canon

COLOGNE, Germany--Canon, adapting to the high-end video revolution its SLRs are helping to fuel, plans changes to its cameras and lenses to make them friendlier in cinema hands.

The company already announced that two of the company's newest lenses, Canon's updated professional 300mm and 400mm F2.8 models, are equipped with a mechanism to permit smooth, steady, motorized focus changes. And at the Photokina show here, the company said further adaptations are coming. Specifically, the camera maker is working on an ability to set specific focus points the lens can move between.

That sort of feature is suited to the cinematographer crowd. Today, even with the new lenses, they must physically mark two focus points and manually change focus until they reach their desired spot.

However, the feature will require updated camera bodies to work, said Mike Burnhill, a Canon Europe representative here. … Read more

There's not much to say about Canon's update to its G series of enthusiast compact cameras: the PowerShot G12 is almost identical to its predecessor, the G11, but with similar enhancements to those rolled out in the S95. Most notably, the G12 includes 720/24p video capture--a much-needed boost over the outdated VGA movies--now with stereo audio and a Mini-HDMI connector.

Like the S95, the G12 also adds an HDR scene mode which combines 3 shots. Unlike some other implementations, however, it requires the steadiness of a tripod.

Here's a recap of its specs and competitors:

There really isn't much to the Canon PowerShot SX30 IS beyond its megazoom lens, though that's all most buyers will care about.

It starts at a 35mm-equivalent 24mm and goes out to 840mm--a whopping 35x magnification.

Canon paired it with a 14.1-megapixel 1/2.3-inch type CCD sensor, which is the standard size you'd find in any point-and-shoot camera. As a result, the likelihood that the SX30 will be able to resolve fine detail at the telephoto end is small. But hey, if you're that far away from your subject and you don't want … Read more