"Dedicated" Digicams: Is The Cliff In Sight?

[amateriat]

Just saw this on the Times site, and I'm wondering how close the tipping point is where small (and not-so-small) digital cameras and camcorders sart their slow, steady dive into insignificance. That'll (hopefully) leave us with the higher-end stuff, but given all the palaver about the "death of print", how long'll that market hold on?

Film? That train will reach the end of the line whenever it gets there. I'm still on board, in the dining car, ordering a three-course of Portra, BW400CN, and a side order of Tri-X, and a good bottle of Cabernet...


- Barrett

 

[Incitatus]

Point and shoot digital might be on the way out. I read an article lately saying that dslr's and micro 4/3 were becoming more popular. As long as people want to be able to take more than just snap shots we'll be alright.

 

[Ducky]

I'm due for a cellphone upgrade. I think I'll take a good look at the camera function.

 

[Pickett Wilson]

I've always avoided multifunction devices because if you lose one function, you lose them all. If your P&S camera, your MP3 player, video player, game machine and telephone are all in one device and it takes a bath at the beach, you are screwed. I'll keep my individual devices, thanks.

 

[amateriat]

Pickett: Trouble is, you have to go far and wide to find, for example, a mobile phone that doesn't have a camera built-in. Given that there are some buildings in Gotham where camera-phones are still verboten, this is rather surprising.

I still prefer my cameras to be cameras, and little (if anything) else. That sentiment, of course, won't stop this sensor from getting stuffed into some near-future smartphone du jour and sold by the container-load. As long ass I can still work in my preferred manner, I don't care.


- Barrett

 

[Tuolumne]

I just got an iPhone. Believe me, the camera is a mere toy compared to the crudest dedicated P&S camera out there.

/T

 

[bmattock]

Enthusiasts make basic assumptions which are always wrong.

We presume that people who buy and use cell phone cameras are interested in making better photos. They're not.

We presume that because digicams are less capable than more advanced cameras, people will move up to get better photos. They won't.

People, and by that I mean the mass of consumers who merely want to record a photo of their college buddies throwing up off the balcony at the last house party, do not want, nor will they pay for, anything capable of producing high-quality photographs. They will only pay for convenience, and the quality of the image comes a distant second.

We are enthusiasts. We tend to put our values on other people. But we're not like most consumers who buy cameras, and our values are radically different from theirs.

Cell phones will continue to eat into digicam market share because it's one less thing for a suburban soccer mom or brain-damaged college student to carry around. If the image is somewhat recognizable, that's good enough for them.

A vanishingly small percentage of general consumers ever 'move up' to better cameras, and when they do, it's often just a case of keeping up with the Jones', not because they give a rat's patoot about the photographs.

The lowest common denominator rules. That's why the last film cameras being sold are single-use snapshot cameras, because that's all typical consumers want (if they can't afford an el cheapo digital).

It doesn't matter how crappy it is. It only matters how convenient it is.

 

[murrayb53]

There has always been a warm spot in a for a compact "pocket" camera, film or digital. Cell phones don't hit the spot. Little cameras won't be exiting any time soon.

 

[bmattock]

Enthusiasts always think they're the market. You're not the market.

 

[amateriat]

Bill: Brutally frank as usual, and correct.

Now I'm gonna load a roll in the Contax and get some air. 🙂


- Barrett

 

[Becoming]

Enthusiasts always think they're the market. You're not the market.

Hell yeah.

 

[Al Patterson]

There has always been a warm spot in a for a compact "pocket" camera, film or digital. Cell phones don't hit the spot. Little cameras won't be exiting any time soon.

I'd be happy with a decent 5 megapixel camera in a cell phone that I could carry in my pocket. If I want better pictures, I still have a DSLR, a digital P&DS, a pair of SLRs, a bunch of rangefinders and a TLR. Don't overlook the utility of a small camera you can take everywhere.

(Read what Bill says, as he usually says it better than most...)