Canon Unveils AII-supported Flash

By Ela Teodosio, Christian Post Contributor Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Canon unveils new artificial intelligence supported flash that can identify on its own which direction to point.

Through its new device called 470EX-AI, Canon hopes to change how users view flash photography. The new Speedlight model automatically finds the "best" spot to bounce off the light and make photos look more flattering.

The 470EX-AI looks just like any Speedlight flash from the outside but its inside is a bit more intricate. It features motors at the base and the hinge and a sensor located in the corner of the face of the flash.

For professional photographers, using the flash does not mean pointing it exactly at the subject. The trick is to bounce off the light off a wall or a ceiling to make photos look more natural. This could be a pain for photographers, however, and could also take a lot of time.

Canon is taking that struggle away with this new introduction. The process starts when the user double taps the camera's shutter button. The flash will then point directly at the subject, calculate the distance, point at the ceiling and also calculate the distance, then reorient itself to find what it thinks is the best direction to bounce off the light.

The flash should help photographers, especially those who are new to the trade, to "utilize the ideal lighting and natural brightness of the room."

The flash will use the same computation as long as the subject and photographer maintain the same position. Once they start moving around though, the flash will have to reorient itself and repeat the process all over again.

Semi-pros will find the semi-automatic mode very useful. With this, they can pick whatever angle they think the flash should point to and store it in the device's memory so that the flash would turn back to that angle every time the shutter button is double tapped.

A note to photographers, the upcoming flash features an optical receiver but lacks a radio transmitter.

The 470EX-AI Speedlight will become available in April for $399.