Erwin on Leicas future

sitemistic said:
So what do you do if you are Leica? You can't compete at the low or middle end with the Canon and Nikon Juggernauts, and your own sales tell you the limits of seiling in the high end rangefinder market.

I think you are left with trying to do what Lee was trying to do. Dress the pig up and put lipstick on it (metaphorically speaking, of course). But, it seems, even fewer people wearing Doc Martins are willing to buy $5,000 rangefinders then we gear heads.
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Yup, they're juggernauts. And if you don't want to compete with them at their game, just don't play their game. Do something different. Something that will differentiate yourself from the other players.
 
Porsche.

They don't sell millions of anything, they don't have cheap entry level models, and they are very profitable.

They don't have to be the only company that can do this.

It's time to move on, guys. :)
 
sitemistic said:
So what do you do if you are Leica? You can't compete at the low or middle end with the Canon and Nikon Juggernauts, and your own sales tell you the limits of seiling in the high end rangefinder market.

I think you are left with trying to do what Lee was trying to do. Dress the pig up and put lipstick on it (metaphorically speaking, of course). But, it seems, even fewer people wearing Doc Martins are willing to buy $5,000 rangefinders then we gear heads.
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Well they do seem rather boxed in. I noted earlier that they're doing all they can in the low-end market through their Panasonic relationship.

They don't have the capital or electronics expertise to go head-to-head with the big boys in the digital SLR market, even if they can hold a niche with a revamped R-system.

The high-end rangefinder market is a niche market only. An RD-1-alike lower-end body might gain them some "pull-through" to the M8 if they could hit the right price/quality trade-off, but I doubt it would justify the capital and R&D outlay and diversion.

Moving to medium-format (or larger, for that matter) doesn't fit their brand associations, and that ground is both rareified and occupied.

That doesn't seem to leave many options. I can only see two. One is to muddle along as they are doing. If they can survive doing that then, well, that's OK. If they can't survive like that, or if they want to do better than just OK then they have to go sideways, and escape the box by doing something nobody else is doing.

The only thing I can see there is a new small-ish (so "35mm-like") non-reflex camera system. I say "system" because you need the sales of lenses, the system lock-in that provides and the moving up through the price points that allows. Something like Mike Johnston's DMD fixed-lens camera might be part of the solution (perhaps providing some short-term income, as well as being worth doing for its own sake) but can't be the answer in any long term. I say "new" because, well, the M8 shows the market limitations of sticking with the M as your only option.

The only way I can see that as possible is if they can produce a really, really, really good viewfinder system that makes people want to adopt it. Something like we've never seen before. It can't be electronic because I don't think EVF technology is up to the mark yet, and Leica don't have the electronic nous to do it (AFAIK). Leica is supposed to be chock-full of brilliant optical engineers and designers. So perhaps they could come up with a new optical viewfinder system (coupled with an appropriate AF system, ancilliary LCD display, etc. etc.) that would just knock people's socks off, and show them a world quite different from the increasingly ordinary, just plain bad or completely absent optical viewfinders that seem to be the market direction these days (and, yes, I include many dSLRs). And quite different from and more modern than the M-system finders. Much though I like those myself, that's the past, not the future.

Possible? Perhaps. Likely? Who knows? I'd like to think the Gnomes of Solms are working on a new category-creating system even as we speak. I suspect, though, that its more likely a passing fantasy than any sort of reality.

...Mike
 
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Size really does matter

Size really does matter

sitemistic said:
nextreme, it matters if you are trying to sell enough high end digital rangefinder cameras to survive.
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Leica does not need to sell as many cameras as Canon, will not happen. Canon is building cameras that will be replaced in two to five years. Part of the Leica mystique is robustness, a camera that will take a licking and keep on ticking for years. What Leica must do is sell a camera that is built to last. These sales must generate enough money to return to it's owner enough money so he is happy to keep Leica being Leica and keep the people employed. Leica Camera is much smaller than Canon.

I believe that the second hand digital rangefinder market would be quite happy with 12mp five years down the road, perhaps even ten.

Robust + Simple + Elegant = Leica

More Features + More Features + More Features = Canon

B2
 
sitemistic said:
The 5D seems to be the tool of choice at most mid-sized newspapers in Texas, from what I hear and see at our Texas Press Association conferences. That and Canon HD video cameras.
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Did you notice how many people mention the 5D? The point is that it is a lot of a camera for the money, that is what Leica should do: A good value for money. Either a 4000US$ camera which does more than a EOS1MkII or a 2000US$ camera which does much more than a 5D, not a 8000US$ camera which perhaps, when is not out for service, does a little better than a 3000US$ camera!

GLF
 
Don't know too many of my colleagues working at mid sized papers who would want/use a digital rf for work but I know some at large market dailies that would jump on one. Got a buddy at a large wire that begins with R who uses an Rd-1 but would go Leica if they had 24x36 and not so expensive.

For those who travel on assignment, having a small, discreet camera that doesn't scream "big honkin' dslr" is not a minor matter. If I had one when I was in China, I wouldn't have had to use my coolpix in a few spots. I don't want people to notice me and a dslr just asks for attention in some quarters.

It's not about going toe to toe with a 5d/D3 etc..It's about the right tool and for some, a ff digital M camera would be the right tool. Nothing more than that really.
 
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It's ridiculous to think that any digital camera built today is going to have any "longevity" as a serious tool in the timeframe of ten or even five years. In twenty years, today's digital cameras will be taken as seriously as disposable cameras are now.

Today's cameras will be usable as a curiosity or something for hobbyists, but you or I cannot even imagine the advances that will be built into digital image making machines in a decade or so.

I'm not even sure they will look like "cameras" anymore. I think they'll capture not only still images but full video streams with startling resolution, dynamic range, and other embedded information that will be seen as basic requirements.

"Viewfinders" might be implanted in your head or will track your eyeballs.

Also, digital files, methods of compression and transmission and other factors will be totally different.

The processing power in an image device will rival or surpass mainframe computers of today.

The train has already left the station.


BillBingham2 said:
Leica does not need to sell as many cameras as Canon, will not happen. Canon is building cameras that will be replaced in two to five years. Part of the Leica mystique is robustness, a camera that will take a licking and keep on ticking for years. What Leica must do is sell a camera that is built to last. These sales must generate enough money to return to it's owner enough money so he is happy to keep Leica being Leica and keep the people employed. Leica Camera is much smaller than Canon.

I believe that the second hand digital rangefinder market would be quite happy with 12mp five years down the road, perhaps even ten.

Robust + Simple + Elegant = Leica

More Features + More Features + More Features = Canon

B2
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sitemistic said:
Porsche sold over 100,000 cars last year, Digital. If Leica had sold that many M8's, we wouldn't be having this discussion.
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Yes, I think I pointed out how many they sold. The point is, that's a trivial number compared to GM just like the M8 is trivial compared to two million Canon dslrs.
Volume does not imply profitability or the lack thereof.

The M8 is not Leicas only product. They make money on lenses, film models, and other digitals too. Who knows what those numbers are.
 
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Olsen said:
My neigbour (american, from Dallas, Texas) works for a Norwegian company, - periodically he works in New York and visits his old parents in Dallas. To fly across the Atlantic is cheap.
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My neighbor is Bill Gates. He wipes his back with 1000$ dollar bills and he likes to play golf with Noctilux lenses instead of Golf Balls.

Don't be fooled people, Noctiluxes are cheap.
 
M. Valdemar said:
It's ridiculous to think that any digital camera built today is going to have any "longevity" as a serious tool in the timeframe of ten or even five years. In twenty years, today's digital cameras will be taken as seriously as disposable cameras are now.
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I still have the first digital camera an Epson Photo PC, maxxed out with all the memory she would hold. It's in a box as I was hoping that Epson would offer a trade in on the R1D, ugh. My second digital camera I got is a D-100/C1 that I use as my EvilBay/Classified camera. It works fine and will continue for many years I hope.

I would point out that the Kodak DCS and Nikon DX (single digit) lines are holding their value quite well five years or more. A good digital camera will last 5 to 10 years. Many of the point and shoot digitals seem to last two years. A few (read very few) like the Ricoh GR-D I feel like they will last a lot longer (10 years I hope). I do not expect a digital Leica to last they way my old M6 will (it too has some electronics). But I do expect it to last as well as long as most Nikon D2s have and a bit longer

M. Valdemar said:
Today's cameras will be usable as a curiosity or something for hobbyists, but you or I cannot even imagine the advances that will be built into digital image making machines in a decade or so.

I'm not even sure they will look like "cameras" anymore. I think they'll capture not only still images but full video streams with startling resolution, dynamic range, and other embedded information that will be seen as basic requirements.

"Viewfinders" might be implanted in your head or will track your eyeballs.

Also, digital files, methods of compression and transmission and other factors will be totally different.

The processing power in an image device will rival or surpass mainframe computers of today.

The train has already left the station.
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I have enough problem with cell phone antennas being so close to my head (N9QFR says .... ..). While I know I am not the one who will imagine the next generation of stuff, there is no reason the old stuff should not be easier to work and last longer. I remember talking with chip engineers about how hard it was going to be to design motherboards when we crossed the 1 GHz barrier, not an issue fifteen years later. I was at the Apple Developers conference back in 1989 talking about wearable computers with folks in ATG (Advanced Technology Group). The iTouch iPod is much better than she dreamed and we've had wearable computers in some industries for over seven years.

I'm not a big fan of the swiss army knife approach to technology. While I hate my belt making me look too much like Batman, but having had a pager, phone, email system die really does put one in the dark. Bluetooth and WiFi seem to provide a lot in interesting capabilities for discrete devices working in harmony on a task rather than a single device with millions of functions to test and configure.

While I got rid of my falsie a few years back and got an implant (front tooth) that's as far as I want to go for fun. Just because we can does not mean we should.

B2 (;->
 
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sitemistic said:
My point is that it's easier to peddle Porsches' than M8's because its easier to pick up girls with the Porsche.
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Cannot you imagine how easy is to get girls with leica m? maybe it does something with our age?
 
Ben Franklin is over 50, bald and overweight, but he looks GREAT to women.

The more portraits of him you show women, the more they like you.
 
cme4brain said:
rangefinders are and always have been a specialty camera, appealing to a rabid few who will accept their limitations to achieve the incredible images (seen in the M series lenses).
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You must be a young 'un. RFs were not specialty cameras in the '50s and much of the '60s.
 
Gabriel M.A. said:
Erwin's grammatically-challenged musings aren't the gospel for me. He may be knowledgeable on some things, but he speaks the truth about anything as much as Dr. Phil on the topic of Treasury Bond exchange (making him the "authority" on something doesn't by osmosis make him the authority on the other)
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Agreed. I think he's Dutch, and though he writes English infinitely better than I write Nederlands, dat weet ik wel, I can't help but think "pompous ass" when I read his ramblings.
 
Still also believe that a big part of the solution for Leica would be to provide digital backs for the M series, thereby injecting fresh viability and life across the whole M product range. There will definitely be continuing demand for such a product as well as M photography, especially as digital advances into new delivery formats (eg mobile phones).
 
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