Some Graphs Just Make It Clear

drd1135

Zen Snapshooter
Location
Virginia
Name
Steve


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I bought my first SLR in 1973 as the photography hobby really took off around the world. Sales volumes then were much lower and there were a lot more camera manufacturers competing. The problems in the industry these days include large, vacant factories after the digital explosion, shareholder expectations of unending growth and the gutting of processing and print sales for B&M stores.
 
Film CL or new Digital CL?

The rate of change in the Line-Up and high cost for new cameras and lenses might have something to do with it. I took out the Olympus E-P2 yesterday, it delivers good-enough results for most people. You can get a used body on Ebay for $75, less than 1/10th of the price for a new one.

I looked at the Nikon Z-series mirrorless. $500 for a 50/1.8. That is just stupid. You can get the AF-S 50/1.8 for about a third of that price. I will not be buying into the Nikon Z Mount.

The camera industry needs to compete and offer advantages at a reasonable price, just not come up with something new and set any price they want for it. If they want to compete with a cell-phone, they need to design cameras without overly-complex menu systems with a million choices except the one you need to use the camera. This is analogous to the 1970s when SLR's were replacing the Box camera and Instamatic as the cameras of choice.
 
Yup... For me - I look at the recent mirrorless introductions and am not really tempted...
Sure, they would give me noticeably better image quality than my m43 setup...
But the cost to get those better pixels doesn't seem to be worth it...

Until some company introduces something that changes the game more fundamentally than just "better pixel quality with the same old clunky process" I think I'll stay put... :)
 
Yup... For me - I look at the recent mirrorless introductions and am not really tempted...
Sure, they would give me noticeably better image quality than my m43 setup...
But the cost to get those better pixels doesn't seem to be worth it...

Until some company introduces something that changes the game more fundamentally than just "better pixel quality with the same old clunky process" I think I'll stay put... :)
I'm kinda at this point. And more working on my lens lineup at this point. To get noticeably better image quality, I would need to move up to the GFX line.
 
It's still about the workflow. Setting aside the observations about relative IQ coming from a much smaller phone sensor, it's more and more about how to get the photo to where you want it, manipulate it and publish it quickly and efficiently. I was watching a YouTube video about a Hollywood shooter using Leica Q2, and as beautiful as his exclusive access backstage/Green Room B&Ws are, I can only wonder how he manages to squish down his 47MP photos into a portable enough file to immediately publish on Instagram.

Camera manufacturers haven't even come close to meeting that level of smartphone workflow convenience. We've been asking for it for years, but clearly no one is listening.
 
It's still about the workflow. Setting aside the observations about relative IQ coming from a much smaller phone sensor, it's more and more about how to get the photo to where you want it, manipulate it and publish it quickly and efficiently. I was watching a YouTube video about a Hollywood shooter using Leica Q2, and as beautiful as his exclusive access backstage/Green Room B&Ws are, I can only wonder how he manages to squish down his 47MP photos into a portable enough file to immediately publish on Instagram.

Camera manufacturers haven't even come close to meeting that level of smartphone workflow convenience. We've been asking for it for years, but clearly no one is listening.
Since you mention this, I have read that most of the differences of new Sony A9 II (relative to the MK 1) involve the handling and transferring of files.
 
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Definitely built for the deadline journo, with a base laptop in the media room sending the hot take to editors for near real-time publishing. Not sure how well that works for the individual shooter with no infrastructure support, but a step in the right direction.
 
Two things...

THING ONE - Sorry/not sorry to nit pick, but using two different scales (really splitting these into 2 different axes, period) is bull$ht. It makes me angry, because it’s needless manipulation of the viewing audience. They’ve made two curves look to be of similar size, ostensibly to make it “clearer” with two easily identifiable curves, but this completely changes the message. I’ll attach what it would look like if you actually showed them both to the same scale. The headline would be the same, but the message would feel different, wouldn’t it? This is roughly the same data points at the same years, but all at the same scale.

Picture1.png


…It goes from “We used to buy –this– (holds hand up to chin level) many cameras, and then we stopped buying them and bought –this– (holds hand up to nose) many smartphones!” to “A few of us used to buy cameras, and then we mostly stopped, and EVERYONE IN SIGHT bought a smartphone. Your grandmother bought one. Your neighbor’s 7 year old kid. Everyone.”



THING TWO: Amen on the workflow comments. I put up with transferring “real” pictures from a “real camera” to a smartphone for my wife, because I like the end result so much better for a lot of reasons. I don’t feel “ambivalent” or “so so” about the process, it doesn’t have highs and lows, it just kinda sucks, period. But I do not enjoy taking pictures on a phone, and I deeply enjoy taking them with a Fuji X.
 
Two things...

THING ONE - Sorry/not sorry to nit pick, but using two different scales (really splitting these into 2 different axes, period) is bull$ht. It makes me angry, because it’s needless manipulation of the viewing audience. They’ve made two curves look to be of similar size, ostensibly to make it “clearer” with two easily identifiable curves, but this completely changes the message. I’ll attach what it would look like if you actually showed them both to the same scale. The headline would be the same, but the message would feel different, wouldn’t it? This is roughly the same data points at the same years, but all at the same scale.

View attachment 209789

…It goes from “We used to buy –this– (holds hand up to chin level) many cameras, and then we stopped buying them and bought –this– (holds hand up to nose) many smartphones!” to “A few of us used to buy cameras, and then we mostly stopped, and EVERYONE IN SIGHT bought a smartphone. Your grandmother bought one. Your neighbor’s 7 year old kid. Everyone.”



THING TWO: Amen on the workflow comments. I put up with transferring “real” pictures from a “real camera” to a smartphone for my wife, because I like the end result so much better for a lot of reasons. I don’t feel “ambivalent” or “so so” about the process, it doesn’t have highs and lows, it just kinda sucks, period. But I do not enjoy taking pictures on a phone, and I deeply enjoy taking them with a Fuji X.
I also don't like different scales, but this one is very clearly marked and the "point" of this graph is that the decline of one corresponds to the rapid growth of the other. This crossing is really obscured on a common scale. Phones are more than just camera replacements (hence the higher sales volume) but the fact that they are a camera at all killed P&S cameras. What is amazing about the phones, however, is exactly how many were sold. First world, third world, whatever, cell phones sold in volume. The funny part is that this effectively put digital cameras into the hands of people who never would have bought a dedicated camera.
 
I'm still reading the charts as saying that around 2013, smartphones had reached critical mass and traditional camera sales would never be the same.

But as a guy who has owned a record and CD shop for 25 years, I have had a front row seat to watching what happened to records. When I was selling them in the 90s and early 00s, it was a niche market.....like cameras are today...... and CDs (before the rise of mp3s and the ability to stream music) were like the smart phone. Eventually, even though people had loads of CDs (and many were amassing digital files for their music libraries), some people decided for reasons too numerous (and frankly some of them quite flawed) to mention, the LP record has made an unbelievable comeback.

Of course the numbers will never be like the old days, but they have survived. And I think a similar revival may be starting now or will shortly for dedicated photographic tools (if the camera makers can think outside of the box....and have the marketing to back it up).
 
I don’t think dedicated cameras will go away. The big question is how big the remaining market will be. Of course, we on this forum will proudly do our part.
 
Re: Workflow - well, now that I moved up (see GAS Latest Acquisitions thread), I can now use Bluetooth instead of an ad-hoc WiFi to connect my phone and camera. It's crazy how night and day the difference is in terms of ease and reliability. It even asked me did I want to upgrade the firmware when I first paired them up. After swapping batteries for a full unit, I crossed my fingers and hit Start. Can't believe I actually tried it over wireless - I'm so used to the reliability of an FW image on the card. So in some ways, the connectivity piece is getting better for the average user. Now if they could just somehow write some APIs that would auto-format a picture destined for transfer, and I could check off Facebook, Instagram, Cameraderie :) and bingo they hit the phone and then get relayed to all the target channels at the desired specs. That's what I'm looking for as an end-user, and it gets to some parity with smartphone taken photos.
 
I'm still reading the charts as saying that around 2013, smartphones had reached critical mass and traditional camera sales would never be the same.

But as a guy who has owned a record and CD shop for 25 years, I have had a front row seat to watching what happened to records. When I was selling them in the 90s and early 00s, it was a niche market.....like cameras are today...... and CDs (before the rise of mp3s and the ability to stream music) were like the smart phone. Eventually, even though people had loads of CDs (and many were amassing digital files for their music libraries), some people decided for reasons too numerous (and frankly some of them quite flawed) to mention, the LP record has made an unbelievable comeback.

Of course the numbers will never be like the old days, but they have survived. And I think a similar revival may be starting now or will shortly for dedicated photographic tools (if the camera makers can think outside of the box....and have the marketing to back it up).
Also along this line of thinking. People are still shooting film cameras. I have a few long time photographer friends who have gotten away from digital and went back to only shooting film.
 
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