Canon Patents Smartphone Camera Attachment with Multiple Lenses

A new patent has been unearthed that reveals yet another strange camera design from the folks at Canon. Following in the footsteps of the “clippable” IVY REC and monocular Powershot Zoom camera, this particular creation would be a smartphone camera attachment that lets you swap in various lenses.

The patent was discovered by Canon News via DesignWatch, although it’s not exactly new. It was submitted at the end of 2019 and granted in September of 2020. However, unlike most patents that we’ve seen, this one comes complete with 3D renders, making it seem a bit more fleshed out and closer to a “production-ready” design.

Check out the figures for yourself below—it’s pretty self-explanatory:

The patent seems to show a spring loaded (or magnetically attached) camera that clips onto your smartphone and uses interchangeable rectangular lens “modules” to offer three different focal lengths. The shortest version is ostensibly an ultra-wide, then a normal, and the long module shown in the second-to-last image would be telephoto if we had to guess.

Normally we would scoff a bit at an “out there” design like this, but given the kinds of wacky cameras that Canon has been showing off at trade shows and bringing to market over the past couple of years, it’s entirely possible that some version of this will wind up on Indiegogo and eventually make its way into consumers’ hands.

Whether or not something like this would actually sell… well… that’s another story. Just ask Sony.

(via Canon Rumors)

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