Few things are more exaggerated in photography than the development of the global shutter, which offers many advantages over its more traditional counterparts. The holy grail is the consumer-grade global full-frame shutter, and thanks to Canon’s recent announcement, we’re getting closer to that.
Global shutters, which display and read all data from the sensor at once as opposed to traditional sequential reads, are overrated for a number of reasons. Since the entire sensor works at the same time, rolling shutter and distortion of fast-moving subjects are eliminated. This also means that there are no flash sync speed limits and no need to resort to alternatives like high-speed sync. However, global shutter has traditionally been for smaller formats (like 1″ sensor) or extremely expensive (Canon’s C700 GS retails for around $30,000).
However, Canon has announced two new full-frame global shutters, the LI5030SAI and the LI5030SAN. Both models are 19-megapixel full-frame sensors with global shutter and 12-bit, 57.99 fps read rates. LI5030SAI can capture both visible and near-infrared light and is intended for industrial applications, while LI5030SAN has no microlenses or color filters and is intended for electron microscopes and detection cameras. X ray.
Of course, what many photographers and filmmakers are probably wondering is whether we’ll ever see this on consumer cameras anytime soon. It has long been rumored that the upcoming flagship EOS R1 will have a global shutter. To be clear, I doubt that will be the case. Universal shutters are simply still very expensive (perhaps too expensive even for a top-of-the-line consumer camera). However, it does show that Canon has an active interest in them and knows that this could be the next paradigm-changing technology for the industry, so I doubt that they have the intention to bring them in eventually. consumer level, perhaps in a camera like the EOS R1 Mark II.
