Alpha 7's & RX10

[Atgets_Apprentice]

I think that todays' announcements from Sony prove two things:

1: The Alpha 7 & 7R do mean the A mount is all but finished. No matter what Sony say.

2: The RX10 shows that Sony have really lost the plot. £1,000 for a bridge camera?

[pakodominguez]

I think that todays' announcements from Sony prove two things:

1: The Alpha 7 & 7R do mean the A mount is all but finished. No matter what Sony say.

I don't think so. But I don't think that even top managers at Sony can give you an straight answer of what's the future for the A-mount...

2: The RX10 shows that Sony have really lost the plot. £1,000 for a bridge camera?

The Cyber-shot DSC-R1 with a 24-120 Zeiss lens was 999$ at introduction.
The DSC-F828 with a 28-200 Zeiss lens was also 999$ at introduction.
DPR not only "recommended" both cameras, but scored 9 and 8 on "Value for money".
And, before real life test, some people are quite exited about the technology behind this camera:
http://www.eoshd.com/content/11337/surp ... deo-output

[Atgets_Apprentice]

I think that todays' announcements from Sony prove two things:

1: The Alpha 7 & 7R do mean the A mount is all but finished. No matter what Sony say.

I don't think so. But I don't think that even top managers at Sony can give you an straight answer of what's the future for the A-mount...

2: The RX10 shows that Sony have really lost the plot. £1,000 for a bridge camera?

The Cyber-shot DSC-R1 with a 24-120 Zeiss lens was 999$ at introduction.
The DSC-F828 with a 28-200 Zeiss lens was also 999$ at introduction.
DPR not only "recommended" both cameras, but scored 9 and 8 on "Value for money".
And, before real life test, some people are quite exited about the technology behind this camera:
http://www.eoshd.com/content/11337/surp ... deo-output

Sony managers lied before, when they said they hadn't written off OVF cameras, and then discontinued them all.

As for the RX10, in this day and age, for £1,000, you'd expect a bigger sensor.

[peterottaway]

Well you make your choice and you pay your money.

The last compact camera I bought was a Minolta A2 and it was in the end a wonderful and a wonderfully frustrating experience. The small size convenience and the quality result that it could produce for the time was very good. But even with experience, the multiple frustrating failures with its shutter lag saw me looking for a decent brick wall to smash the bloody thing into.

The 1 inch sensor with decent software and good processing technique has proven itself to be quite capable. Which just goes to show how far technology has progressed recently.

As a everyday camera it makes more sense than buying a low to medium price DSLR kit to lug about.

[pakodominguez]

As for the RX10, in this day and age, for £1,000, you'd expect a bigger sensor.

You are paying the big money mostly for the lens, not the sensor.

[bfitzgerald]

Very limited market for this kind of product that's my view.
Pako you seem to be on some kind of crusade to prove how much cheaper cameras and lenses are nowadays.

I for one am not buying it.
With regards to cameras being electronics goods they have not shown the huge price decreases of other consumer electronics items such as computers (massive price drop in the last decade simply HUGE) hi-fi stuff again big price drops over a period of time, pick just about any electronic product and it's way cheaper today than it was 10-15 years ago.

It's certainly not playing out that way for the camera market bar the budget DSLR's.
FF is still hugely expensive, higher end APS-C cameras have not gone down in price. Lenses continue to climb in price too.

When it's all said and done we're not stupid, if Sony can kick and APS-C sensor out the door in a camera for £300, there is little reason to pay £600 for a 1" one, and by your pricing the lens is about £400 on top, that's a big crop factor lens too with a lot less glass than a FF or APS-C lens..on top of an already overpriced RX100 body. Not that Sony are alone Olympus are in for a rude awakening on their overpriced OM-D EM-1, and the premium compact market is about to blow itself out with too many products from too many makers.

One reason the camera industry is now in a big decline is they've milked it for all it's worth, and the market has finally decided that the prices just are not good enough. So expect a long term decline in camera and lens sales over the next 5 + years. The party "is over"

[classiccameras]

From what I read, bridge cameras are one of the few types to still be holding their heads above water, but this is the sub £600 market.
I have always been tempted to look more seriously at bridge cameras purely from a carry less one will do all point of view.
I'm just waiting to see if Fuji use their new sensor in the rumoured X-S2.

[pakodominguez]

Very limited market for this kind of product that's my view.
Pako you seem to be on some kind of crusade to prove how much cheaper cameras and lenses are nowadays.

I for one am not buying it.
With regards to cameras being electronics goods they have not shown the huge price decreases of other consumer electronics items such as computers (massive price drop in the last decade simply HUGE) hi-fi stuff again big price drops over a period of time, pick just about any electronic product and it's way cheaper today than it was 10-15 years ago.

When it's all said and done we're not stupid, if Sony can kick and APS-C sensor out the door in a camera for £300, there is little reason to pay £600 for a 1" one...

My only crusade is against faux statements like your "overpriced" mantra. The more you say it, the less people pays attention because nothing makes think that you really knows about pricing or marketing.

Manufacturers sells, at introduction, at about 100% more of the price of the cost of producing the item -this is not Sony policy, this is the regular way for all of them. In the case of the A900, Sony probably made less than that margin. In the case of the A3000 they are definitely making less (probably 50%) but, in other hand, other than the brand new 20 MP sensor, the A3000 is "old technology" and the kit lens is the same since the NEX-5 (introduced June 2010). This is the camera meant to be cheap, and sells a lot during the holiday season.

Cameras and lenses announced this weak are totally new designs. The prices are what they are, and you can think they are overpriced, but you don't have a clue of how much it cost to produce them (me neither, so I prefer to just decide if I can afford them or not).

The case of the RX10 is special, this is the first high end bridge camera from Sony in a long time, since the 2005's R1. It is really appealing for stills AND video, and the lens, on paper, is really impressive:

A constant maximum aperture of f/2.8 ... Optical SteadyShot image stabilization... The lens also features 7 aspherical elements... and Carl Zeiss T* anti-reflective coating.
http://sonyalphalab.com/2013/10/sony-fu ... -anounced/

Close focus (until someone makes a test, I don't want to talk about "macro") is also impressive. The weakness of this lens is, apparently, the zoom-by-wire operation, that is not "fast" -I guess it is optimized for video.

One reason the camera industry is now in a big decline is they've milked it for all it's worth, and the market has finally decided that the prices just are not good enough. So expect a long term decline in camera and lens sales over the next 5 + years. The party "is over"

Camera makers are not selling less units because their pricing policy, but because users are happy taking pictures with their smartphones, and don't need a second device for it (same happens with MP3 players). Sony is selling less P&S cameras, but investing hard in smartphones (beautiful ones) in order to follow the tendency.

Sony needs to improve a lot of things (software, lack of lenses for ALL their lines, flash system, etc) but their pricing policy isn't their biggest problem.

[bfitzgerald]

I'd love to know where you are getting your figures from for margins they just don't add up at all.

The R1 was a huge flop for Sony it failed big time, though it was priced well below £1000, more like I think £590 odd in the UK at the time (which then was broadly in line with DSLR prices) the lens should have made it a real winner, but Sony made a very obvious serious mistake.

I actually pointed people I knew in the direction of the R1, as I felt it might suit their needs a bit better than a DSLR and kit lens and these users would do well with the focal range it offered. Every single one of them shot it down..and based on "it looks odd not like a real camera"

Sony screwed up in a big way on that camera, they made a lens and tried to put a camera around it, rather than trying to make a normal looking camera with a decent lens fixed to it. That sealed the R1's fate, despite a vocal few fans it was a failure for Sony. Add the lousy AF, weird LCD design it was a dead turkey before it even hit the shelves.

But that was then you'd pay near £600 for a DSLR and at least the R1 had an APS-C sensor, now you can pay about £300 for a DSLR. The RX10 has no chance at all it's DOA at £1000 odd Sony are just out of their minds and out of touch with the market in a big way. There might be a market for a bridge type body, but 1" isn't APS-C, and the price needs to be significantly more appealing.

As for pricing I think the A99 proved how out of touch Sony "can be" with pricing, some of these new products and lenses only confirm that too.

I also fail to see the connection between smartphones and DSLR's. I can see smartphones v compacts being a reason why sales have dived in that segment a lot, but not DSLR's that is an entirely different type of user.

[bakubo]

I just skimmed over this article by Hogan about all the new stuff that has come out in the past week from just about all the companies. Seems to be something that Barry and others will like to read and maybe discuss. It is a bit of the camera companies as sports teams sort of stuff, but I think some will find it interesting.

Interpreting An Interesting Week

http://www.dslrbodies.com/newsviews/the-interesting-week.html

[pakodominguez]

I just skimmed over this article by Hogan about all the new stuff that has come out in the past week from just about all the companies.

Read it this AM. Yep, interesting. There were a couple more article posted this week by Thom that are a good complement to this one. I love this one:
http://www.sansmirror.com/newsviews/the ... whoop.html

[bfitzgerald]

He's mostly on target with that.
I agree with the majority of his observations, but not all

Nikon are shoving inventory trying to clear out older stuff, Fuji have IMO too many X mount models esp lower end (they need one but not 2) and they need to up their game with their X compacts sensor size, Pentax probably won't have any impact nice K-3 or not the big USA price hikes on lenses will kill interest for many.

I don't think Canikon should go for super expensive G or P type bodies there is no real market for it. I can't see the RX10 doing that well at this price
Samsung are wasting their time with android cameras no question, as are Sony with their QX experiment (can't see it taking off at all)

Can't say I share his view on Panasonic I think they've up their game lately esp the GX-7 (had a play quite like it surprisingly) it's a lot cheaper than the EM-1 too so has some interest in the market though it has to compete with the EM-5. GM1 is a waste of time at that price point has to be said they really could have come up with a premium micro 4/3 compact and done some decent damage there, instead taking the micro 4/3 mount route they've a slow lens and a price that's too high.

Yes I also agree the DSLR market is shrinking, and Canikon will be doing price cutting to boost sales.
On the other hand I'm not convinced the ILC/CSC market is strong either right now so the situation is the same for everyone. Trying to take a slice of a decreasing pie.

The way forward is basically cheaper all round. You can't boost sales with higher prices so I'm actually quite pleased it's fallen flat on it's face

[pakodominguez]

http://www.eoshd.com/content/11380/new- ... eo-quality

I had the chance to play with the RX10 this morning at the PPE2013 show. The camera is as big as an A3x. Menus are the same as the others RX/A7(R) cameras. And, as the above article mention, the only minus is the zoom-by-wire: a little slow...

[bakubo]

http://www.eoshd.com/content/11380/new-sony-a7-a7r-rx10-exclusive-hands-look-video-quality

I had the chance to play with the RX10 this morning at the PPE2013 show. The camera is as big as an A3x. Menus are the same as the others RX/A7(R) cameras. And, as the above article mention, the only minus is the zoom-by-wire: a little slow...

It looks from the link above like the RX10 video is pretty good. I hope the slow zoom-by-wire can be speeded up with new firmware. There is both a zoom toggle and zoom ring on the lens. Maybe the slow zoom is better for video so it would be fine with most still photographers, I think, to have the toggle be a slow zoom and the ring to be a faster zoom.

[bfitzgerald]

Best way to avoid power zoom is to do mechanical zoom. This is one of the grumbles I'm on about lately...stills shooters are taking a back seat for a minority of video shooters. You can never please both camps, that's quite clear, but power zoom sucked back in the 90's and it still sucks now.

A good quality, smooth mechanical zoom is what's needed here.
Interesting to note even DPR cast doubts on the price of the RX10 in their preview we'll see how it stacks up real world.
Also Sony have not gone 4k on any of the new cameras, I guess that leaves room for an update across all these models.