Originally posted by ThorSanchez And price. APS-C is still far more affordable than FF.
And that's the problem, Thor.
Not for us shooters, but for the companies. The profits aren't large enough to cover the drop in volume of sales - which the CEO of Canon expects will halve again in the next two years.
They're really squeezing the lemon, and shutting out people on a tight budget.
Sony have no interest in the entry level A3000 or mid-level A5000 cameras, it's only the high end 6000s or full frame.
Panasonic have skipped APS-C searching for a premium product and gone straight to FF.
Nikon and Canon ignored APS-C with their vision for the future, the R and Z series also went straight to full frame.
Fuji have even skipped FF and gone for medium format.
If a K-3 user upgrades to a K-3 III there's a real danger they will just reuse their existing lens. Encouraging/forcing customers to go to FF or even a new mirrorless mount means there's potential for additional lenses to be sold.
And in fact, we've seen with the DFA lenses that they sell so few copies with a limited pool of FF customers that it's hard to get their money back - they've tried to sell the DFA*50 to Canon and Nikon owners hoping 'quality wins'. But I've not seen evidence of the Tokina Opera being popular despite its outstanding performance.
It's a lot to think about for Pentax, which has to think, what does a niche player do, that doesn't involve going head to head with the giants?
There are opportunities, perhaps … the big guys are seemingly downplaying APS-C, which on the other hand might be selling five or six times the number of units versus FF right now. And they are betting the ranch on mirrorless, which even at this point is still being consistently outsold by DSLRs.
If you're the Ricoh product manager, you'd be commissioning all kinds of studies for the different scenarios. And you've got to do it without losing money year to year - the orders from above to all divisions including cameras, is to attempt to survive, to break even, to not chase market share in dire economic times.