Canon Executives at CP+ 2026: RF Lens Roadmap, R6 Mark III Choices, AI Philosophy & Third-Party Plans Revealed

In a recent roundtable interview conducted at CP+ 2026 in Yokohama and published by Phototrend, Canon assembled five of its most senior executives, including its Executive Vice President, Go Tokura, who heads its Imaging Division, to answer questions about its intentions for its EOS R system, its most recent technical decisions, its latest RF lens releases, its evolving relationship with other lens makers, and its measured approach to AI. Having been a keen observer of Canon’s activities for many years, I thought the interview came across as polished and assured, yet once again, I felt like Canon is holding its cards very close to its chest.

In terms of the EOS R6 Mark III, Canon’s lead developer, Kazumasa Yoshikawa, offered insight into its decision to fit the camera with a front-side illuminated sensor and not to include its Digic Accelerator, like its flagship R5 Mark II and R1 models: "We believe we have found the best balance between performance and cost, which is the reason for these technical choices for the EOS R6 Mark III." Of course, one might wonder whether enthusiasts upgrading from the original R6 to the Mark III might think its specification is slightly conservative, while still offering excellent Dual Pixel AF performance.

In the lens section, more concrete enthusiasm was expressed. Optics director Tetsushi Hibi talked about how the RF mount’s large diameter and short flange back allowed the new RF 14mm f/1.4 L VCM to deliver L-series image quality in a surprisingly compact design: “Thanks to the RF mount with its large diameter and short mechanical flange, we have gained flexibility in optical design, including for the peripheral regions of the image.” This is thanks to Blue Spectrum Refractive lenses, aspheric lenses, and coatings.

With the RF 7-14mm f/2.8-3.5 L Fisheye STM, Canon’s first fisheye in years and sporting a world’s first 190° angle of view, Hibi spoke candidly: “We have not targeted a specific use case, whether in photography or video. We aimed to offer this lens to creators who wish to express their creativity or explore something different.” The ability to combine two of these lenses with another to capture a 360° image also feels like Canon giving photographers something new and interesting to play with, rather than targeting a professional niche market.

The RF 45mm f/1.2 STM also garnered some excitement as Canon’s attempt to deliver a more affordable bright prime. Hibi explained the design compromises: “To achieve this large aperture in a compact format, we had to reduce the number of optical elements. By effectively utilizing molded plastic aspherical elements and adopting a gear-driven STM motor, we achieved a compact and lightweight design, offered at an affordable price".

He also mentioned Canon’s plans to “continue to explore additional varieties of accessible lenses,” which may bode well for photographers who have been turned off by the high price of bright primes.

Optimism from the horse’s mouth: Tokura himself declared the progress of the RF mount in its eighth year: “We have reached a pace of six to eight new lenses per year, and last year we surpassed 60 RF lenses in total. We aim to sustain this pace and continue to enrich the lineup.” He claimed that the flexibility of the RF design allows for “greater flexibility in optical design than the EF system,” offering more choices in theory.

Third-Party: Once they are in, they are in

The biggest challenge, however, was third-party access to the RF mount. Tokura readily agreed that “collaboration with new third-party optics manufacturers will intensify in the future,” though he immediately qualified it with “some restrictions related to our commercial strategy.” Tokura did, however, assure that Canon would not interfere once the third party opens the segment. “Once a third-party manufacturer is active in a given segment, we do not position ourselves to comment on or control their product decisions.”

Though the current emphasis is on APS-C RF-S lenses with Sigma and Tamron, Tokura downplayed the rigid division between full-frame and crop sensor. This, according to him, is only an “external point of view.” One can only wonder if Canon’s top officials are entirely convinced about their claims with regard to the full-frame RF system.

On the issue of artificial intelligence, Canon’s position is reassuring. “Our policy is to use AI to reproduce reality as it is, and not to generate visual content. Specifically, we intend to apply AI more in four areas: noise reduction, color correction, aberration and distortion correction, and upscaling.” The aim is to achieve greater image detail, improve subject recognition that is consistent with the user’s intention, and capture exactly what the user wants.

More 3D in our Future

Further out, Tokura provided a vision for the future: “We envision that the next big step forward will be the move from 2D to 3D. The term ‘3D’ simply sounds more real than ‘2D.’” He expects great things from AI and deep learning for image quality, user interfaces, possibly voice interfaces, and workflow in the coming years, but not image creation. The whimsical “Analog Concept Camera,” a waist-level viewfinder camera inspired by the classic Rolleiflex, was revealed to be the brainstorm of “a designer at our company.” It was not part of any product plan.

A special edition PowerShot G7 X Mark III was produced to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the PowerShot series, but was not presented as a harbinger of things to come for enthusiast compact cameras.

Closing Thoughts

The interview reinforces Canon’s confidence in their RF mount but presents a company that is pragmatic, protective of their own interests, and committed to ensuring AI plays a role in supporting authentic images rather than being a replacement for creative vision. Whether the floodgates of cooperation will be opened wide or remain suitably contained is the question that Canon seems content to answer incrementally. As with most things Canon, we'll see how the lenses and cameras they actually ship tell the story.

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