"Go Out and Buy an FX Format Camera(Please!!!)"

[cgw]

Found this interview a bit unnerving for illustrating(and confirming) Nikon's isolation from the market that's so often discussed here and elsewhere. Not sure this guy realizes that DX is what's helping to keep his weight up. The reluctance to see a Nikon MILC beyond CX sensors told me no one's ever been in the same room with a Fuji X-T1. Faith in FX seemed excessive, especially in light of current pricing. Have a listen:

Nikon: "we are not ignoring the DX line"; new "exciting" lenses coming soon | Nikon Rumors

 

[jaomul]

Interesting enough. Seems Nikon more focused on FX.

I would say though that a pro using a dx camera won't be swayed into thinking it's entry level because of a marketing strategy. What I mean is that it makes sense for a marketing guy to say upgrade to an fx body in the hope that many existing dx owner enthusiasts will see this and buy ff. A pro who knows they need an fx will get one, a pro who needs his d7000 or other dx will keep it. The interview here seems to be aimed at the unsure enthusiast who wants new whether needed or not.

The comment dx is naturally entry level is at least to my mind designed to push the jittery compulsive buyers to spend their money, because it puts doubt in their minds now about their entry level dx gear.

Good marketing strategy

 

[Solarflare]

I dont agree thats what he's saying. He's saying if you want to get really into photography with Nikon - go full frame. However, he is aware that the mass of people who really want to get into photography would do that anyway. So I dont think his position is as ignorant as implied by this thread.

Many people buy an entry level DSLR and a kit lens - and add a superzoom later. And thats already all they ever do. So yeah, I dont think APS-C is TOO important because many APS-C users indeed dont care.

However, some do. And for them, Nikons offering for APS-C really have some glaring holes. Thus I think Nikon needs to do:

- AF-S 10-18mm f4.5-5.6 VR DX which needs to be AFFORDABLE, just like the Canon version
- AF-S 24mm f1.8 DX and/or AF-S 18mm f1.8 DX, because not everyone is a fan of 50mm (or rather 53mm, which is what 35mm is on APS-C)
- AF-S 24mm f1.4 DX and/or AF-S 18mm f1.4 DX



P.s.: WOA HUGE OVERSIGHT !

Of course Nikon needs a good replacement for D300 ... like, they dont need it NOW, they needed it 2 years BEFORE NOW. At this point one starts to wonder if they should still bother, though. With the Canon 7d mk2, the last people that still actually wait for a D400 will probably move over to Canon anyway, unless Nikon moves really, really fast.



P.p.s.: Really good article from Thom Hogan about this: The Big Nikon Leak | byThom | Thom Hogan

 

[cgw]

Many people buy an entry level DSLR and a kit lens - and add a superzoom later. And thats already all they ever do. So yeah, I dont think APS-C is TOO important because many APS-C users indeed dont care.

Nikon would find life hard without DX revenue. That's what makes the glib tone of the interview so odd with its GM-like degree of isolation from marketplace realities. Have a look at Thom Hogan's reading of Nikon's annual report.

 

[Derrel]

Marketplace Reality: Nikon's best-selling d-slr models for approximately the last two years have been older models, sold at steep discounts. In this flat camera market, older models, like the D3100 and D5100, have been big sellers--despite the fact that both of those models are "two full generations back" now. The APS-C camera market has shifted to a point where PRICE, as in LOW price, is what is driving sales. Marketplace Reality: much of the world is in economic downturn. Many well-to-do North Americans seem to be ignorant of what the realities are in Europe and China and South America. Nikon has switched focus and switched emphasis toward items that cost more at retail, and which have hugely higher gross profit margins for Nikon. Nikon's focus is more on profitability rather than emphasizing adding more inventory to the already huge surplus of $349 to $599, entry-level DX d-slr bodies.

There is a proverbial $hi+-ton of low-end and highly discounted Nikon DX inventory available all over the world; the last thing Nikon needs to do is to listen to a writer who is constantly bitching about how to run a multi-national corporation and who is so firmly convinced that he knows better than the people who have been running the multi-national corporation. The same writer who admitted that he somehow managed to miss the release of Nikon's Annual Report 2014, by about three weeks....wow, that guy must reallllly have his pulse on the company if he "somehow missed" the release of the annual report.

Nikon does not want to sell more cheap d-slr cameras and $99 to $159 kit zooms....18-55 kit zooms, or 55-200 or 55-250 kit zooms, are not profit centers. It's no longer 2007, but it seems like a lot of people cannot shake the old Dx-era ways of thinking and viewing the camera market AS IF it were still 2004-2007.

 

[Gary A.]

In the late 90's Nikon publicly announced that there wasn't a future in digital professional camera soooo ... they weren't investing much in professional level digital R&D.

This opened the door for Canon to crave out a huge pie piece out of the pro marketplace.

So Nikon has been wrong in the past. (Just sayin'.)

My real point is, that for what I shoot and how I shoot, FF doesn't make that big of a difference. I have FF cameras (1Ds), MFT (EM1s) cameras and APS-C (Fuji) cameras. My camera of choice is the APS-C. If I was a commercial photog then maybe the difference in DOF at similar aperture might make a difference. But I'm not a commercial photog ... so for me it really doesn't make a difference.

What does make a difference is build, features and system. For many the improvements in build, features and system is worth moving up to FF. I don't crop much (trying not to crop at all) and I don't print 20 feet by 30 feet posters ... so the extra I get in a FF sensor as opposed to a APS-C sensor isn't significant.

 

[Derrel]

Where FF makes a big difference is in profitability for Nikon! Not only in bodies, but in lenses. The d-slr market has changed. The camera maker flash market has been decimated by cheap $50 Chinese flashes from Yongnuo and Meike. The battery grip market has been killed off by the Chinese knock-offs. Yet we still have writers insisting that the camera makers need to follow a decade-old model structure, AS IF the marketplace is the same as it was for the first 14 years of the d-slr business.

Back to Hogan and the doomsday scenarios he churns out each week... I find it surprising the number of web-based writers that keep acting as if the camera market is the same market it was in the 2004-2009 era, and who keep insisting that ,"What Nikon needs is another DX format camera to replace a DX format camera that came out years ago." The **profitability** that has been lost due to cheap, Chinese-made accessories like flashes and battery grips and so on means that it might be smart to cultivate a different type of customer--one who can afford to buy a $2,000 to $3,200 camera, and who can afford something a bit more up-market than a discounted, two-generation old, overstock $349 DX body from BestBuy, along with a $99 kit zoom and a $150 discounted 55-200 zoom. Chasing the kind of customer who can barely afford a d-slr, and who wants to buy cheap, low-end, entry-level gear? That is called a race to the bottom.

We don't have writers continually opining that, "What Mercedes needs is a good $19,000 car to compete with Kia," or that, "What BMW needs is a nice minivan to compete in the suburban mom minivan market segment." In a race to the bottom, the only winner is the customer who wants cheap, low-end items and is willing to buy a $50 Yognuo flash and a generic battery grip.

 

[Braineack]

I don't see any reason to make dx lens but for kits.

 

[PaulWog]

The real money is wherever the cellphone market takes things. The term "aperture" is becoming a little more widely known by the masses, same with ISO, and shutter speed. With computers, it used to be "how many ____ does the hard drive have... how much ____ does the RAM have?" Then multiple cores came around, and it was "How many cores does it have?" instead of "How many GHz?" Sure, there's different tiers of consumers. Some are even less interested, and just ask the question "Can it run this?" But the point is that when we have enough low-end consumers looking for a specific spec, we have the manufacturers paying more attention to that.

Look at televisions. It used to be "How big is it? And is it a Plasma, or an LCD?" Now the average joe understands color, white, and black contrast a bit more. You don't end up hearing "It's a 65 inch widescreen" anymore, since that's common-place. Size and type is obviously a feature, but the average consumer doesn't fall for the trick of the lowest price tag on the biggest screen as often anymore... Certain features come to be expected as being cheap now as well... and that's all based on what the average consumer ends up fixating on.

Unfortunately, phone manufacturers do not want us to look at sensor sizes. Nor do camera manufacturers, if they're trying to sell small-sensored cameras. So, the masses won't know what a sensor is... If phone manufacturers have a will and find a way, and they develop an improved method to incorporate larger sensors into a small phone, then every single consumer will sure as hell know what a sensor does and why bigger is better. Right now, not so much.

I think that's what keeps the whole DX, FX, etc, lines all expensive, slow-moving, and constricted. The average consumer usually won't go for that kind of stuff. Even people who have low incomes and tight budgets find a will and a way to raise their budget significantly if they have been immersed in the market (televisions, computers, phones, etc). The reason why DX will be developed on (lenses) is because there is a large DX market (but it's not as significantly large as it needs to be & likely won't grow just with improved lens offerings)... giving DX more lenses is more a matter of bleeding out profits from the current set of DX consumers, rather than fostering a market that will bring in an accelerated number of new DX (or DSLR) shooters every year.

 

[jaomul]

I would have thought the dx market would be more important now than before because of the amount of newer type and size cameras that turned up over last few years.

Fullframe cameras have evolved but so have their crop cousins, to a point where in my theory at least, the d7100/5300 etc are at least as good image quality wise as a Canon 5d.

Throw the smaller Fuji mirrorless in, along with Sony's a6000 type cameras and maybe even Samsung now if this Nx1 lives up to hype and you have cameras that are good enough for a lot of pro photography if there is enough lenses and accessories.

This is not a ff vs crop thing. We all know the benefits of ff, but many pros now are finding that the crop sensors are good enough. It may take a little more work to isolate a subject etc , but it can be done.

It was mentioned above that Nikon may be targeting photographers that have more money to spend. That is probably true, but I would bet many wildlife shooters would drop as much on nikons version of a "7d Mark 2" as they would on a d610.

 

[cgw]

Hogan-bashing aside, there remain the soothing fictions that Nikon just needs to sell more high-end, high-margin merch(albeit into a small, possibly shrinking market) and to abandon high volume, low-end schlock and any R+D that might improve its sales. Funny but Hogan's less fond of doomsaying than simply analyzing publicly-available data. You parse the CIPA numbers and whatever else Nikon cares to disclose and discuss it here. Truisms cut no ice.

 

[greybeard]

It looks to me like the still camera business is doing the same as the video camera business, the low end is being swallowed up by cell phone technology. So, is there a future for the APS-C dSLR? There are probably R&D teams within Nikon and Canon debating this very question.

 

[runnah]

Well as a media specialist I feel like I have the insight to weigh in on how a billion dollar company should run their business.

Oh wait...

 

[Braineack]

I dont understand what the cell phone market has to do with the aps-c.

 

[PaulWog]

I dont understand what the cell phone market has to do with the aps-c.

A whole dissertation could be made to answer that. I couldn't pretend to know about how (or if) manufacturing processes benefit from mass production of small sensors. But the main points I am getting at are:

- Processor development.
- Mass consumer base-line knowledge is developed slowly through passive exposure to the technology/advertisements over the years. Average consumers learn a few buzz-words: ISO, aperture, and shutter speed are more and more commonly used now... and it's all up to the cell market how much more they focus on the camera end of advertising. Apple has more recently started using these terms. A consumer who doesn't know why they want a product is less likely to buy it. Example: My girlfriend wanted a better camera than her phone's camera, but she didn't know what she wanted to be better about it. Most consumers just know the word "Megapixels" and the term "Picture Quality", and they buy blindly otherwise.