Elias

Here's an idea for Apple to take over the lower-end of the cinema market: Now that the iPhone 15 Pro/Max have USB-C ports, how about creating an Apple standard to connect external lenses and sensors to the iPhone?

This might seem dumb to do, but here's where it gets interesting: The makers of these third-party accessories now wouldn't have to deal with user interface issues (the iPhone and third-party camera apps would take care of that), or storage issues (the iPhone would handle that), or video/audio encoding issues (the iPhone would also handle that). Essentially, the iPhone would become an add-on to these third-party accessories where the iPhone does all the heavy software lifting, and the hardware would only be in charge or sending the image (lens) and storing it (sensor). The sensor would send data to the iPhone as a standardize RAW stream which Apple would then convert on the fly to whatever format is needed.

This would reduce the cost of such a device (minus the lens) to only a few hundred dollars (under US$500 or even US$300 is entirely posible) and all you'd need to supply is the lens (say, Micro Four Thirds, Canon, L, etc).

Heck, Apple itself could provide such an adapter and then it's up to you to simply provide the lens. Let's call it the "iPhone Professional Camera Kit", which would also come with HDMI output, XLR inputs, Timecode, etc. And you could use am iPad mini (or any iPad) if you want a larger monitor.

 

I saw the movie on a "normal" theater as we don't have an IMAX nearby, and the experience was amazing.

About the only criticism I have for the movie is that the dialog is constant. There is rarely a moment we get to rest. It feels like those songs where the artist wants to attach lyrics to every single note of the song from beginning to end.

However, besides that, the movie is well worth seeing, and I'm pretty sure it will get at least 6 or 7 Oscar nominations and probably will end up winning most (if not all) of those.

Without a doubt one of the best of Nolan's movies (and definitely way better than Tenet).

I actually have to agree with Andrew 90% of the way (I'll explain my other 10% in a bit, below).

To start with, what I love about EOSHD is Andrew's honesty. He writes his reviews from a real-world perspective, and if he hurts anyone's feelings by telling the truth so be it (and btw, if camera manufacturers were smarter, they would pay attention to Andrew and actually provide interviews and honest respondes which would gain the favoritism of people like me).

I run my blog and social media accounts in a similar way and it's clear that being honest is not a good attention-grabber for advertisers who want you to only talk about the great things their products offer and sweep under the carpet the bad things.

I also greatly appreciate that at EOSHD I get the opinion from someone who actually uses gear to do real-world stuff. More often than once you buy stuff which sounds great on paper but when you try it it simply sucks for whatever reason (usability, quality, durability, expandability, simplicity, etc). And the problem (for advertisers and manufacturers) is that the truth is that most of the time you don't need all the bells and whistles and attention-grabbing features they advertise, they are designed to make you upgrade your gear and spend more cash.

Having said all that however (here comes the 10%) I think we need those guys who buy gear every year (and thus, also the paid bloggers and youtubers) as they provide the necessary financial incentives for these companies to continue adding features and competing in the market on a continuous basis. If that had not been the case we'd still be using cameras with technologies from 10 years ago with FullHD sensors and no image stabilization.

So bottom line, I think there's space for both sides. We need the B.S. celebrities in order to buy stuff, so that every few years the artistic community can upgrade to truly better equipment that could make a difference in their work.

I want to add some thoughts to Andrew's (with which I mostly agree): At least among the group of photographers and videographers that I know, the main reason they buy m43 or APS-C cameras is not because of the look of the smaller sensor, or even because of their size or weight, but rather because of cost.

If it was up to most of my friends, they'd be using full-frame cameras all the time. As a matter of fact, many of them just abandones the GHx line in favor of the new lower-cost Canon, Nikon and Sony mirrorless cameras.

So as the price war keeps raging, my guess is that eventually the m43 format will disappear or become a much smaller niche. It's a pity though, as their sizes and weight makes them wonderful tools for certain scenarios (for artistic and/or practical reasons).

The good news is that at least from a creative standpoint we will be able to continue using crop sizes within full-frame sensors to get things done, although many lenses will need to be adapted obviously.

One aspect that is driving so many of us nuts these days in cinema (both for theater and streaming serials) is the excess of political correctness. It seems film studios have a Rule Book which requires every new series or movie to have a quota of actors which represent white people, black people, hispanic people, oriental-looking people, a woman, someone in the LGBT+ community, someone with some physical handicap, etc.

This is simply ridiculous, the real world does not function like this and it drives me (and it seems, most of my friends and family) mad.

And the worst is that if someone complains that James Bond should be played by a British White Male (as it was conceived by its author) instead of an American Black Female, we're called racists. This is getting ridiculously out of hand...

I'd argue that digital camera sales have not slowed down, and actually speeded up. And the reason is that this graph is not taking into account cellphone cameras, which for all intent and purposes *are* digital camera replacements. I'd even go so far as to predict that the decline in sales of non-cellphone digital cameras have a direct relationship with the increase in sales of cellphone digital cameras.

Bottom line: That graph does not tell us much as it is imcomplete.

There is no doubt this is one incredibly amazing camera, and if any vendor could manage to sell something similar under $2,000, they’d own the market.

But at this price point this is way out of most people’s pockets and squarely into the Pro territory it is obviously aimed at.

I wonder if the market is ripe for a new vendor to come in and do something great at an irresistible price point (RED was my hope for that a few years back, then BlackMagic Design)...

Following up on my first comment at the beginning on this thread, there's another larger issue at play here which is an issue that has greatly affected the advertisement industry as well...

It so happens that not too long ago advertising for anyone would be an usually very expensive proposition, specially if you wanted to advertise on popular TV, Radio or print media. And the main reason this was accepted is because there was no way to reliably determine the effectiveness of the ads. This was a business mostly running on faith, and the power was on the side of the advertising agencies and channels, not on the companies and people who wanted to advertise.

As the internet and social media took off, it became obvious that you could reach a much larger amount of people with a much smaller budget, and directly targeting your users who are most likely to buy, all with a simple app (like Instagram). The money now went to the creative people creating the ads.

Similarly, in the movie world, people have been spending very large amounts of money going to movie theaters for the simple reason that there was not other choice. I understand that some of us love the movie-going experience (so long as it's a real good theater with a good movie), but the reality is that most people would rather stay at home to watch it from the confort of their sofas and beds.

Some might object to this saying things like "it defeats the purpose of enjoying a movie", but who are we to judge how other people wish to spend their time? Saying stuff like that is analogous to us trying to dictate if gay people should marry and live together or not: it is not our business to decide how people decide to live their lives. Sure, some Nolans and Tarantinos (two of my all-time favorite directors, btw) might want their creations to be seen on an IMAX screen with Atmos sound, but that's not what most people want.

Just last night I watched at home a real nice movie on my 75" HDR TV, and the sight was glorious, a much better experience than most theaters near where I live, and I got to eat whatever I wanted while watching, all in the confort of my underpants. And like me, there are countless other very valid reasons why people rather watch a movie at home, like for example:

1. Parents with small kids who don't have a nanny to watch over them while they go out to the movies.

2. Couples who rather have a private meeting while watching a movie.

3. People who simply can't afford the very high expense of going to a movie theater nowadays, where you have to factor in the high ticket prices, the exorbitant prices of snacks, transportation costs, etc.

4. People who simply live far from movie theaters (remember folks, hundreds of millions of people don't have access to a close by or decent movie theater).

5. People who simply have little time and prefer to watch the movie at home in whatever little time they have.

After saying all that, and going back to the advertising industry example, we're entering a new era in movie watching, an era where the movie industry won't be able to charge the customary high prices to consumers, an era where prices will need to come down to a more balanced level. This will definitely be an issue for huge blockbusters, but it will also encourage a larger participation of filmmakers to get in the game, and the more people get into the film industry the more chances of discovering new Nolans and Tarantinos we will have, and organically the quality of film productions will go up.

And a final word: We don't need US$100M-plus budgets to create great movies. Look at classics like Pulp Fiction and Leon: The Professional, these were productions made with a fraction of a typical high-gross movie budget. And if you prefer movies like Avengers, technology is advancing so fast that soon we'll be able to make an Avengers-like movie at a 10th of the cost (just look at the new technologies being used to produce The Mandalorian).

I for one, think that this is one of the best news that have reached us in decades (ever since the advent of IMAX and HDTV ), and time will tell if we were right or not...

Andrew,

I usually agree with most of what you publish, but this time I have to disagree, for the following reasons:

1. This move will encourage people to buy projectors, big-screen TV and audio systems for their homes. That unto itself if a big win for the industry as a whole. People will be more aware of the artistic aspect of movies by watching them on bigger screens and with better audio. This would also encourage the use of HDR.

2. Consumers should decide how they want to consume content, not studios o directors. Do note that I actually fall in the group of movie fans who prefers the theater experience (specially IMAX), but my folks and most of my friends don't think like me, and they also should be heard and decide how to spend their money.

3. Math is on the consumer side: A 75" TV a few feet away from you looks to the human eye as large as a bug movie screen because it covers a similar are of your field of vision.

4. In most markets, movie screens are usually crap save for a few places. At least in the latinamerican world, it's common to watch movies on screens with very low lumens, dark images, crappy sound, etc. We get a better experience at home in these markets. If Nolan ever visited one of these theaters he would get a heart attach and immediately understand that in these markets his movies look better at home.

5. The mp3 industry learned a huge lesson which I think carries over to movies: There was a time when most digital music was pirated, but then affordable music streaming services started popping up and now most people pay for their music.

6. I disagree that this will hurt movie bottom lines in the long term. The more people have access to same-day releases, the more people will be willing to legally pay for movies. In a small poll I ran with friends and family, most of them would pay US$20 bucks to see the latest James Bond film for example. Once people get used to it, I think most filmmakers could make *more* money than before, specially once you factor out all the savings they will get on promotion and distribution. About the only cases where people might stand to make less money us for huge blockbusters like Avengers or Star Wars, but that's a casualty of war.

7. As for piracy, whoever uses the argument that people will get access to high-quality version of movies the day after they are released online is missing the point entirely: Most people who pirate movies today are willing to see bad quality versions of these movies because what they care about is not really how good the movie looks (not saying that it is not important), but rather they care about being able to see the movie *itself* in the first place. Quality of content vs quality of imagery. If the industry wants to fight piracy they need to fight it by understanding this and releasing their movies on the exact same day on all markets worldwide so that people rush to pay to see it. They also should make these release affordable. I think US$10 is an ideal price to watch a new release, and US$20 is pushing it a bit for a blockbuster.

Bottom line: I think long-term this will be seen as a great success for the industry, and the numbers will show it 5 years from now.

21 hours ago, John Matthews said:

I think it's important to note that although ARM is making these chips for Apple, they are still Apple designed (1000+ engineers only for that).

Actually, a correction: ARM is not making these chips for Apple. ARM actually doesn't make chips at all, they license their designs in two distinct ways.

The first way is licensing a full design of an actual chip, so all someone like HTC or LG has to do is pay the licensing rights, send the design to a Fab (where chips are built) and they are done.

The second (and much less common way) is that they license what's called an "ISA" (Instruction Set Architecture), which is basically (to put it simply) the words/instructions that the "language" of an ARM architecture speaks, and then someone like Apple can license this ISA and then design and implement its own chips designs *from scratch* implementing the ISA, and this is where things get interesting as Apple has world-class leading-edge engineers designing from ground zero its own chips. So although Apple's chips are "ARM-based", they are not the generic chips most other manufacturers buy, and this is where Apple shines. A great thing about this approach (which as you can imagine, is very expensive) is that Apple can modify the chip as fit, and add all the extra circuitry to it to optimize it for specific things (like macOS acceleration, encryption in real-time, video encoding and decoding, Machine Learning, etc).

Bottom line: Even if you try to compare two ARM-derived chips running at the same frequency between say a generic Android device and an Apple-designed one, it is highly-likely that Apple's chips will be more efficient in real-world terms.

For those interested in this topic I wrote a lengthly article about Apple Silicon. I offer below the original link (in Spanish) and the Google-translated version of it in english (the translation is surprisingly good):

http://eliax.com/index.cfm?post_id=11569

https://translate.google.com/translate?sl=es&tl=en&u=http%3A%2F%2Feliax.com%2Findex.cfm%3Fpost_id%3D11569

Hope that explains a bit what's going on here (as a Microprocessor Engineer and Computer Scientist I know a bit about these things and the industry as a whole, and love to share my knowledge in layman terms).

What I want from next year's "M2" machines:

1. FaceID. This would be even more useful on a Laptop that on a phone or tablet, and would save us tons of time everyday. This is a no-brainer to add and I'm sure support is already there on the M1 chips (as it has all the A-series circuits also). I'm also pretty sure that we will see this sooner rather than later.

2. More RAM. A significant segment of the Pro market needs at least 32GB of RAM, specially if they will be editing 8k files...

3. Apple please just go ahead and merge macOS and iOS/iPadOS into "appleOS" so we could run the same apps on iPads as well (and heck, even iPhones with external keyboard, mouse and display). They are already capable of doing so, and it'd be great to be able to do some tasks on these devices (maybe with the help of an external keyboard and mouse). This would be useful for a wide industry range (I'd use my iPad Pro in a blink to do programming jobs on Visual Studio Code for example).

13 hours ago, independent said:

So all three Macs share the same M1 chip...wouldn't they all perform roughly the same? 

Also, sad to see the Mac Mini top out at only 16GB of ram and drop the 10-bit gigabit ethernet. 

Actually (a microprocessor engineer talking here), not really. Let me explain briefly...

The fact that all 3 machines use the same chip does not mean that they will perform the same, as Apple is probably targeting different performance characteristics and scenarios for each one.

Note that Apple in the new system specs does not mention anything about how fast these chips run on each machine (i.e., "1.8Ghz", "3.1 Ghz", etc), which should provide a clue that these systems use either a dynamic frequency or a couple of pre-set frequencies to run at, depending on the machine and the workload.

On the MacBook Air for example, most likely you will be running most of the time on the high-efficiency cores, and use the high-performance cores only casually, but once it gets too hot the system will probably return to the less-performant higher-energy-efficiency cores (while continue doing work on the MacBook Pro due to the built-in fans).

Another thing Apple could do on the Pro is allow all 8 cores at once, while on the Air allow only 4 at a time depending on usage (again, restricted by thermal characteristics).

Botton line: For short runs all these machines would probably offer similar performance characteristics, but as you get into more compute-intensive runs you'd probably notice the Pro machines pulling ahead in the long run.

I, like you, am very excited about the prospects of this M1 family of chips. If this is the first version I can't wait to see what we'll see down the line a couple of years down the line.

As for Hackintosh, there's some hope on one side of the fence as I have the gut feeling that this will push the non-Apple PC industry to adopt ARM in the form of Windows for ARM (Linux is already there but most enthusiasts still use x86 hardware). And yes, I know Microsoft already tried to come up with a Windows version for ARM tablets (it failed miserably) but my guess is that Apple will now push Microsoft to transition the full-blown Windows to ARM eventually. When that happens the Hackintosh world would have some hope. However, on the other side of the fence, I doubt this will help the Hackintosh community as now that Apple controls its own environment fully it is highly unlikely that it will continue integrating functionality on its M-series chips that will simply not be available on generic ARM chips down the road. So for most purposes this is truly the end for the Hackintosh community.

However, from another point of view there are some good news here: The new Mac mini at just US$699 with the M1 chip will probably get you more performance than what you could get from a generic PC box at the same price, so in the end you might end up with a more performant system at a lower price than by trying to build it yourself. This is, of course, assuming that Apple will not try to increase the entry-level point to its system.

And one more thing: If you think about it, the M-series and the A-series will very likely be (most likely already are) binary-compatible, so one thing the Hackintosh community could turn its attention to is on hacking low-cost iPads to turn them into Hackintoch running macOS. Just sayin'... 😉

23 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Do we really want to end up with a dominant Sony and their soulless shooting experience, boring ergonomics, and Canon with their marketing games?

Just those two?

Rather than do something genuinely interesting in the APS-C market like Fuji has done with their rangefinder style mirrorless cameras, Sony has simply slapped a full frame sensor in one of the most unergonomic and boring bodies, it's the most unimaginative, most risk averse way to kill the crop sensor market I've ever seen.

 

I don't think this move by Sony will kill the likes of Fuji (or Panasonic for that matter) and instead will keep pushing them to innovate and lower prices for us all while providing us with better cameras.

However I do agree with you in some of the things you're saying, like for example the fact that today other brands provide a better value, although this would depend on if you're a new user or an existing user. If you're already invested on Sony glass then this camera would be a great one to carry around for light work of your family trips, but if you're new you're better off buying a Fuji or Panasonic probably.

On a side note, as much as I appreciate the APS-C format (I have tried three times over the past 4 years to get an APS-C camera for my travels) specially for video (like with a Speedbooster) the bottom line is that I personally can't get over the fact that full-frame sensors provide much less noise on photographs, but the framing is just way nicer, so I'm all happy to see new small form-factor cameras coming into the market with full-frame sensor. I think that once we cross the "under US$999" price there will be no turning back and the APS-C market will dramatically decrease in size (at least among Pros and knowledgeable enthusiasts like me). There's of course the lens cost (which is what will keep many on the APS-C front for a while) but that's also changing with newer lens entries from Sigma and the likes.

As for my biggest wish: A truly universal lens mount to allow us to mix and match bodies.

Cheers!

Hi Andrew,

This would be the very first time ever that I disagree with you. Let me explain why:

1. In a free market if a product does not meet user's expectation and a better alternative shows up the market will balance itself out. If there is too much competition prices will come down. If the prices hurt producers some will die and the market will balance itself out again. In the end we all win as we'll end up with better spec'ed cameras at lower prices.

2. It's best to eat your own lunch rather than having someone else come eat it for you. I think this is a decent move from Sony to protect itself from the likes like Fuji in this segment (should they decide to come into the market with a compact full-frame alternative. And it's better to get a consumer to invest into a lower-margin Sony camera than spending the money on a competitor. And finally if someone decides to go for this camera instead of an A7III is because they know what they're into and wanted a lower price option with similar features, and again it's best for Sony to grab that money rather than losing it to someone else.

3. There is a specific user-case for this camera: People who know and understand the value of a full-frame sensor, but who do not want to carry around a massive camera with them, and also have the spare money to buy such a camera (maybe as a second camera). I aaaaaalmost fall in that category but I don't want to pay US$2,000 for it. Had this camera been US$999 I'd have placed my order right away and never look back (and probably later spend a lot of money on lenses, maybe even selling part of my huge Canon collection of lenses).

Bottom line: This camera is not for everyone, but competition and experimentation is a good thing IMHO.

Cheers and keep the good work.

One question Andrew: Have you tried resetting the camera after it says it overheats just to test if this resets the internal overheat timers? Do note though that if this does not reset the times that this could mean that they save the state to non-volatile memory so we as consumers cannot get around the crippled firmware.

If Canon indeed did this on purpose I will be another one joining the camp of users jumping ship (probably to Sony or maybe going back to Nikon).

This is not the way a company should treat its customer base. We pay dearly with our hard-earned cash just to be sold an obviously defective product.

And do note that I’m an engineer by trade and this issue of not using any thermal solution in the CPU is either a monumental engineering error (which should *not* have happened as this is a basic error not event a recently-graduated engineer would do) which should result in Canon firing whoever is behind these stupid designs, or something very fishy which smells to having been done on purpose, in which case Canon deserves to be sued.

If anyone at Canon cares about this whole issue they very least they should do is take this seriously and urgently start coming up with a solution and stop the release of these cameras. It'd also be nice of them to acknowledge that what Andrew is doing is actually *helping* Canon long-term.

And let's be clear everyone: Bloggers and Influencers *do* get paid either directly or indirectly to talk nice about company products (I was offered a few times, and declined every time), and in other cases (like with the DPreview "experts") they simply lack the technical know-how to do a proper review.

And like Andrew, I was all set to place my order, but this overheating issue is ridiculous and indeed it wouldn't surprise me if Canon gets a lawsuit if they release the cameras in their current form.

Huge bummer.

I was *extremely* excited about these new cameras but this overheating issue basically makes them worthless to the professional (or even prosumer) user.

On the future R5 Mark II (or R5 Rev B) they should really put active cooling in there along with vents (they don't even to be active all the time, only when temperature reaches a certain threshold).

Another option: Make your chips more energy efficient by going to a lower nm size (say 5nm like Apple, or at the very least 7nm). Going this route will definitely hit margins but considering how expensive these cameras are sold I'm pretty sure Canon is already making some good money on them, and beside whatever margins they "lose" they will make up for it by selling more cameras (as it is, I strongly doubt that serious videographers will buy this; this camera "as is" right now will only attract the still photography market, or the hobbyist market who has the money and time to spare to let the camera cool down).

If you ever decide to launch a hobbist camera project, I'd be willing to contribute some of my free time to designing the user interface module.

I've been an advocate of real simple UIs (User Interfaces), however with a balance of the things you need most often right at your fingertips at all times. Today I mostly don't like any of the user interfaces on any of the usual suspects in the camera business (Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, etc), and I think this could be much improved if these manufacturers gave us tools to create our own user interfaces and be able to share them with anyone else; heck, it could be something as simple as designing the UI with HTML, CSS and/or JSON and then providing javascript hooks into the actual functions, something similar to this:

camera.setISO(800);

camera.setSpeed(50);

camera.setApperture(lens.getMaximumApperture());

timeToShoot = 300;

camera.shootVideo(timeToShoot);

etc

On 3/26/2020 at 10:45 PM, Andrew Reid said:

Here we go again

I'm not banning free speech. I'm trying to increase the quality of speech on this forum, which is after all a knowledge-base that is supposed to be of use to people and to help people.

It is not yours to abuse for a political agenda.

You are asked to leave.

Totally agree with you Andrew.

People should understand that posting in *your* forum is a *privilege* and *NOT* a "right". And just like when you visit someone's house you must show respect (even if you don't agree with them).

Besides, I'm pretty sure that no one (including Andrew) will ban anyone so long as they (1) follow the conversation topic, and (2) express themselves in a respectful manner with constructive criticism (I have seen myself that here many times over the years).

On a side note, we all in the community hope that you're safe (whenever you are right now). Don't hesitate to ask for help in a blog post if things get messy, I'd personally help with anything I can.

I'm a long-time Canon user and I decided to give them one more chance with the Canon EOS RP. I like the camera for stills (but being Canon, I feel in many aspects I gave a step back from my Canon 6D Mark II), but all these video restrictions drive my mad. So I'm waiting to see what they come up with next. The only reason I'm still in the Canon camp is their lenses, but if their next-gen mid-level cameras don't deliver on video as well a higher dynamic stills range, I'm switching to either Sony or Nikon's Z line (still waiting for more lenses there).

And like many have said, Canon is only generating ill-will against themselves with these stupid upper-management-level decisions. Their attitude is basically this: "Do not worry, remove all the features to force them to buy our more expensive gear, after all they will stay with us because of their large investment in lenses". Well, everything has a limit and soon I'll start figuring out how to get rid of all my Canon glass, or even better, adapt it to other mounts...

You summed it all up when you said "Adobe is setting itself up for a migration of users, the size the software world has never seen before", and that is *exactly* what will happen if Adobe does not change their greedy way of treating customers.

I do not know of *one* Adobe CC/Cloud user who has not asked me at least once what other choices they have to migrate from the monthly subscription fee. Everyone is looking at options and many developers and companies are starting to see an opportunity here (Procreate is one tool that has replaced my Photoshop usage by 98% for example), and we it arrives (and if it delivers on the basics, but it will happen sooner or later) Adobe will be in trouble sooner than it thinks and it will be too late for them to recover, as there is a lot of bad word of mouth regarding their greediness and they're turning into the old Microsoft everyone hated but had no choice to use.

I think US$20 a month to use all their offerings should be enough (as most people do not use not even 1% of what they offer), and if they do something along $20/month for everything, they'd get about 10 times more users signed up as millions of users are pirating their offerings left and right because they either can't afford the expense or because they have no choice (some customers demand the use of Adobe software) or because they simply think it's unfair the pricing scheme.

Here's one more thing that's needed: Depth Information.

It amazes me that I get depth information from an iPhone but can't get it from my $3,000-dollar DSLR or Mirrorless cameras.

Camera manufacturers in general should get on the depth-information bandwagon because it simply is *very* useful and something that cellphones are getting very good at.

From a photographer's perspective it allows us to re-light a photo *after* it has been captured, which I use creatively to great effect on my iPhone.

And from a cinematographer's perspective it can aid on doing green-screen effects *without* a green screen.

Computational photography can be very useful in the DSLR/Mirrorless market, but it seems that camera manufacturers are lacking people with vision on where to drive the industry forward.

And btw, I actually have done a couple of jobs using my iPhone which I'd rather have done otherwise on my large camera bodies with larger sensors, which is a great example of why cellphones are eating away slowly on camera sales. The camera manufacturer dinosaurs have to wake up or die.

A message for Nikon (and particularly Canon, and all DSLR/Mirrorless manufacturers):

Guys, seriously? Are you aware that there exists something called "The Internet"? It's pretty cool and thanks to things like "blogs" or "social media" and tons of other "review sites" and "forums" the community of professional and enthusiasts have information in mere seconds at their fingertips.

You might want to impress us with flashy press releases, amazing specs, and blah blah blah, but nowadays we know better.

We know when you're charging us way too much money. We know when your specs do not deliver. We know when you're simply B.S. us.

So, quit it. Stop it. Look at what Blackmagic is doing, look at what Sigma is doing. Instead of removing features they know we want (in order to push us to buy higher-end products) they simply deliver what we want.

Read that again: "They deliver what the customers want". It's Capitalism at its best. And nowadays with so much information around we know what we want.

In my personal case, I aaaaaalmost bought a Nikon Z6, until I saw the lens lineup situation, and the promised RAW update situation (note that I *might* still buy one now that some decent lens adaptors for other brands are popping up, and once Nikon decides to create a firmware update to write RAW directly to XQD), but I'm full of Canon glass (they know they got me by the balls with all that investment, which is why their lackbuster attempt with the EOS RP) but I'm definitely starting to see Blackmagic (BRAW is truly awesome and revolutionary) and even some of Sony's offering with nicer eyes, specially now that I can adapt my Canon EF glass to them...

So please, stop treating us like ignorant children and show a little more respect and appreciation for your customer base. We feed you and pay your bills. The market today is not what it was 10 years ago. So if you want to be successful long-term stop making these stupid decisions and start delivering equipment with 4K 120fps, global shutter, higher dynamic range, RAW to a local card or the very least an external SSD (and looks at BRAW, is licensing-free), decent audio inputs and headphone jack, zebra stripes, focus peaking, fast auto-focus (for those who need it), simple manual controls, a nice and simple touch-base interface, a flexible LCD (like on the EOS RP), and make it all under US$2,000 and you will not know what to do with all the money you will make and all the market share you will steal from your competitors.

It doesn't take a genius to figure all this out (and yes, I know there are costs associated with all this but you need to look at the bigger picture here, I'm a computer engineer by trade and know a thing or two about sales and marketing as well, having worked with many top-billing companies, so I know a thing or two of what goes on behind the scenes).

So, thank you for reading,

- A deserving customer (or maybe soon an ex-customer, or a possible new customer, your choice)