The Camera Market Continues to Shift

Fujifilm has been on a roll with in-demand products, but they’re very aware that the market is changing and they must continue to innovate.

Phototrend sat down with Fujifilm during CP+ and mentioned some curious things about the Chinese Market.

It feels like every time I sit down to sift through camera news this is jumping out at me more and more. It was just today when we wrote about the January 2025 CIPA results and detailed what we were seeing in China and compacts, and how Japan is still on a compact craze, and here we are again, talking about it some more.

We have seen the importance of the Chinese market rise over the past 18 or so months for the Japanese camera companies, as it moved to be the largest regional market for mirrorless cameras that CIPA monitors.

Should Fujifilm Gone Into The Full Frame Camera Market?

Phototrend asked if they felt it was a mistake for them not to get into the full frame market, and Fuji stated that their sales were increasing especially in the younger generation and especially female photographers.  They are looking for better quality products than their phones, and they want a camera that also looks good.

The X100VI fit that role well, and right now the Chinese market is the driving force behind Fujifilm sales.  This is especially important when 40% of the population is between the age of 20 and 39 in China.

The key to our success is that we launch attractive products and services that meet our customers’ expectations.

Tomohide Yazawa, Fujifilm

Fujifilm is increasing the manufacturing rate of the X100 VI but still has not matched the demand, and they expect the demand to continue for at least 1 or 2 more years.  That’s some impressive demand.

I think what’s also important to note is that this isn’t an inexpensive camera.  While China’s economy is growing quickly, and there is more wealth for personal items, a $1600 built in lens or compact camera (selling for around 12,999 Yuan) is still an expensive purchase, especially when you consider the average salary in Shanghai still runs around $1900 per month.

To put that into a smartphone perspective, the Xiaomi Fold 4, which is a dual display folding phone, which are usually considered the most expensive tier of smartphones, is a ‘mere’ 8999 yuan or $1250.

I think Fujifilm was smart in a couple of ways, they didn’t chase full frame and spread their lens ecosystem across two different sensor sizes of APS-C and full frame, and they concentrated on APS-C lenses, when the bigger companies of Nikon, Sony and Canon chased the full frame market and largely ignored APS-C.

Canon and the other manufacturers getting back into compact cameras or built in lens cameras (for those that are not quite “compact”) is a good thing, but they seem to be also missing part of the equation that Fujifilm is mentioning here, which is – does it look good.

The Fujifilm X100 VI isn’t exactly a small camera, it’s a good size larger than the PowerShot V1, but especially the silver and black model carry a distinctive look that leaves the other cameras looking quite “plain”.

Also, the Fujifilm X100 VI, with its 35mm F2.0 equivalent lens and a 40MP APS-C sensor combined with IBIS is a stills photography camera on steroids, but especially the silver model, it just looks good at the same time.  Competent photography gear doesn’t necessarily have to be all black and boring.

The Shifting Message

This is a topic that I’ve touched on before in an opinion piece last year that talked more about this, basically talking more about CP+, but in 2024.  One year later and we are still looking at a Shifting Focus in Marketing from the big companies.  It’s one thing to shift marketing, but you still need to deliver the products that help sell that message. 

Fujifilm took that message to heart – and gained greatly from it.  We’ve seen Nikon’s own Zf and Zfc sell well in Japan last year as well. 

I shot hundreds of rolls of film on Minolta cameras in the 80’s before I moved to Canon, so I’d love to see Sony do something there too.  Sony has introduced some styling, it’s A7C mirrorless camera in silver is a good-looking camera, with great features and image quality, and has hardly left the top 10 sales lists in Japan since its release.

Interestingly, DPReview published their thoughts on CP+ and made note of this message, and who was going to CP+ this year, stating that the show attendees also included a significant number of younger photographers and also women.

What jumped out, however, was the number of young people we saw in attendance, and it was common to see them in sections of booths specifically targeting ‘creators.’ You found them in other places, too; at least anecdotally, the industry’s efforts to connect with this up-and-coming customer base may be paying dividends.

Additionally, it seemed like there were more women in attendance this year. I don’t have any hard data to back this up, so you’ll have to trust my observations, but it’s certainly a good sign if the industry is more effectively connecting with women photographers.

https://www.dpreview.com/articles/1139861968/at-cp-2025-it-finally-felt-like-the-camera-industry-got-its-mojo-back

This is all great news for the industry, and we can only hope this continues.

So, what About Canon?

Canon coming out with an R5 mark II and an R1 last year was great for us photography geeks but did little for that message.

Now we know that Canon is waking up a bit in this area that they have ignored for 30+ years and coming out finally with a RE-1 or similarly named classical looking camera, and this is a good step in the right direction for Canon.  It’s only been how many years since Nikon made the Nikon Df and followed that up in the mirrorless world with the Zf and the Zfc cameras? It’s about time Canon. 

My understanding was that Canon didn’t want to revisit the FD era because of the pain of that forced transition from the FD mount to the EF mount, which probably ranks up there as one of the most ballsy moves by any camera company.  To be fair, talking with some old Canon users, they are STILL upset about that switch from FD, so Canon may have a good point.

But its long overdue.  Canon has a rich and long history of making some of the most technological advanced cameras on the market, and they should be celebrating that history, not hiding from it.

We hope that Canon will continue down this road and develop mirrorless camera that adopt a better “look” to attract cameras to different segments of the population that may be interested in a better device than a phone but also want something that looks good too.

The Potential for Market Expansion

The expansion of the market is a good thing, and attracting a new generation of photographers means that these companies will continue to innovate and make great products.

Gearing more products to a younger audience will mean that the companies, instead of hoping to sell the next camera to the same photographers that are getting quite old I might add (yours truly) that they will be targeting newer and more diverse photographers and creators.

Only time will tell.