June 14, 2016, Saitama, Japan - Tamron Co., Ltd., (President & CEO Shiro Ajisaka), an integrated optics manufacturer and leader in the security/surveillance equipment industry, announces the release of World's Most Lightweight LWIR 3X Zoom Lens for VGA (17μm Pixel Pitch) Detectors 50-150mm F/1.6 (Model: LVZ3X5016N).
LWIR imaging products have gained large market recognition in security / surveillance applications including monitoring for critical facilities and infrastructure systems. Tamron, since the initial launch of a first LWIR lens model in 2012, has successively released a series of high-performance LWIR lenses, and, in 2014, started selling the world's most lightweight LWIR (Model: LVZ3X3516N / LVZ3X3516A). Standout advantages of the LWIR technology that assures clear images under adverse lighting or weather conditions, as well as high optical performance, have been highly appreciated by users.
In response to strong demand from the customers of Model: LVZ3X3516N/ LVZ3X3516A for a lens with a focal length longer than 105mm, Tamron now announces the development of a 50-150mm F/1.6 optical 3X zoom lens (Model: LVZ3X5016N). Model: LVZ3X5016N enables capturing images with a larger telephoto range while the features of Model: LVZ3X3516N / LVZ3X3516A - a lightweight and miniature construction with excellent optical performance and user utility. For each specific application, an optimum choice is now offered in three models of Model: LVZ3X516N and LVZ3X3516N / LVZ3X3516A.
Tamron as an integrated optics manufacturer aggressively pursues lenses with ever higher performance and excellence in utility, expanding LWIR applications and new market potential.
Product Highlights
1. World's Most-Lightweight, Small-Size Zoom Lens
The world's most lightweight 50-150mm F/1.6 zoom lens with a weight of 1,170g (2.6lb), inheriting outstanding features of the Model: LVZ3X3516N / LVZ3X3516A. Compared to major telephoto-range lenses, its compactness allows continued use of existing housings or those widely available in general size and specs, thus reducing a system's development cost and overall geometry. The new 3X zoom lens is also suited to locations where installation has not been feasible due to large geometric size or form constraints of conventional lenses.
2. Clear and Crisp Image Quality
Optical Zooming is adopted for the adjustment of the lens's angle of view, which assures image quality free of artifacts associated with digital zoom processing. This feature unlocks new security / surveillance applications that have not been easy to implement using fixed-focal lenses until now. An active athermal (electric-drive focus correction) is employed to suppress focus shift caused by a change in environmental temperatures. A stepping motor is used for directly driving the focus mechanism, which enhances the focus precision and endures consistent high optical performance at the telephoto end.
3. Constant Aperture over the Entire Zoom Range
LWIR images are sensitive to be a brightness change: a camera re-adjustment would be necessary when the focal length, and thus the corresponding F-number, change in zooming. To make such an adjustment unnecessary and to eliminate degradation in image quality, Model: LVZ3X5016N maintains an aperture of F/1.6 throughout its entire range of 50-150mm. This feature assures optimal image quality over the entire focal length range with no camera adjustment necessary.
4. Excellent User Utility
A new proprietary general-use serial communication control, compatible with the ones adopted in the Model: LVZ3X3516N / LVZ3X3516A, has been developed and employed. This supports low-cost system integration for the existing users of the two lens models. A DLC (Diamond-Like-Carbon) coating which has been applied to the front element of the lens makes a Germanium window unnecessary for the lens housing. The lens was designed with diverse usage environments and improved user functionality in mind: the lens is expected to unlock new and wider scenes of application, expanding the security / surveillance imaging market.
