The next Foveon camera?

Doppler9000 wrote:

tarmov wrote:

Doppler9000 wrote:

tarmov wrote:

The subjective impact of extra noise is subjective - some eyes are better and some brains can better impute some noise to its liking.

Which brings us to the cruz of the differences in opinion: you believe that the Foveon market niche is too small to be sustainable in the long run, while most of the Sigma forum participants

Indeed. A small group with no information about the financial realities of the proposition.

What makes you think a larger group with no intersection with that smaller group would have more information?

I realize you’re trying to make a point, but why did you add the assumption of no intersection? Given Sigma’s historical marketing approach, many of the potential FFF buyers are likely to have some experience with Sigma cameras in the past.

The question you posed was whether or not the market for the FFF was too small to be sustainable. Sustainability would require a sufficiently large group of people that would pay high enough prices to make the investment profitable. Sensor manufacture requires large production volumes to keep unit costs low. So, the smaller the market, the higher the unit cost (see Leica Q2). If the Sigma forum had hundreds or thousands of members saying they might buy the camera, that would provide more information than if it is five or six people, who have self-selected as particularly ardent fans, and have no idea how much the camera would cost.

Hey hey. Look. Sensors obviously don't cost that much to manufacture, or Sigma (and others) wouldn't sell cameras for well under $1,000. Obviously the sensor itself is only part of the cost of a camera that sells for well under $1,000. By deduction one can assume that a full-frame sensor would play by the same rules, so it might be three times as expensive, because of its larger size and lower yield. If the actual cost of a camera that retails for $700 is $400 (not including cost of warehousing, accounting, marketing and sales), then the cost of the sensor in that camera was likely less than $300. A sensor that costs three times as much would likely be well under $1,000 in this case. Now that does not mean the FFF camera can be sold for just $700 plus $1,000 for its more expensive sensor, because margins climb as costs climb. If a camera that retails for $700 has a margin of $250, then we can assume a margin of approximately 30%, or a markup of about 50%. If the camera costs $400, but a newer, more expensive sensor to be put into a similar camera costs $1,000 then the resulting camera cost would likelybe at least $1,400. Let's say it will cost $1,500 (a round number), to cover a portion of the extra development time and expense, plus the cost of inflation, etc. With a markup of about half that we're approaching Sigma fp L territory (for the price level). Could Sigma sell the FFF for $2,500? I think that's likely, but frankly I think they should price it higher, because it will be such a unique camera. I also want them to add a few features, like an articulating tilt screen and Wi-Fi, so $3,499 is where I think they should price it at first, and then they can put it on sale for $2,995 from time to time.

(and the CEO of Sigma) think otherwise.

The CEO of Sigma is developing the camera to honor the legacy of his father, it seems. Given that they have no idea of the ultimate costs of development or production, imputing sustainability is a stretch.