Alec

Looking forward to toothpicks by Nikon

What do you think about this after today's news re: AP switching to SONY? Still far-fetched or perhaps now a bit less so??

Conversation between management and engineers:
"ok that feature you said you could do that we told you NOT to do because there wasn't market demand, and also prohibited you from independently assessing market demand - you have to do it yesterday, because sony"

Case in point: to live-stream from my SONY camera, I need https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07P7Q1WYL

To live-steam from my Samsung Galaxy Android phone, I need nothing of the sort. This dynamic doesn't help the camera market - it is one thing when cameras are insufficiently far ahead of the smartphones in daytime image quality, but quite another when they are actually leaps behind in terms of connectivity.

Craig, that's sound reasoning. That said, besides gravitas/heritage/brand equity, Nikon has patents and a large customer base. SONY did really great with Minolta's camera and lens engineers (nearly all of whom had stayed on at SONY).

The main reasons the (camera) market is imploding is (1) smartphone cameras are more than adequate for consumers; (2) smartphone ecosystem is far more innovative; (3) smartphones enjoy standalone 24x7 network and cloud connectivity that cameras do not.

With 5G, cheap connectivity will no longer be the exclusive domain of smartphones. Even washing machines will come with a SIM slot. I don't expect cameras to go away any more than say quality microphones would go away for sound capture. But yes, for that to happen, camera makers would have to get off their butts and innovate like there's no tomorrow.

Hopefully SONY will buy them within the next 36 months. Given what they've been able to do with MINOLTA SLR & lens engineering heritage, if they add Nikon they'll be even more competitive.

ozturert, Toni, you both make good points. That said, there is always a sizable range between "what we can deliver with all-out effort" and "what management thinks we can get away with delivering for the time being". There are always things left in the back pocket, for reasons ranging from intra-company politics, to holding back until next generation thus saving per-generation R&D put in play, to controlling costs by managing down innovation and technological risks it brings along.

That's all speculation - but what IS undeniable, is that this camera offers a substantially greater per-generation innovation than several past generations. There are multiple reasons for it (ranging from general camera market losses to SONY's advance to finally covid-19). Regardless, I'm glad Canon is raising up to those challenges. Even being a SONY shooter - the market as a whole benefits.

Evidently it takes a 80% drop in profit for the company to consider giving users an actually innovative product, as opposed to minimally viable.

The diagram depicts DRAM built into the sensor. So it has nothing to do with the shortage of 3rd party stand-alone off-the-shelf DRAM chips.

I've bought their bundle, and am ok w/ paid upgrades so long as they don't require them in each subsequent year - and they won't 'Wait until [the upgrade] actually includes something you want to pay for,'

My grief with them is that the utility bundle should really be a single app. It's pretty ridiculous to guess whether to use jpeg2raw or gigapixel first on an image-by-image basis and their tech has admitted it may work better one way or the other depending on the image. Plus both tools have artifact reduction / sharpening stages that are redundant / may degrade image if applied more than once - yet undermine the core algorithms in the given stage if set to nothing.

Utility Bundle should be one app, with a single-stage processing, and the current utility bundle apps should be "skills" / sliders in that app. I'm ok with them being licensed separately besides a bundle (i.e. same pricing structure as now) if a client doesn't want to pay for what they don't use.

Hence the reason for my original comment, cosinaphile. Does this look similar?

https://www.konicaminolta.com/us-en/index.html

lancet I love A900. I am still operating two of them, w/vertical grips. I even have cute A900-shaped USB sticks (the "body" is the USB cap, and the "lens" is the USB stick that mounts on it). Those cameras don't know the meaning of the words "lock up", "reboot" or "not work". Just perfect.

But I got the A7III for the 4K video, and I like it plenty. Without the grip it's great on a slider and in other filming rigs. With the grip the ergonomics, to me, are very usable. Not worse than Nikon D800 in which I'd dabbled. Try setting up exposure bracketing on that thing. Being able to use my Minolta MD shift vfc lens and Nikon tilt-shift and Peleng fisheye on the A7III- is just wonderful. I love the adaptability of the mount. Ergonomics - to me at least - are workable. The important thing is what I can do with it.

cosinaphile Minolta has not had the resources to challenge Canon and Nikon - even before the lawsuit they were languishing, relatively speaking, as a distant, quirky 3rd choice. There's absolutely no denying that SONY's brand oomph and financial backing has given Minolta folks the backing they needed to take MORE risks and win.

Would I prefer an independent, strong, innovating Nikon to being acquired by SONY? Yes.

But better acquired while they still have institutional culture and strength, than ridden into the ground like so many hollow camera brands of years past that have not merely lost their qualified people to make anything, they lost their qualified people to dream. Think Kodak, Contax; think PanAm. I wouldn't want Nikon to become a hollow token like that.

Revenant, HowaboutRAW: my point of the comparison exactly. Nikon, like Minolta, has other lines of business outside photo cameras and lenses - which are more profitable and not suffering from the camera sector's systemic pressure. Like Minolta, Nikon may choose to off-load the camera business.

cosinaphile, lancet: Minolta has had, for decades, wonderful innovative cameras and lenses, but no budget to scale them up in a manner that would result in a positive feedback loop (more gear - more sales - more innovation - more demand). Rather, they were circling the drain with the quirky and brilliant engineering saving the day in spite of budgets falling behind and creating more and more handicap for the brand. SONY has given their camera designs (AND their entire camera division's workforce) a new home and the results speak for themselves.

I wouldn't want to see Nikon follow Kodak and rather hope it will follow Minolta (namely, will also be acquired by SONY)

Yes! And they could even have detents (at least the infinity one) if desired or a latch to firmly lock the distance setting (and its weather seal) in place.

Who says it needs to
(1) only be used narrowly as the action camera (as opposed to a compact robust camera for all sorts of uses), and
(2) be actively focused by folks using it as the action camera? They can leave it at the current default "infinity" setting, while other folks can also use "6ft/2m/portrait" and "closeup" settings.

Back-Bone is a company that modifies GoPro and other action cams, swapping the built-in fixed lens for a C-mount. This costs real money and voids the warranty, but the results in favor of being able to focus the lens are clear:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cie3426gWdk

Sorry?