Canon Seeks Patent Limiting IBIS Range During HDR Stacking

Canon is trying to eke out more advantages in stacking photos for high dynamic range (HDR), where multiple images are taken in a row and then processed into one photo, with different bits of the frame coming from the most appropriately exposed picture. In-body stabilization (IBIS) wasn’t an issue for Canon until this past year, when it finally caught up to competitors and was able to include it in the R6 and R5 cameras. Now, as noted by Canon News, Canon is hoping to tamp down the IBIS wiggling during HDR image collection, to make for a less cropped final image, and likely also to make it much more likely that the alignments will be easy to process when combining photos.

The patent application indicates that the IBIS won’t be turned off, but will be turned down in certain circumstances “…to secure a sufficient image blur correction range while suppressing fluctuations in the angle of view…” Canon News pointed out that this would allow for less cropping, as each of the component images will cover a more similar frame. As big a benefit to Canon, though, may be a radical improvement in how much processing needs to be done to make sure those images line up. IBIS systems – especially ones as effective as Canon’s, which can reach up to 7.5 stops of stabilization with an unstabilized lens that passes accelerometer information back through the lens mount – are very complicated. They react differently to different types of sensed movement. Vibrations may continue to be controlled, but the system may opt to not compensate for jerks or other types of sensed movement that would anyways cause a misalignment of a series of images.