Canon global

Incorporating a 35mm full-frame 18.1-megapixel CMOS sensor, the camera achieves continuous shooting at 12 frames per second and offers standard ISO sensitivity up to 51200. The development specs of the EOS-1D X flagship-model professional SLR camera exceeded the bounds of conventional thinking of experienced engineers. They did not simply combine an existing high-speed professional-model camera with a high-image-quality camera, but instead upgraded every aspect of the 1D X. Therefore, the technology incorporated into the camera was completely developed anew.

A bounce effect occurs when the heavy mirror used in full-frame SLR cameras is raised and lowered during high-speed continuous shooting. A major hurdle in reducing this phenomenon was improving the locking function to securely hold the mirror in place. It was also necessary to accurately perform automatic exposure (AE) and autofocus (AF) in the short amount of time available for each frame. Moreover, further increasing the performance of AF and AE was also added as a condition. All of these were difficult tasks requiring millisecond-level adjustments.

Realizing high-speed continuous shooting with high image quality requires an increase in readout speed by the CMOS sensor. To achieve this, the number of channels for reading signals was increased from 8 in the previous model to 16, resulting in improved continuous shooting performance. Speed is also required when processing the readout image data. Because of this, the 1D X is equipped with two newly developed DIGIC 5+ image processors. The camera also delivers high performance noise reduction at high ISO sensitivities.