Latest Canon Patents: Stacked Sensor and C700 Shaped Video Camera

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Two new Canon patents for you to speculate about. One is about a stacked imaging sensor, the other one describes a video camera that looks a lot like the C700.

Canon patent application 2021-002807 (Japan) discusses a stacked imaging sensor. Machine translated excerpt from the patent literature:

In the prior art, while the pixel signal can be read out at high speed, the number of vertical output lines in each pixel row increases, so that the number of constant current circuits to be connected increases and the power consumption increases. In particular, the increase in power consumption during Live View shooting greatly affects the number of shots that can be taken. Further, as the vertical output line of each pixel sequence increases, the scale of the correction circuit for correcting the offset to the pixel signal and the gain variation caused by the vertical output line increases. Correction circuit after the image sensor.

If it cannot cope with the increase in the vertical output line, it is necessary to mount a correction circuit on the image sensor. In this case, it is necessary to also mount a memory for storing the correction value, the power due to the read / write of the memory also increases, and the power consumption increases more and more.
The   present invention has been made in view of the above-mentioned problems, and an object of the present invention is to provide an image pickup apparatus capable of achieving both high-speed reading of a pixel signal and reduction of power consumption.

Doesn’t look like a patent that might hit the market any time soon.

Canon patent application 2021-002871 (Japan) discusses a video camera that appears to look like the Canon EOS C700. The patent literature discusses a better wiring layout.

When the number of connectors is further increased, if the connectors are arranged on the side surface of the camera body, the connectors are likely to come off due to the cable being caught when the camera body is moved while being carried on the shoulder. 
On the other hand, if all the connectors are arranged on the back surface of the camera body, the size of the camera body in the width direction is further increased, and the shape becomes unsuitable for a shoulder-mounted professional digital video camera.

More Canon patents are listed here. Some particularly interesting patent applications we think might get into production are these:

Canon Patent For Stacked Sensor Technology

Canon Patent
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Canon patent application US20190096931 describes a stacked sensor. If you want to lear more about how a stacked sensor works, this article might help.

From the patent literature:

In CCD type and amplification-type solid-state image pickup devices used for digital still cameras, camcorders, and the like, in order to obtain high definition images, the sizes of pixels are required to be reduced. However, as the sizes of pixels are reduced more and more, a light receiving area of a photoelectric converter, in a pixel, detecting light is decreased, and the sensitivity is decreased.