Canon 4K Lineup Adds Lighter Lens; Zoom and Focus Accessories Enhance Lineup

The Canon 4K lens lineup has expanded with the CJ-18ex7.6B KASE portable zoom lens for 2/3-inch cameras. Larry Thorpe, Canon, senior fellow says the lens meets the needs of customers who have been asking for a lighter 4K lens that also is lower cost and can be more appropriate for colleges, local sports, and more. The lens features a zoom range of 7.6-137mm and an aperture of f1.8 while also supporting ITU-R BT.2020 UHD color gamut and HDR.

Canon’s new CJ18ex7.6B KASE S 4K lens weighs only 3.7 pounds.

“What’s nice about this lens is it wraps up our first major phase of 4K lens development as we now have 4K lenses that can cover all applications in the field, from studio, to ENG and EFP,” he says.

The key to cutting the weight and size was eliminating the optical range extender. The ergonomics and digital servo operational controls of the lens are similar to Canon’s current lineup of portable zoom lenses, providing users with maximum mobility in a variety of shooting situations.

Additionally, the lens is compatible with the new Canon ZDJ-G01 Zoom Demand and FDJ-G01 Focus Demand accessories that provide operators with enhanced functionality and operational control of the lens.

The CJ18ex7.6B KASE S portable zoom lens achieves high-level 4K UHD performance across the entire zoom range thanks to Canon’s proprietary optical design technology, incorporating materials such as fluorite and Ultra-Low Dispersion (UD) glass. In addition, the lens supports the wide color gamut approved by the broadcasting standard – all features essential to HDR imaging.

Zoom and Focus Demand Accessories
Also new from Canon is the ZDJ-G01 and FDJ-G01 zoom and focus demand accessories (collectively called “G-Series”) that represent an innovative step forward in lens control technology.

“While developing our long lenses we were working on new zoom and focus controllers that are very important to camera operators and were shaped by their feedback,” says Thorpe.

Both accessories incorporate digital control processing, displays, and new control switches. The combination greatly empowers the controllers to add new creative operational capabilities to meet the many different needs of disparate sporting events, televised stage shows, and operatic broadcasts.

“They will work with all of our portable and box lenses and they have pre-set capabilities handle a range of operations tailored for different shooting environments,” says Thorpe.

The accessories also support cinematic settings of focus to allow vernier control of the same while supporting smooth rack focusing between talent on a stage. It further allows for the selection of preset positions, select curves and creation of range limits, all of which can be saved to multiple user profiles. The accessories support a wide range of Canon field, studio and portable broadcast lenses.
The Canon CJ18ex7.6B KASE S 4K UHD Portable Zoom Lens is scheduled to be available later in 2020 while the ZDJ-G01 Zoom Demand and FDJ-G01 Focus Demand accessories are currently available. For more information, please visit, www.usa.canon.com/broadcast.

For more information on Canon, please contact Richard Eilers at [email protected].