Is Canon About to Release a Camera That Shoots Photos at 30 Frames per Second?

One of Canon’s ambassadors has made a cryptic comment in one of his Instagram posts, saying that he is testing a new camera that shoots at 30 frames per second. So does Canon have something in the pipeline that’s about to out-muscle the Sony a9? As usual, the facts are a little murky.

TheNewCamera.com picked up on the fact that, according to his Twitter account, photographer Andy Rouse was out shooting wildlife using some “new kit” and that he wouldn’t be answering any questions as to what it was. Given that Rouse published various videos as a Canon ambassador shooting on a EOS R only a few months ago, many speculated that he might have his hands on a prototype from the Japanese manufacturer — perhaps something mirrorless, or perhaps an early version of the much-slated 1D X Mark III.

In a subsequent post, Rouse mentioned at the end of a caption that in order to shoot a particular tiger while exploring the Ranthambore National Park in India, he had to rein in his camera from 30 fps to 5 fps as he was “was taking too many sharp shots” (I hate it when that happens).

Perhaps understandably, those leaving comments immediately began asking what Rouse was shooting on, to which he responded, “It’s not Canon kit and wouldn’t be.” For all of those who love a good rumor, this is rather disappointing. Speculation as to what Canon is going to produce ahead of the Olympics in 2020 has been rife, with the Mark III iteration of the Canon 1D X creating plenty of chatter. With the a9 cranking out 20 frames per second, Canon is under pressure to bump up the speed from 14 frames per second. Mirrorless cameras seem to be pushing the boundaries recently with the Fuji X T3 churning out a rather beastly 30 frames per second but comes at the price of a 1.25x crop, and the successor to the Sony a9 is expected to offer something equally impressive, if not more so.

From Rouse’s comments, it seems that any excitement about a 30 fps Canon is a little premature. If you’ve any thoughts on this mystery, be sure to leave your comments below.

Lead image by Sayantan Kundu.