Kind of surprised you paid $700 over retail when you bought the 1Dx.
NYC sales tax... its 8.75%
Yet, it hasn't affected their sales, profits or product development
Canon has said that the R3 will not be its flagship. But, I'm curious why you think it is a gimmick. I have doubts about how effective the eye autofocus might be for sports, although I can see that, depending on how it is implemented, it could be useful for some sports. For those where it isn't, I would just turn it off. Not going to hurt anything
Golf?
You always seem to overlook the fact that you represent a tiny, tiny portion of professional sports photographers. You may shoot professional sports, but there are a lot more of us professionals who shoot non-professional and non top level NCAA teams. Those who shoot high school and small college sports far outnumber you and I'd wager a bet that a great many will find the R3 to be the perfect camera, especially, if as you suggest, an R1 comes in at $8,000. Face it, Canon cares about total sales. Your team may warrant a little extra personal attention from Canon to make you feel valued, but for decisions that actually impact development, Canon is far more interested in the enthusiast and small market professionals, because they represent a much larger share of revenues.
I.dont think our groups are small at all. Sports teams, leagues, tv networks, advertising agencies, production houses, magazines, newspapers, digital content producers, publishing houses, independents. we are a big group and we tend to spend an average well over 100K per employee over the life of a platform. This is before we add broadcast and film production with an average of $250K to $650K per employee.
Canon enjoys our business and the margins and 'the fact' that as we shoot on the sidelines, consumers see this and want the same equipment. We are well pronounced marketing component that reaches millions of consumers.
You are right, Canon's share of the market is..oh wait...it's bigger than anyone else's.
SONY, Fuji, Panasonic, Samsung from where we sit are getting larger spends on platform, glass and electronics in processional setting in studio and remote.
Why do I get the feeling that if and when an R1 is finally announced, you will declare that it is worthless?
If the EVF as planned is next gen and able to work in direct sun and stadium lights without bloom and lag, many will buy-in but it will have have at least double the resolution of the 1DXMKIII