bright light baby!! I go to take the shot, but wait, the shutter speed needed is 1/2000th to expose correctly. That's OK because the camera sees the upper limit of 1/500th and sets the ISO to 50. Wow!! I love this new 3D and it's AvAI mode. This thing has saved me so many times now.


Am I the only one dreaming realisticallyhere?


Sorry for the rant,


Chuck

I would LOVE that! This is a quote from Bryan'sCanon EOS 50D Digital SLR Camera Review and it's exactly what I'd like to see:


"The big remaining step in my opinion is to make auto ISO work in M mode which would give us "Aperture and Shutter Priority" auto exposure. I want to set the aperture and shutter speed and let the camera determine the ISO setting needed to correctly expose the images."

[peety3]

I would like in the new 3D/7D the ability to set the aperature then limit the shutter speed. I would like an AI modethat could set the proper ISO when that shutter speed limit is breached. So, I get to the shoot, I set the camera on Av/AI mode. I set the Aperture to f4, the ISO to 400 and shutter speed low limit to 1/125th and the upper limit to 1/500th. I head in to start shooting. Light changes and I find myself in a not-so well lit place. I raise the camera to take a shot but the shutter speed needs to be 1/60th for proper exposure. Well the camera sees that I've set the lower limit to 1/125th so it bumps the ISO to 800. I get the shot. Eveything is beautiful. I now head outside while chasing the bride and groom. Bang!! bright light baby!! I go to take the shot, but wait, the shutter speed needed is 1/2000th to expose correctly. That's OK because the camera sees the upper limit of 1/500th and sets the ISO to 50. Wow!! I love this new 3D and it's AvAI mode. This thing has saved me so many times now.
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There's a framework of this in the 1D(s) Mark III bodies. Safety shift is available in an ISO protection mode (though it doesn't go into the expanded ISO ranges), and it's possible to put some boundaries on shutter speed (though not as tight as you request above) to create an Auto ISO. The downside is a loss of accurate buffer count - since the camera might go to ISO 3200 (1600), the buffer might end up small, and therefore it shows in the viewfinder as 14 (JPEG) or 6 (RAW). I used to use this religiously, gave up on it, but might go back someday.


If it's in the 1 series and not the 5 series, I don't think I'd expect to see it in these other hypothetical single-digit cameras though.

[Jarhead5811]

IS is not necessary whenclean high ISO is available...

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<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: black; font-family: Verdana;"]True, and it seems the sky is the limit on ISO performance. I know there are technical limitations but you have to admit that in ten years outrageously high ISOs will allow shots unheard of today. For those that disagree, just look back ten years. There could come a day whenlarge apertures are used mostly for effect, not speed.


<span style="font-size: 9pt; color: black; font-family: Verdana;"]BTW - I don't even own an IS lens or even a good tripod but like the Idea of having both, eventually.<o></o>

[Jon Ruyle]

True, and it seems the sky is the limit on ISO performance. I know there are technical limitations but you have to admit that in ten years outrageously high ISOs will allow shots unheard of today. For those that disagree, just look back ten years. There could come a day whenlarge apertures are used mostly for effect, not speed.

It is unlikely that the next ten years will show the same improvement as the past ten did. Photon noise is a consequence of the nature of light, not something caused by cameras. To lower noise, one must capture a higher % of photons that strike the ccd. Once one gets to 100%, there will be no way to reduce noise further. (Exactly how far we are from that limit, I don't know. I've been told "not far").

[Chuck Lee]

It is unlikely that the next ten years will show the same improvement as the past ten did

There is some truth to that statement when focusing on thecurrent sensor technology.


But, that is not the only technology involved with sampling light. What if there was a way to multi-sample during a shutter. Think in terms of the 1st and2nd curtains but faster. If I could sample 3-4-6-12 times across the sensor line by line pixel by pixel I could average the noise out. It's sort of what our eyes do.That's binocular video, I know, but there are sampling methods that could be developed to virtually elliminate noise during a shutter of reasonable duration.


Also, Kodak has made some major breakthroughs in filter technology that should be filtering down into consumer products very soon. Refocus imaging is another technology that's on the way. So, I would have to say that the next ten years could deliver major advancements in camera technology if the consumer would ask for the right things instead of asking for IS on a 10-22mm DX lens. What? Canons coming out with a 10-22 H-IS? Oh I gotta have that!! Only 999.00 USD? No problem!!


I agree to some extent with Jarhead. Look at the last ten years or less. Thishappened in the Summer of 2002


I also agree that I would like a 70-200 IS lens. It would really help when shooting flash at 1/200 sync rate on a 5D. That's why I would like to have a 1/500 sync. Outdoor flash photography would be so much easier.


I also agree that IS on telephoto is preferable.


I do not agree that we need it on anything less than 100mm. It's a waste of resources that could be spent developing more useful and more beneficial photographic equipment.

[ShutterbugJohan]

I've read the press release 3 times. (!) And I still don't know what they are adding. All I know is that they say that they are improving the IS system. Does anyone understand exactly what they are doing? Thanks!


--Johan

[Daniel Browning]

For the general masses like me, stop making better IS lenses, make better lenses for less $ and create a 16MP FF sensor that is clean up to 6400. I mean as clean as ISO 100 is today. I could then take 256000 ISO action shots in a gym at f8 1/500th that'd look like the 800 ISO shots I take today.

True, and it seems the sky is the limit on ISO performance.

There are two types of noise in images: one that is a fundamental and inescapable element of light itself (photon shot noise) and another that is a side effect of imperfect sensors (read noise, thermal noise, pattern noise, etc.).

As Jon mentioned, photon shot noise is already about as good as it's ever going to get. Canon improved it by 30% in the last 3 years and only 5% in the last 1 year. Theoretically, it's possible to almost another full stop of light (and therefore less photon shot noise), but that will require the removal of the color filters, which means we'll have to measure the color another way such as with microprisms. That tech appears to a long way off (think "Star Trek"), and anyway will only result in an improvement of less than a single stop.

But the other type of noise (read noise) is definitely possible to improve by many stops, at least in theory. The ingenuity of senso designers has been such that it has improved by over 3 stops just in the last 5 years. I would hope that sensor designers will continue to find ways to reduce it further for years to come. At some point they will run into practical limits (probably long before the theoretical limit of zero read noise), but I hope that day is far off.

If you see noise in your image, you might be wonder how much of it is from photon shot noise and how much is from read noise. It's kind of complicated, and I can calculate it for specific circumstances, but here's a few generalized examples using typical high contrast conversions:

In a ISO 100 shot from a digicam, it's all photon shot noise, from the highlights to the shadows.
In ISO 100 from a DSLR, it's all photon shot noise, from highlights to shadows.
In ISO 1600 from a DSLR, all photon shot noise from highlights to midtones, but it begins to mix with read noise so that both of them are in the shadows.
In ISO 6400 from a DSLR, it's mostly read noise in the shadows, mixed in the midtones, and mostly photon shot noise in the highlights.

What all this means is that the future ISO 6400 will never look as clean as today's ISO 100 because of photon shot noise. But it's possible that someday it will be "clean enough" in the shadows that we will use it anyway (despite increased noise in the midtones and highlights).

Another option is to use larger sensors with the same f-number (i.e. bigger, heavier glass) and same display size. That captures more light and therefore less photon shot noise. It's just expensive. RED Digital Cinema is planning sensors all the from 2/3" to FF35 to 6x17cm.

More exotic options include aperture "stacking" where multiple cameras and lenses are combined digitally (like the eye of a fly). But for a single lens and single sensor size there is no way to get around the photon shot noise barrier once you reach 100% QE, as Jon said.

What if there was a way to multi-sample during a shutter. Think in terms of the 1st and 2nd curtains but faster. If I could sample 3-4-6-12 times across the sensor line by line pixel by pixel I could average the noise out.

That is one type of technique that will improve read noise, but has no effect on photon shot noise.

Also, Kodak has made some major breakthroughs in filter technology that should be filtering down into consumer products very soon.

Yes, their RGBL design does help get a little closer to 100% QE at the cost of color resolution and processing complexity, but the difference is minor (the 5D1 -&gt; 5D2 was a much bigger improvement). Other breakthroughs such as Back Side Illumination, Black Silicon (now Pink Silicon), etc. all either help get a tiny bit closer to 100% QE (e.g. 50% -&gt; 60%) or reduce read noise.

Also, I want a flash sync of 1/500th so why don't you spend some R&amp;D on curtain design?

This one is important to me too, and Canon now has other good reasons to work on this: video. Video will be improved greatly by increasing the read-reset speed of the sensor. If that gets high enough, it can, in turn, improve flash sync. speed ($100K cameras are doing 1/8000+ already and that will come down to our level soon.) Unlike Nikon, Canon is already using an electronic first curtain, so I'm sure they are thinking of this. This is one case where, even if you don't care one whit about video, you can be thankful that there is a huge market force behind it, because it benefits stills features.

In the mean time, we keep begging for a 24-70 IS and are over-zealous to spend the extra coin on it. This is the demand that is drivng this IS deal forward. Please Stop!!

I respect your opinion, but you didn't convince me; I still think IS in &lt;100mm lenses is important enough to my photography that I would like Canon to add it if possible, no matter the improvement in underexposure (high ISO) noise.

I would like in the new 3D/7D the ability to set the aperature then limit the shutter speed. I would like an AI mode that could set the proper ISO when that shutter speed limit is breached. [...]
Am I the only one dreaming realistically here?

Those are the same features I've been asking for too, among others. Here are the improvements I would like in 5D2 firmware (no hardware changes needed), which I mentioned in the 5D2 review thread:

* Stop crippling the Auto ISO for the very purpose that it is most useful: manual mode.
* Stop warping the histograms by 1-3 stops (i.e. use raw instead of jpeg).
* Stop deleting up to 5 stops of highlights from the RAW data (i.e. allow ISO to be metadata).
* Stop clipping highlights in raw files taken at f/2.8 or less just to compensate for sensor AOR.
* Stop hiding important features such as the dead pixel remapper and shutter count.
* Stop wasting huge amounts of storage on ludicrous compression like sRAW.
* Stop avoiding intelligent compression such as nonlinear bit depth
* Stop preventing users from choosing their own JPEG preview size/compression.