Canon, King in SLR Cameras, Makes Inroads Into Mirrorless

[kubelik]

I would be very happy to purchase the M50 except for the dearth of EF-M glass. everything starting at f/4 or f/3.5 and being variable aperture really doesn't cut it. yes, I know there's a single "fast" prime ... which is really a 35 f/2.8 equivalent so not that fast either.

would be interested to see a 32mm (50mm equiv.) f/1.8 prime or a 18-28mm (28-45mm equiv.) f/2 zoom (heck, at least f/2.8). I'd love to have this as a walkaround alternative to my 5D3 but right now with the lens speeds there's not a whole lot of difference at shorter focal lengths between the M-system cameras and my G7x.

 

[ritholtz]

Many people want great photography AND video features. Any micro four thirds camera will fall short of the high standards set by APSC and full frame cameras for photography (goodbye Panasonic and Olympus). Since 8 megapixels is enough for 4K video, it is not too demanding for a smaller micro four thirds sensor and the accompanying glass to resolve that much resolution.

Canon medium format? The could make a huge 0.5x crop factor (2x width and 2x height of full frame) sensor, with some glass to match

M50 is very nice for the price. We can see this for $500 levels on refurb store. Canon did offer lot of gear at ridiculous prices during holiday season. Official video showing various features. Pretty nice pics and tracking.
Like touch and drag feature, Canon should implement some gestures to change SS and A. No need to bother about any missing dials or buttons.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ADilGN7RUhM

 

[Wolfloid]

I would be very happy to purchase the M50 except for the dearth of EF-M glass. everything starting at f/4 or f/3.5 and being variable aperture really doesn't cut it. yes, I know there's a single "fast" prime ... which is really a 35 f/2.8 equivalent so not that fast either.

Yes, very poor lens selection, poor battery life, poor buffer seem to be holding Canon back in the mid-range, and of course, nothing in full frame. I am a Canon user, like the DSLR that I have, from a period when Canon was innovating (5D II), have a full complement of lenses, and yet I am seriously thinking of going with the Sony A7rIII or the new A7III. Even the Fuji XT2, with its excellent lens range is much more tempting than anything from Canon now. It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

 

[Talys]

It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Except, as rrcphoto and neuro just posted, they're not:

 

[littleB]

Yes, very poor lens selection, poor battery life, poor buffer seem to be holding Canon back in the mid-range, and of course, nothing in full frame. I am a Canon user, like the DSLR that I have, from a period when Canon was innovating (5D II), have a full complement of lenses, and yet I am seriously thinking of going with the Sony A7rIII or the new A7III. Even the Fuji XT2, with its excellent lens range is much more tempting than anything from Canon now. It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Why are you only whining here?

All your Canon equipment suddenly stopped working and you cannot make photos anymore?
Are your Canon camera or lenses the main cause your photos are bad?

Whining alone will not make your photos better. Just go to Sony fanboy forum, you will be welcome there, feel much better, and in the end your photos made with sony equipment will be so much better.

 

[tomri]

I would be very happy to purchase the M50 except for the dearth of EF-M glass.

Full ACK. For me, the existence of a decent standard zoom is entry criterion into a new camera system. And the lack thereof tells me that Canon is not serious about positioning the M series for the "advanced amateur" market.

 

[Larsskv]

It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Except, as rrcphoto and neuro just posted, they're not:

Can we trust this graphic? What happened to Panasonic? They are suddenly gone from one year to the next. And where is Fuji?

 

[fentiger]

Yes, very poor lens selection, poor battery life, poor buffer seem to be holding Canon back in the mid-range, and of course, nothing in full frame. I am a Canon user, like the DSLR that I have, from a period when Canon was innovating (5D II), have a full complement of lenses, and yet I am seriously thinking of going with the Sony A7rIII or the new A7III. Even the Fuji XT2, with its excellent lens range is much more tempting than anything from Canon now. It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Why are you only whining here?

All your Canon equipment suddenly stopped working and you cannot make photos anymore?
Are your Canon camera or lenses the main cause your photos are bad?

Whining alone will not make your photos better. Just go to Sony fanboy forum, you will be welcome there, feel much better, and in the end your photos made with sony equipment will be so much better.

yeah, go buy the sony gear, then come back here moaning you cannot see the difference

 

[Wolfloid]

Why are you only whining here

I think the regulator should do something about you. I have no doubt that you would not say that to my face.

I have been a Canon user for ten years, and I am now looking to change cameras for the following reasons - I am fed up with the bulk and the weight, I am fed up with poor dynamic range and shadow banding, and in difficult lighting situations I want to see the exposure I'm getting, which is now possible. Oh yes, I also want a full range of focusing points, and a tilting mirror would be nice and I'd also like to use my Leica lenses. These are all completely objective points, and as you see there are plenty of them.

It is not my fault that you do not seem to be able to recognise that others might have different priorities from you, or that you express yourself so coarsly, but I have as much right as you to express myself here. I am disappointed that Canon, despite my investment in their equipment, has not given me an easy route to the improvements I'm looking for. Obviously, if their attitude is anything like yours, I will simply take my money elsewhere - their loss.

Here is a comment from Tom Stanworth from the Fundamentalistphotographer website that I have just read and which articulates all the points I wish to make in an eloquent way (notice he uses arguments). Naturally, no one is forced to agree with him, but he makes compelling and pursuasive points

http://thephotofundamentalist.com/a7-a7r/sony-a7-iii-the-volkskamera/#more-6163

See if you can read it.

 

[Wolfloid]

yeah, go buy the sony gear, then come back here moaning you cannot see the difference

And how old are you?

 

[Talys]

It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Except, as rrcphoto and neuro just posted, they're not:

Can we trust this graphic? What happened to Panasonic? They are suddenly gone from one year to the next. And where is Fuji?

The numbers come from the Japan BCN camera rankings:

https://www.canonnews.com/japan-bcn-results-are-out-canon-still-in-there-at-2-for-mirrorless-over-who-sony

https://www.dpreview.com/news/0966656912/2018-japan-bcn-camera-rankings-canon-dominates-dslrs-tops-sony-in-mirrorless

The BCN numbers only include top 3. The categories are digital cameras with lenses, DSLRs, and MILCs. Panasonic and Fuji don't make the cut; however, you can do the arithmetic for "other".

For example, MILC -

Olympus (27.7%) up from 26.8%
Canon (21.3%) up from 18.5%
Sony (20.2%) up from 17.9%

Total for top 3 = 69.2; therefore others = 30.8.

You can see that as recently as 2011, Panasonic, Sony, and Olympus accounted for nearly all MILC sales. In 2015, Canon beat out Panasonic for the #3 spot, and has steadily grown since.

I'm perfectly fine with other surveys and numbers that might paint a different picture, but those claiming "Canon is bleeding sales to Sony" should quote some source for that instead of just saying it; otherwise, it simply sounds like "I like Sony's approach; therefore, they must winning customers."

 

[Wolfloid]

I don't read the graph quite as sanguinely as you. This is, after all, as you say, only the Japanese market, and says nothing about the global market. As I see it, every purchse of a Sony A7 camera is a loss of a FF DSLR sale, and that mostly means Nikon or Canon. Sony has come into the market aggresively and that is having an effect on Canon's potential sales.

I see this as more of a pity than anything else, firstly, since I am invested in Canon lenses, and secondly as I like, and am used to the Canon UI and ergonomics. Had the 6D II not been so badly crippled by its old sensor, lack of joystick and focus point coverage, I might have been satisfied with the 155g weight saving on the 5DII.

 

[Talys]

I don't read the graph quite as sanguinely as you. This is, after all, as you say, only the Japanese market, and says nothing about the global market. As I see it, every purchse of a Sony A7 camera is a loss of a FF DSLR sale, and that mostly means Nikon or Canon. Sony has come into the market aggresively and that is having an effect on Canon's potential sales.

I see this as more of a pity than anything else, firstly, since I am invested in Canon lenses, and secondly as I like, and am used to the Canon UI and ergonomics. Had the 6D II not been so badly crippled by its old sensor, lack of joystick and focus point coverage, I might have been satisfied with the 155g weight saving on the 5DII.

The Japanese market is an extremely important one, because it's a huge market. Neuro provided global sales numbers, where Canon is also #2 in MILC sales, with Sony and Olympus switching positions.

Every purchse of a MILC is not a lost DSLR sale, because that assumes that some people don't buy both, since they excel at different things. For example, someone might love mirrorless for shooting weddings, but it's less likely that they'd love it to shoot football games.

With regards to the 6D2, it's an easy camera to pick on based on a spec sheet that seemingly falls short -- no different than the 6D, by the way. But both are a lovely cameras to own, a real joy to use even for hours at a stretch, and produces photographs that are no less stunning than any other camera when you have the elements of a good photograph in place.

 

[MayaTlab]

a real joy to use even for hours at a stretch

That isn't exactly my feeling when I use my 6Ds. Or most cameras for that matter. But particularly my 6Ds.

 

[fentiger]

yeah, go buy the sony gear, then come back here moaning you cannot see the difference

And how old are you?

Depends, how old do you want me to be?
what I'm saying is take a photo with Canon and sony same subject same time, can you tell which camera took what

 

[jolyonralph]

Why are you only whining here

I think the regulator should do something about you. I have no doubt that you would not say that to my face.

Ignore the fanboys. Most of us here are adult enough to discuss serious questions without insults.

 

[BillB]

I don't read the graph quite as sanguinely as you. This is, after all, as you say, only the Japanese market, and says nothing about the global market. As I see it, every purchse of a Sony A7 camera is a loss of a FF DSLR sale, and that mostly means Nikon or Canon. Sony has come into the market aggresively and that is having an effect on Canon's potential sales.

I see this as more of a pity than anything else, firstly, since I am invested in Canon lenses, and secondly as I like, and am used to the Canon UI and ergonomics. Had the 6D II not been so badly crippled by its old sensor, lack of joystick and focus point coverage, I might have been satisfied with the 155g weight saving on the 5DII.

You are right. The 6DII sensor lacks on chip ADC (but does have dual pixel Liveview), doesn't have a joystick, and its focus point coverage is what it is. On the other hand, Canon has been selling refurb 5DIV's consistently for $2700, and sometimes less than that. The refurb 5DIV costs more than the 6DII of your dreams, and it is heavier, but it is a heck of a lot more camera, at least as far as I am concerned. That was a good enough deal for me.

 

[EduPortas]

Now it's time for Canon to unleash the consumer mirrorless cameras that will sell a ton. Cheapish cameras
will bells and whistles that further their position as the imaging giant they are.

Agree. This is happening with the cheaper offerings with EOS M, but I believe Canon going all-in branding wise with a 'Mirrorless Rebel' and putting the weight of the business behind it will gobble up sub-$1k mirrorless sales like they did with SLRs.

Once the first Rebel with 4K is released, it's basically game over for everyone else.

And here is where we disagree. I believe the future of the Canons/Nikons/etc. of the world in the consumer space is to latch on to folks who live in social media (heavy IG + FB users in particular) -- those folks want content that pops above and beyond what a cell phone can capture, not necessarily some high resolution video that pops on a 4K monitor that few folks actually process their social media on. So in my mind, for those folks it's about color / small DOF / low light performance much more than video resolution.

And the type of video features consumers need differ a ton from the needs of videographers. Don't get me wrong, video is great for social media devotees, but DPAF + tilty-flippy + touch + the ability to conveniently pipe/transfer/share that video is far more important than 4K for those folks, IMHO.

- A

Yes, completely agree here. Those are exactly the "bells and whistles" I expect
Canon to come out with in the next 12 months. But it's hard to deny that 4K has become
a badge to sell more gear. Place it on the box and you've just doubled your sale's potential.

 

[Mikehit]

I see this as more of a pity than anything else, firstly, since I am invested in Canon lenses, and secondly as I like, and am used to the Canon UI and ergonomics. Had the 6D II not been so badly crippled by its old sensor, lack of joystick and focus point coverage, I might have been satisfied with the 155g weight saving on the 5DII.

The 6D2 has a new sensor and many who actually use it say it is better than the original 6D. And the AF coverage is barely smaller than other Canon FF cameras.

 

[jayphotoworks]

It is a pity that they are bleeding sales to Sony.

Except, as rrcphoto and neuro just posted, they're not:

Some of these numbers should take other factors into consideration.

In 2016, Japan was hit with a major earthquake. None of Canon's fabs were directly hit, but Sony's sensor fabs were directly affected. Olympus, Panasonic and many others utilize Sony sensors so this probably had a direct impact to their numbers both in 2016 and part of 2017. This is probably also reflected in the BCN awards for 2018 (which reports on CY2017 numbers). Canon gained mirrorless market share, but this may or may not be directly attributable to their push into mirrorless. I feel after 2018, we might have a better look into exactly where the trends are headed.