Canon has announced that this year marks the 50th anniversary of the release of its FD 55 mm f/1.2AL (released in 1971), the company’s first lens for interchangeable-lens SLR cameras that employs an aspherical lens element.
Aspherical lens elements are not only used in the company’s interchangeable-lens SLR cameras, but also broadcast lenses, semiconductor lithography systems, telescope mirrors and a wide variety of optical products. To mass-produce aspherical lenses, the company reportedly needed a processing technology that was precise to within less than 0.1 micrometres, as well as high-precision measuring devices that could measure to within 0.01 micrometres. In March 1971, Canon’s first interchangeable-lens SLR camera employing an aspherical lens was released, the FD 55 mm f/1.2AL. Then, in 1973, Canon developed the ALG-Z nanometre level ultra-high-precision aspherical lens grinder, and in 1985, the company implemented the large-diameter glass mould (GMo) aspherical lens element into the ‘New FD 35-105 mm f/3.5-4.5’ (released in December 1985).
Canon reports that it will continue to polish its optical technologies in order to create products and technologies that help meet the customers’ wide-ranging needs.