fawate said:
What worries me is the fact that we are not seeing many new camera models being released recently. And without that continuous supply (and demand) of cameras, the use of film is expected to decline. In fact, I believe that the manufacturers don´t have much interest in pursuing the film camera market. They prefer to invest in digital models that are "obsolete" in just a few years than to make something that can be passed from one generation to another. It is sufficient to see what happens to Leica. In my belief, they make an excellent camera, but the used market does not help them much.
I agree with you. This has been a fundamental problem in the transition of traditional film-based camera companies to digital, and that is the basic understanding that a digital camera is more like a PC than it is like a film camera.
A film camera was an investment, and it was expected to work as part of a system and to fit the other parts you already had, and it was expected to have a certain lifespan and to be repairable. Manufacturers sold people on new cameras based on new features, such as AE, AF, and so on. Film cameras did not become 'obsolete' as long as there was film made for them. A 1964 Canon FX would mount and use the latest Canon FD glass, and vice-versa (with certain restraints). Same for Nikon, Minolta, Pentax, and so on.
Now, however, cameras are not like film cameras of old. Because their electronics are embedded within them and cannot be upgraded beyond the basic firmware upgrades to fix bugs, when a bigger or more sensitive sensor comes out, or a memory card with more capacity, or a faster on-board processor, the camera is obsolete.
This is the part that the traditional manufacturers did not get at first - there is no need to build cameras of transient value to the physical standards of film cameras. The first Kodak digital SLR cameras were huge hulding beasts built on Nikon and Canon flagship SLR models with the electronics added on. Monsters - very well made. But obsolete within a couple of years - yet the bodies were designed for a decade or more of use.
This represented a huge problem for consumers, who would not and could not spend tens of thousands on a camera that would be obsolete in a couple years.
So a paradigm shift was necessary. The manufacturers learned that they needed to build the hardware to a standard that was not 'decades' but 'five years' and 'three years' long. This helped them bring down costs to the point where they could sell a new digital SLR every three years to the people who want digital SLRs.
People do not complain that their PC is made of cheap metal. They don't complain that the plastic isn't designed to hold up over the long run. Very few use a PC even five years, let alone ten. It is understood that it is a commodity item, and you'll ditch it and buy another one every couple three years.
Cameras are a different world now. People do remember the good old days and complain that cameras are not built to those standards, but really, that's a bad business model.
This was something I mentioned when Leica came out with their Modul-R digital back (do they still sell those?). Great Leica build quality - not a great idea. A digital back designed to last 20 years when the technology will be obsolete in two years is just a fail condition. Lose, lose. Leica did not 'get it'.
It would appear that Leica is now trying to strike a compromise - by making a high-quality digital M that you can scoop the guts out of every few years and upgrade. Hmmm. I see the logic, and there is no denying that Leica buyers are different than typical camera buyers, but I just don't know if this model will work for them.
Leica's problem is that there may be no business model that will work for them. They just don't make commodity items, but that's where the market is now.
They may end up making more money licensing their name to Panasonic as they do now. Hard to say.
