# LaForet: Dedicated Cameras are Coming to an End for all but PROS



## dolina (Feb 26, 2015)

I am sharing this on every photo forum I am a member of as we are either working or hobbyist photographer who have probably bought a mirrorless/SLR camera. I find it a fun topic to talk about, assuming you aren't selling these still cameras.

Vincent LaForet was the first to promote the coming of HD video onto SLRs making his thoughts on the ongoing decline of still cameras have weight.

Without further adieu read this blog post below.

Prediction The Age of the Standalone Still Camera is Coming to an End for all but PROS Vincent Laforet s Blog

Note to Vincent: Get someone to proof read for you. 

This video below expounds LaForet's thoughts with some rounded numbers






Here are some more precise numbers to supplement the blog and video.

http://lensvid.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/Infographic-1920-1200-ver-2-0.jpg

Source: LensVid Exclusive What Happened to the Photography Industry in 2013 - LensVid.comLensVid.com

Production, Shipment of Digital Still Cameras  in 2014

42.8 million - still cameras covering point & shoots, mirrorless and SLRs
- 29.28 million point & shoots
- 3.17 million mirrorless
- 10.32 million SLRs

Production, Shipment of Digital Still Cameras  in 2013

61.0 million - still cameras covering point & shoots, mirrorless and SLRs
- 44.19 million point & shoots
- 3.18 million mirrorless
- 13.64 million SLRs

Production, Shipment of Interchangeable Lenses in 2014

22.3 million lenses covering crop & full frame
- 5.7 million full frame lenses
- 16.6 million crop lenses

Production, Shipment of Interchangeable Lenses in 2013

25.88 million22.3 million lenses covering crop & full frame
- 6.01 million full frame lenses
- 19.87 million crop lenses

vs

1.3 billion smartphones shipped in 2014

Of which 1 billion are Android and 193 million are iPhones

Makes me wish I used all the money I spent on Canon & Apple gear went into Apple stock at $7.00/share in 2002.

What makes the smartphone market so big is that a sizeable chunk of smartphone users are on contract so they get upgraded phones every 12, 24 or 36 months. These upgrades are "pushed" on them rather than us working/hobbyist photographers "pulling" these upgrades with our still cameras.

I also think just like the PC shipping figures still cameras are either abandoned in favor of smartphones/tablets or upgraded based on need (the subject they're photographing needs XYZ feature or the camera broken down and isn't worth repairing).

Less than 1% of those buying a still camera of any sort buys a SLR. The 1% of the 1% of SLR buyers buys a double grip pro body like a Canon 1D X or Nikon D4S.

It puts into perspective where/who we are today. Doesn't it?

With this in mind do you find yourself thinking perhaps the next upgrade you will skip all together?


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## gsgary (Feb 26, 2015)

No need for me to upgrade, I shoot film, it much cheaper


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## waday (Feb 26, 2015)

Please not another smartphone vs. camera thread.



dolina said:


> With this in mind do you find yourself thinking perhaps the next upgrade you will skip all together?


No.


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## Derrel (Feb 26, 2015)

*"* *The sky is falling! The sky is falling! " ~ Vincent Laforet*

Ummmm, yeah. Only one, itty-bitty little problem with Laforet's Henny Penny-like doomsday scenario: he forgot the untold millions and millions of people world-wide who have amateur photography as their all-consuming passion. You know, the millions upon millions of avid amatuer snapshooters, hobby shooters, flower shooters, landscape photographers, portrait shooters, moms with cameras, dads with cameras, enthusiastic teen photographers, travel and photo-happy retirees, nature-loving photographers, soccer moms, soccer dads, stamp collectors, motocross enthusiasts, NASCAR fans, you know...all of THOSE kinds of people for whom photographs are regularly made using "real cameras". And uh....all of those professional cameras and lenses Laforet talks about professionals needing and relying upon? Uhhhh...the R&D and development of those products are subsidized by the SALES made to the group of hundred of millions of non-professionals...you know, the people who BUY the majority of those Nikon D4's and those 200-400 VR's and so on...they are not professionals, but rich amateurs in most cases.

He seems to view the photgraphy world as two basic segments: "professionals" and "smart phone users". The helicopter-sized fly in the ointment that is the central premise of his argument is that he is overlooking a positively HUGE segment of photographic equipment buyers that comprises a really critical part of the entire industry: the dedicated "amateur" or "hobby" photographers who have as a class, propped up the entire photo industry for literally, over one hundred years. His article is written from the point of view of a person seemingly unaware of the amateur photography enthusiast market.

Laforet's article identifies a trend, yes. But it is also the exact type of poorly-conceived crap that belongs in the category of doomsday statements like these:

"Radio will cause the death of the theatre, and will put newspapers out of business within a decade."
"The VHS and BETA tape business will kill Hollywood movie-making, and ruin the movie industry."
"Television will kill the movie business by 1960."


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## Braineack (Feb 26, 2015)

Here's the solution:

Nikon, Canon, and the rest should start offering their DSLRs on HUGE discounts, with some models being free, so long as you sign a two-year contract for some other service you're require to pay large chunks of money each month for.


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## vintagesnaps (Feb 26, 2015)

Over the years the average person using a camera for family and holiday and vacation pictures probably would have gone from an instamatic to a film p&s to a digital p&s to a cell phone (without any slr's along the way).

People used to take pictures with a camera, _and_ use a movie camera/camcorder to make home movies; these days people have been posting videos on YouTube for some time but that doesn't seem to have stopped people from taking selfies with their cells. 

There's quite a range from taking pictures w/a cell of what you're having for dinner to post it on FB, to people who use DSLRs and enjoy photography occasionally, to hobbyists and pros and a lot of different uses for photography and video. I don't think one necessarily replaces the other.


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## photoguy99 (Feb 26, 2015)

Obviously the trend lines will go down for a while and then settle in to some sort of more or less horizontal line. The only question is where that line is and how many businesses of what general sort can be supported there.

Derrel is right, the customers will certainly include a bunch of enthusiasts. How many? I always take the SLR sales figures from the 1970s as a benchmark. You can argue that it will be 2-3x that number because of the new markets that have come online since then (China, India, etc). You can argue that it will be quite a bit smaller than that number, because.. I dunno, a bunch of reasons are possible here.

But it's gonna level out, and it's gonna include some professionals and some enthusiasts and the latter will almost certainly outnumber the former.

A few million units a year is the obvious guess, and anyone who claims to have one that's more precise is blowin' smoke.


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## Derrel (Feb 26, 2015)

Laforet's essay skips over a huge, important segment of the photo industry's actual customer base, and that omission is a serious flaw in an essay such as the one he wrote. It's one of the dangers of self-publishing stuff that has not been read and reviewed by a third party. This is why editors are employed at all publications that want to be taken seriously.

Laforet paints a picture of an industry which has exactly two types of shooters: professionals at one end, and at the other end are mindless, three-clicks-then-upload-from-phone-to-social-media types ( let's call these people the dirty, unwashed masses). He seems to see nothing in between the professionals and the dirty, unwashed masses. His conclusion is actually pretty much an overreaching doomsday scenario.


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## Braineack (Feb 26, 2015)

Or better yet: the Nikon EDGE plan -- the cost of your new camera is split into 36 equal payments.

get the all new D810 for only $100/mo for 36mos!!!

$0 down for qualified customers.

Plus you'll have to option to upgrade to any new models (since we put out trivila upgrades every two years or so in each model line) for no extra cost. You original Nikon camera must be returned in good working condition and have no significant damage as determined by Nikon EDGE.


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## Derrel (Feb 26, 2015)

Kind of like car leasing plans! Customers get that new car feeling, dealers get a nice down payment plus a two or three year lease income stream, and most often a relatively new and good condition vehicle to SELL as a used car after they have extracted a good deal of blood from the victim...err...the customer.

I disagree with the $0 down for qualified buyers....nope...there's gotta be a down payment to make this scam work.


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## astroNikon (Feb 26, 2015)

dolina said:


> Makes me wish I used all the money I spent on Canon & Apple gear went into Apple stock at $7.00/share in 2002.



I had to sell my shares at $9 a share back in the day.
If I kept it each share would be worth roughly $3,628 per share before the splits (2:1, 2:1, 7:1). Multiplied by the number of shares would have been quite a tidy sum.

I got back in it after the recent 7:1 split.


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## astroNikon (Feb 26, 2015)

Braineack said:


> Or better yet: the Nikon EDGE plan -- the cost of your new camera is split into 36 equal payments.
> 
> get the all new D810 for only $100/mo for 36mos!!!
> 
> ...


Keep the money changing hands.
Nice !!

Exactly my thought Derrel .. car leases ...
Of course that can create a new larger market for Refurb's.


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## astroNikon (Feb 26, 2015)

waday said:


> Please not another smartphone vs. camera thread.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


If you read carefully,  It's mirrorless and SLR cameras.  
So dSLRs are not included 
I didn't know film SLRs sales have dropped since the 1970s ... who woulda thunk ?!


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## Braineack (Feb 26, 2015)

Derrel said:


> Kind of like car leasing plans! Customers get that new car feeling, dealers get a nice down payment plus a two or three year lease income stream, and most often a relatively new and good condition vehicle to SELL as a used car after they have extracted a good deal of blood from the victim...err...the customer.
> 
> I disagree with the $0 down for qualified buyers....nope...there's gotta be a down payment to make this scam work.



Verizon Edge - Verizon Wireless

The coveted Iphone 5s camera ends up at $550.00 PLUS the cost of service/fees/taxes.

A steal.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

things change. For the average person wanting good photos maybe they would have picked up a dslr ten years ago. Since then things have progressed. They are getting good photos off their iphone. No need to carry 20 lbs around.  For someone to buy dslrs or get into lenses they have to have a reason. The majority dont have enough reason and improving technology may have made that transfer unnecessary. I full espect dslr sales and even mirrorless sales to drop eventually. If what they have is already serving their needs, they have no reason to change.

I keep in mind, some of the hobbyists dump thousands on gear to come up with a decent landscape shot. while a lot of these people are paying much less to nothing for a similiar shot with their improving low end gear constantly coming out. Yeah, maybe to some that expenditure and carrying around equipment is worth it. But for the average person, that landscape photo being ten percent better than the iphone photo or point and shoot really isnt worth the expense or time and lugging of gear.

This will only escalate. As the majority of photos taken by these people on their phones are getting better and better, and very usable. Some are actually quite nice. They aren't blowing them up to wall prints. You will still have some of the hobbyists and pros using dslr gear. But even that will change over time. There are people already dumping dslrs to go to mirrorless. They may dump mirrorless for something else even simpler if tech continues to improve.   The dslrs, in the majority of situations, are just becoming less and less necessary and a stupid investment in time and money for most people.

The vast majority of photos i myself shoot i dont need a dslr for. And while not a pro, i consider myself i a pretty serious shooter just in how much shooting i do.   There is a lot of CRAP  for instance on facebook from the general public. But last i looked (been a while) there are some people turning out better photos with cheap point and shoots or cellphones than many of the hobbyists flaunting 10 or 20k in gear. 

Originally i think people with slrs were rather less common. The drop off in sales doesnt reflect the last 20 or 30 years. Because if you really looked back you will find they are probably selling ten time more dslrs now than 20 or 30 years ago. It isn't that sales are so much dying, but that the segment as been flooded for a couple decades or more by hobbyists shooters and everyone and their brother getting into photography.  Good times, money to blow, time to kill, and a huge push by camera companies to gain customers. Once they make you a hobbyist in a system you keep coming back to spend more. That is what they want. Much imo a giant phase the camera companies raked in a lot of cash on.  As it resets, the hobbyists will drop down, the dslr sales might go closer to what they probably should have been to start with. And a lot will just move on too new technology. Even the pro segment isn't safe. i won't claim pros will just all stop using dslrs. But as things many of them too will be dumping dslrs as they nolonger provide a usefulness that could be acquired from other means at the time. Whatever tool serves the purpose.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

astroNikon said:


> Braineack said:
> 
> 
> > Or better yet: the Nikon EDGE plan -- the cost of your new camera is split into 36 equal payments.
> ...


it is pointless for them to try really. Remember when a computer filled a entire room? How about when they were three times the size they are now? The average phone probably has more computing capacity than most earlier computers.   Hence the dslr. Over sized, older tech. Waiting to be shrinked down in modernism. Cameras shrink over time too, just like the computers did.


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## goodguy (Feb 26, 2015)

Thank you for this link.
I am planing to sell my camera and lenses right now, I will only use my cell phone because Laforet apparently told me I must.
Darn and I like my camera so much, never knew I am not supposed to use it any more.
Thank god there are very smart people who tell us what we need to do.


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## photoguy99 (Feb 26, 2015)

I'm pretty sure my phone has more computing power than existed on the planet 20 years ago.


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## goodguy (Feb 26, 2015)

Here is a little story I remember from 2008 when the housing bubble happened in good ole USA
Gas prices went up at the time and I remember an expert in the field predicted cars will not be bought any more because there isn't enough gas for us all, gas prices will be too high and people will not be able to afford cars, he predicted in 8 years cars will be owned by only few people!
He suggested to stop investing in roads and only invest in public transportation.
Well its 9 years since I heard this long interview with this gentleman and guess what we are still driving cars and car industry is having a big boom in last few years.
The case this man made back then backed up with lots of good numbers made good sense but alas it never came through.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

photoguy99 said:


> I'm pretty sure my phone has more computing power than existed on the planet 20 years ago.


no doubt. And just to add fuel to the fire i am going to say that people have more money to piss away right now. Go back a while you wont find many people that couldn't afford to spend 10k on a "hobby" like there is right now. signs of the times. Maybe another economic correction could really sink the dslr sales. Most of these are not necessary items. It is blow money. Disposable income. While camera prices have dropped at the same time. so people are buying a lot more chit. Take away that 20 percent more disposable income you just sucked the profits right out of nikon unless they can talk everyone into buying 100 dollar cameras to replace their cell phones.


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## Braineack (Feb 26, 2015)

public transit make sense to invest in--if you like living in red.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

goodguy said:


> Thank you for this link.
> I am planing to sell my camera and lenses right now, I will only use my cell phone because Laforet apparently told me I must.
> Darn and I like my camera so much, never knew I am not supposed to use it any more.
> Thank god there are very smart people who tell us what we need to do.


well i don't think i would go THAT far it it were me. But in 15 or 20 years walking around with a dslr is going to be the equivalent of me walking around with a film camera. The majority of others will have "something else"


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

Look at the bright side. There will be a million dslrs on ebay and you will probably be able to buy a d800 for 15 bucks.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

love to know what buckster is specifically disagreeing with. I get the feeling he is just disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing. At the most he might be disagreeing just because he gets bored and likes to debate.


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## 480sparky (Feb 26, 2015)

photoguy99 said:


> I'm pretty sure my phone has more computing power than existed on the planet 20 years ago.



It has far more power than the computers used to send Apollo to the moon.


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## Buckster (Feb 26, 2015)

bribrius said:


> love to know what buckster is specifically disagreeing with. I get the feeling he is just disagreeing for the sake of disagreeing. At the most he might be disagreeing just because he gets bored and likes to debate.


Pretty much everything you say in the posts I disagree with, is what I disagree with.

It's not even worth debating with you over it.  

See Derrel's posts in this thread for a primer on reality.


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## photoguy99 (Feb 26, 2015)

Uh. Pretty sure bribrius was making a joke.


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## sashbar (Feb 26, 2015)

I would predict that professional and prosumer cameras will look more like smartphones or tablets in the future. Just imagine something like a Nexus 7 tablet with some additional buttons, an interchangeable lense and detacheable handle with some more buttons on it and a battery inside. Basically that is what future pro cameras will look like.  And, of course they will be able make a bloody phone call. And a video call as well. 

As for this Vincent guy, he argues that smartphones won because of their software:
_
"The key is that the software on those smartphones, and the social media platforms and instant connection to the web – ARE BETTER and cannot be overcome by camera companies that fail to integrate software within their camera bodies going forward".
_
Why on earth does he think it can not be adopted and integrated by camera manufacturers? Why, say,  Sony is unable to use its mobile phones experience for upgrading the software in their cameras????  
I guess camera manufacturers will do exactly that, as soon as the market will demand it. 
Vincent gives no other explanation why photo enthusiasts will start using phones instead of proper cameras and proper lenses. 
This is not serious.


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## Braineack (Feb 26, 2015)

once the big boys embrace some damn technology, smartphone cameras will be a gateway into cameras with sensors bigger than toenail clippings.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

photoguy99 said:


> Uh. Pretty sure bribrius was making a joke.


nope. Not so much. The majority of people on this forum wouldn't be here if they didn't have money to piss away or if their phone camera could do about what their dslr did. Give it a few more years it will. Or another substitute will take hold.  why lug around 30 lbs. in chit if you don't need to.  Half of this is marketing. The camera companies market the chit out of stuff to middle upper class people. It isn't that they are artists. It is that they are a victim of seeing what the person next to them at the soccer game has for a camera and keeping up with them. They are consumers.

Most of the market from the companies goes to this certain group. Sure, they may have some love for photography, or maybe a geek gear syndrome. Majority is competition purchasing fueled by competitive advertising. Billion photos a day. Think about that. uploaded like every day. That is a chit load of sales to a populace on tech and camera crap.
And the article makes a good point. The cell phone is WITH them. All the time. And improving. Talk about captive market for easy sales. They just have to transfer that money you pay canon for that dslr into getting you to spend a extra grand on your phone. And they do that by improving the phone to a extent it fills the vast majority of your photographic needs.  And it is a shut case.

Yeah, but all this in between section, or the vast majority of it. Is people with money to piss away and mostly CONSUMERS. Consumers consume what is convenient to them that fills their needs or makes them look good to peers. If a iphone 8 makes them look good and fills their needs more than a canon mark x they will buy the iphone. .


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## photoguy99 (Feb 26, 2015)

When the DSLR gets enough technology stuffed into it to provide the frictionless social media experience it will be... A phone.

And TPF will disdain it.


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## bribrius (Feb 26, 2015)

Anyone have a ipad? My kids Ipad actually takes damn good photos. sure, no where near what a dslr can do but give it a few more generations.... We were shooting some ocean shots a few months ago and i was pretty damn surprised what she came out with using that ipad.


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## runnah (Feb 26, 2015)

10 million dslrs between $500-$6000 plus all the other flashes, lenses and other junk is still a boat load of cash.


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## sashbar (Feb 26, 2015)

bribrius said:


> Anyone have a ipad? My kids Ipad actually takes damn good photos. sure, no where near what a dslr can do but give it a few more generations.... We were shooting some ocean shots a few months ago and i was pretty damn surprised what she came out with using that ipad.



I have an iPad Air. Yes, it can take pictures.  And it often look decent. On iPad Air.


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## sashbar (Feb 26, 2015)

Never mind. Late 19 century scientists unanimously predicted that by mid 20 century it will be impossible to drive down London street, because there will be so many carriages, the horse sh*t will cover streets up to the first floor. In 10 years time the first car was manufactured. I always remember this prediction when another prophet comes up


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## Bebulamar (Feb 26, 2015)

I don't think his prediction is right! We have to wait and see. I surely hope that he is right that way I can get some cheap gears when they are on the way out. Later on they will be too expensive.


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## rexbobcat (Feb 27, 2015)

I hate when famous voices in an industry jump on the Nostradamus train.

It's kind of pretentious.

Like yeah, you're cool and famous. Yes, you've worked with camera companies.

But you're oversimplifying an industry by making far left field predictions using stats that don't and can't prove causation. 

I'm sure your PR rep told you it was a great idea though, and you're probably going to sell a few tutorials (that's the whole point, right?).

So...congratulations?


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## Braineack (Feb 27, 2015)

photoguy99 said:


> When the DSLR gets enough technology stuffed into it to provide the frictionless social media experience it will be... A phone.
> 
> And TPF will disdain it.



I've more than thrice, taken a picture of my lcd display, to share instantly because there was really no other way.

Nikon and Canon innovate by changing the model number of their cameras.  It reminds me of the early 90s when the next 4x, 8x, 10x, 20x, 42x CD-ROM drive would come out.  Sure they made it better each time, but they did nothing to really advance the technology.

It wasn't until the zipd rive came out where we finally we are able to move onto writeable CD and DVDs and then jump drives.


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## Braineack (Feb 27, 2015)

@Buckster - what exactly do you disagree with?


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## Buckster (Feb 27, 2015)

Braineack said:


> @Buckster - what exactly do you disagree with?


What you said.


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## Solarflare (Feb 27, 2015)

bribrius said:


> things change. For the average person wanting good photos maybe they would have picked up a dslr ten years ago. Since then things have progressed. They are getting good photos off their iphone. No need to carry 20 lbs around. [...]


 I disagree. The people who wanted DSLR 10 years ago still want a DSLR today, or maybe a mirrorless.

The people who are happy with iPhone et all quality are those who would have bought compact cameras. Because thats the market thats collapsing, not DSLRs.

DSLRs only have the problem that people do not buy new DSLRs, because their old ones are still working fine.


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## Braineack (Feb 27, 2015)

Buckster said:


> Braineack said:
> 
> 
> > @Buckster - what exactly do you disagree with?
> ...



besides improving sensors and video capabilities, what leaps and bounds innovation and technology improvements have been made to Nikon DSLRs?

You also disagree that I've done this:







?


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## Buckster (Feb 27, 2015)

Braineack said:


> Buckster said:
> 
> 
> > Braineack said:
> ...


I've no interest in going back and forth with you until the thread gets closed.

I disagree with what you said.  Learn to live with it.


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## photoguy99 (Feb 27, 2015)

That disagree button is working out great!


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## Braineack (Feb 27, 2015)

I disagree.


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## astroNikon (Feb 27, 2015)

I use my dSLR and iPhone ... just yesterday morning - iPhone .. "morning hop"


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## photoguy99 (Feb 27, 2015)

You know what they say. You always +disagree the ones you love.


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## astroNikon (Feb 27, 2015)

everyone's in a disagreeable mood it seems ...


maybe we should talk about dress colors instead


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## Mr. Innuendo (Feb 28, 2015)

I honestly don't really care what some guy I've never heard of has to say. My equipment works well for me, and for my clients, and that's all I care about.


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## minicoop1985 (Mar 2, 2015)

Maybe instead of camera leases Canikonsony could do Rent-To-Own services! Only $24.99 a week for THE REST OF YOUR LIFE!!!!


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## bribrius (Mar 2, 2015)

i disagree with every post in this thread. including my own.


B-A-C-O-N!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


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## Dave442 (Mar 2, 2015)

OK, didn't read the blog but I did listen to the long video. What I can agree with is people want something easy. 

In my case I just returned from a short vacation, my wife has already selected and posted her favorite iPhone photos for her friends to see (a few during the trip and the last few today). I have only imported my photos into LR, tagged, rated and processed a part of those RAW files.  

It seems that over the life of photography there have always been spurts when there were new features that made some part of the process to have a final image available in a easier and faster manner (tintype, film, roll film, 35mm, polaroid, built-in metering, auto-exposure, auto-focus and digital are a few that come to mind). What can drive the next spurt, does it matter?


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