How long until the next FF body? Or buy now?

[Maui5150]

Remember that the vast majority (around 95%) of people never buy another lens after their original purchase of a DSLR.

Please provide a legitimate survey/research to this fact.

I believe if you are talking CAMERAS as a whole, that may be true since Point and Shoots do not take other lenses (though some will take adapters for macro, etc)

Empirically, the stat in my own experience is utter bulls^&*t.

For myself, multiple bodies and lenses.
My father, more a hobbiest, multiple lenses
My sister, more to take pics of the kids, even with a T5i she has 3 lenses
A Doctor friend - has about 4 lenses
Another racing friend - 4 lenses

Ironically, my sister and myself are the only Canon shooters in that crowd, the rest Nikon, but I can't think of a person I know casually who owns a DSLR body and does not own multiple lenses

I am excluding others I know who are professional or semi-Professional (actually on that side I know about 75% Canon shooters). If I go into that realm, of those I personally know, I am at about 65 - 70

So statistically, as I approach 100 people (at least 70% the way there) I cannot think of one person I know or have met who owns a Dslr and does not have at least one more lense, and the average number is somewhere between 3 and 4 (I am at 7 and soon to be 8)

I deliberately tried to go into thinking about more family, non photographers, non hobbiest, but, those folks tended to break into more point and shoot or camera phone.

Seriously

I would be more surprised if 50% of those who buy a DSLR do not by at least one additional lens with 12 months of getting their camera.

I have a proposition for you...

Lets do this.

For every DSLR owner you find that has owned their camera more than a year and has only used a kit lens, I will give you $1

For every DSLR owner I find that has owned their camera and have purchased at least one or more lenses beyond what came with that camera (including those who purchased body only because they wanted a better lens ) you will give me $20.

By your statistics, this gives me a slight edge of $5 per $100

Professional and Hobbyiest shooters can be included.

I would like to also give a warning... if you look at polls like this: http://digital-photography-school.com/how-many-lenses-do-you-own-poll/

9% say they do not own DSLRs
9% say they only own one lens
23% own 2
59% own 3 or more.

Out of 36244
3247 are excluded because they do not own a DSLR

Congratulations, 3263 own only one lens.. I owe you $3263... but

29522 own more than one lens.... OUCH

You owe me $590,440, minus the $3263 I owe you...

I will give you a little break and lets just call it $585,000

By that poll, about 10% own only a kit lens, and in fact 3x as many people own 5 or more lenses.

And given who you are... I would prefer CASH.

 

[Random Orbits]

Remember that the vast majority (around 95%) of people never buy another lens after their original purchase of a DSLR.

I'd love to know how someone can generate such statistics. I mean, you can't correlate sales figures, because you have no idea whether people are buying a body to replace an existing one or buying one fresh. And you can't even assume that people who buy one with a kit lens are new buyers, because they might turn around and sell the lens on eBay at more than the difference in price between the kit and the body-only price, or they might be buying the kit lens to have as a "beater" lens for when they go to the beach or whatever.

Also, even assuming the whole "people don't upgrade" thing is true for entry-level bodies, the main reason for that is because lots of people buy them, try them, conclude that they can't deal with the size and bulk, and go back to shooting photos with their cell phones. That doesn't mean that someone who actually plans to shoot for more than a week with a DSLR shouldn't choose a camera based on what lenses are available.

Also, to the extent that the "never upgrade" thing is true, it means that the manufacturers need to improve their kit lenses, because a lot of folks won't upgrade, and will be daunted by the low-quality images that they get compare with what they were expecting. This leads to people giving up before they find a reason to buy a better lens.

Probably not 95% if Canon production statistics can be used as a guide. In April 2014, Canon surpassed 100 million EF lenses. In February 2014, Canon produced its 70 millionth EF camera (film and digital).

 

[Mr_Canuck]

Remember that the vast majority (around 95%) of people never buy another lens after their original purchase of a DSLR.
[/quote]

Exact inverse on most forums I've been a part of. But a different crowd...

 

[andrewflo]

I'd probably try to snag a 6D at the ~$1400 price point that is going around.

The 5DIV and 6DII will be far out of your budget if you think the current 5DIII is overpriced.

And the 6D is an outstanding camera if you aren't concerned with top of the line autofocusing and moderate video quality (only a professional might be bothered by the 6D's moire and aliasing in video).

 

[dgatwood]

I would like to also give a warning... if you look at polls like this: http://digital-photography-school.com/how-many-lenses-do-you-own-poll/

9% say they do not own DSLRs
9% say they only own one lens
23% own 2
59% own 3 or more.

...

By that poll, about 10% own only a kit lens, and in fact 3x as many people own 5 or more lenses.

Unless that's a separate stat, I don't think those numbers tell you anything about whether they own a kit lens. There are people who buy a body and a single lens separately because they don't like the kit lens. There are also folks who buy a kit, then break the kit lens and replace it with another lens. They only own one lens (usably), but it isn't the kit lens. And there are folks who decide to upgrade their lens from the kit lens, and sell the kit lens for a little extra cash. I don't think it is computationally feasible to model such a complex marketplace without a direct, randomly sampled survey asking "Did you buy your camera with a kit lens? Do you still use it? Do you own any other lenses?"

 

[dgatwood]

Probably not 95% if Canon production statistics can be used as a guide. In April 2014, Canon surpassed 100 million EF lenses. In February 2014, Canon produced its 70 millionth EF camera (film and digital).

Again, this tells you nothing of value, other than that Canon sold a few more lenses than cameras. I suspect that most people do not regularly upgrade their lenses (if ever), but rather buy new lenses of different varieties. By contrast, most people do eventually upgrade their camera bodies.

Depending on the percentage of kit lenses in that mix:

• If most of the lenses sold are kit lenses, then most people never buy a second lens, and most users never replace their cameras. As a consequence, users have, on average, about 1.4 lenses each.
• If most of the lenses sold are individual lenses, then most people do buy a second lens, and most people do eventually replace their cameras with newer models. If you assume that the average user goes through three bodies before upgrading a lens to a similar model (which is probably not far from reality), that means the average user probably owns about 4 lenses.

But even if we knew that information, that still wouldn't tell you what percentage of users never upgrade. If users own 4 lenses on average, you could take twenty people, and nineteen could own one lens, and the twentieth could own 61 lenses, and you'd average out to four lenses each, but 95% of people would still be using the kit lens. Such an extreme imbalance is, IMO, highly unlikely. But you could easily have ten people who have seven lenses and ten people who have only one.

 

[James Lee]

Your decision is absolutely correct.

I have a similar situation as you. At this time, I own canon APS-C cameras and several lens, and I am planing to upgrade to full frame camera this holiday. At the beginning I want to get 5D3 or 6D, but the announcement of Nikon D810, especially D750 changed my opinion. I will wait till Dec to see what will happen, if canon still refuse to drop the price of 5D3 or 6D significantly, definitely I will choose Nikon D750, which has Similar function, better CMOS, and lower price. and sell all my canon gears. Canon has to go forward, including announcing new FF bodies and lowering down 5D3/6D. It is really unwise for canon to keep the price of 5D3/6D steady at this time.

Thank you all for your help!

Judging by your replies and everything else I've read, I don't think it's wise to jump the Canon wagon right now. There are too many uncertainties there. I don't feel like investing in lenses and accessories, based on guesses and hopes.
Canon, like every other company, make money and they'll do whatever's best for them, not for me.
So, I'm going to wait until the end of December and if there are still no FF news coming from Canon, I'll go with Nikon D750 and 24-70. It's out of the question to wait another 6 months or more to find out IF their majesty, Canon are going to do something. Not just because I'm impatient - simply because life is too short to be wasted on blind expectations.

Cheers!