Portraying the digital still camera as an endangered species has been a popular pastime for years in the cellphone industry, and with the high-resolution stills and high-definition video capabilities of the latest round of smartphones, the argument is more convincing than ever when applied to the casual snapshot. But this week at the World Expo in Shanghai, Canon -- a name synonymous with high-quality photography -- offered a vision of a device that not only supersedes the digital still camera, but will likely eliminate photography as we know it.
With an estimated arrival date two decades in the future, the Canon Wonder Camera concept device has an incredible focal length from macro to 500mm with a single, integrated lens. It boasts massive (unspecified) storage, ultra-high (also unspecified) resolution, multiple facial recognition capabilities beyond that available today, and the ability to keep everything viewable in focus at the same time. But perhaps the most radical thing about this camera is that it's really a camcorder. Rather than take individual stills, Wonder Camera owners would simply have their pick of perfectly crisp photos as frames grabbed from video.
Instead of waiting to fire the shutter when someone smiles, one could simply indicate a point (or range) in the video to pluck later. The camera's resolution might even enable multiple high-resolution photos from different parts of a frame. Imagine creating portraits of every member of a grade school class from just a few video frames of the group.
Read more.
With an estimated arrival date two decades in the future, the Canon Wonder Camera concept device has an incredible focal length from macro to 500mm with a single, integrated lens. It boasts massive (unspecified) storage, ultra-high (also unspecified) resolution, multiple facial recognition capabilities beyond that available today, and the ability to keep everything viewable in focus at the same time. But perhaps the most radical thing about this camera is that it's really a camcorder. Rather than take individual stills, Wonder Camera owners would simply have their pick of perfectly crisp photos as frames grabbed from video.
Instead of waiting to fire the shutter when someone smiles, one could simply indicate a point (or range) in the video to pluck later. The camera's resolution might even enable multiple high-resolution photos from different parts of a frame. Imagine creating portraits of every member of a grade school class from just a few video frames of the group.
Read more.
