[hadi]

Sony's FF Alpha line has become a fad. Nothing more than that. If you don't own one, you're a DSLR dinosaur that's behind the times. I see people that aren't even mediocre photographers dropping big money on them... because bro it's full frame and mirrorless. They're the cameras to have for people that know nothing about cameras. That's not to say that they're not good bodies or that the Sony lens system isn't good, it's just that "well researched" doesn't go into the buying decision. They've become the Apple of the camera world.

true.
however, the shoot i went on was on Jason Lanier. a brand ambassador of everything sony related.
as such, all his fans by default are also sony people.
likewise, i also really love Manny Ortiz. technically a brand ambassador of sony. he does have some sort of relationship with sony, thus his fans, usually are sony people.

the same would be true for, say Jessica Kolbessi using canon, and her fans using canon. or matt granger using both sony (used to) and nikon (all through out), thus his fans would be both?

[racingsnake]

Quite a response here guys!) have not expected that to be honest. A lot of good insight and a great opportunity for me to... well... get in your head I suppose) good point about Sony being apple of the camera world atm. Is it bad? Surely not for Sony) a friend of mine has just sold all his canon gear that he sees as redundant and is in the market to buy new gear. Guess which one is at the top of his list? Dang straight it’s Sony!!! So clearly Sony is doing good at least marketing wise. I told him all about my k-1 and the lenses I own and how good blah blah blah. I don’t think he is convinced though as Pentax just doesn’t have the presence. Which suck donkey’s butt big time. But hey, whatever tickles your pickle I guess. Oh and another observation in regards to Flickr. Pentax K-1 appear to be really underexposed there. But that’s a whole different story. Thanks a ton for your opinions guys!!!


Отправлено с моего iPhone используя Tapatalk

[Alex645]

good point about Sony being apple of the camera world atm. Is it bad? Surely not for Sony

Sony (and Apple) has always been an innovator and with that comes pros and cons for them and the user. But when you buy into their products, you have to know they will throw out the old tech to embrace the new tech, so not so great if you're not willing to buy and dispose every 5-10 years. But between various sensors made by Kodak, Toshiba, Canon, Sigma, Samsung, TowerJazz, or Cmosis, I do find the Sony sensors as my top choice in terms of dynamic range and price.

[ffking]

1 used a nikon
1 used a canon
1 used a pentax.

Headline: "Pentax equals Canon and Nikon in popularity."

---------- Post added 23-01-18 at 11:50 AM ----------

Your artistic idols will not use Pentax.

Not quite true of MF, though more so since digital came to dominate and the 67 fell away - but my favourite tog, Obie Oberholzer, used to use a 67, then went FF Canon when Digital took over. The 645Z still has a niche amongst people who take quality outdoors portraits in demanding conditions, but I have to admit I can't name names off the top of my head.

[stevebrot]

If you don't own one, you're a DSLR dinosaur that's behind the times.

Sort of like this?

Tyrannosaurus photoventris, lifted from...Judith Hoffman: Pinhole Cameras

Steve

[AyeYo]

Sony (and Apple) has always been an innovator and with that comes pros and cons for them and the user.

I didn't at all mean in the sense of innovation. I meant in the sense of using large marketing budgets to push inferior products to non-discriminating, mass market consumers through the use of fad creation.

[normhead]

I didn't at all mean in the sense of innovation. I meant in the sense of using large marketing budgets to push inferior products to non-discriminating, mass market consumers through the use of fad creation.

As I sit typing on my 7 year old Apple computer, recently revitalized by a 556 SSD drive I wonder, what inferior products are you talking about. And with the A9 and Zeiss lenses, some might argue that Sony and Apple have gotten where they are by offering superior product at more superior prices. I know everyone wants quality to be cheap, but marketing doesn't get you repeat business. having a good product gets you repeat business.

Somewhere along the line those companies discovered, a superior product commands an exponentially higher profit, than offering the same old stuff everyone else does. Companies in the low end of the market compete against everyone. It's actually much easier to create a piece of crap product and sell it for cheap than it is to produce product for a more demanding clientele. You won't be successful if you don't produce.

A few years ago, I bought a "tablet" that was "just as good as an Apple " according to some. It mostly sits on the shelf. While my 4 year old iPad mini see's daily use. One was $100, one was $300, which was the better deal? The expensive one with all the marketing.

---

Last edited by normhead; 01-24-2018 at 07:11 AM.

[hadi]

As I sit typing om my 7 year old computer, recently revitalized by a 556 SSD drive I wonder, what inferior products are you talking about. And with the A9 and Zeiss lenses, some might argue that Sony and Apple have gotten where they are by offering superior product at more superior prices. I know everyone wants quality to be cheap, but marketing doesn't get you repeat business. having a good product gets you repeat business.

Somewhere along the line those companies discovered, a superior product commands an exponentially higher profit, than offering the same old stuff everyone else does. Companies in the low end of the market compete against everyone. It's actually much easier to create a piece of crap product and sell it for cheap than it is to produce product for a more demanding clientele. You won't be successful if you don't produce.

A few years ago, I bought a "tablet" that was "just as good as an Apple " compared to some. It mostly sits on the shelf. WHIlr my 4 year old iPad mini see's daily use. One was $100, one was #300, which was the better deal? The expensive one with all the marketing.

keep in mind that part of the success of sony is unlike the canikon, or olympus, panasonic, or pentax, or any other camera branch.
camera brands for the most brand only deal with cameras, or related products (canon with printers. nikon with telescopes and contact/glasses. pentax with medical equipment, and whatever richo does etc).
sony on the other hand is able to diversify itself into the following:
movies (some of the biggest movies block buster movies are sony)
music (sony studio production)
music players (mp3/cds/boom box? etc)
tvs
game stations (up until recently, a dinosaur device, the sony play station 2 was still in production)
computers

all of those are not cameras. once you add cameras, they have a lot of R&D at their disposal. that is part of the reason why sony is able to release so many new bodies and lenses each and every year. part of the reason third party are supporting sony more and more and not focusing on canikon as much any longer)

[Alex645]

I didn't at all mean in the sense of innovation. I meant in the sense of using large marketing budgets to push inferior products to non-discriminating, mass market consumers through the use of fad creation.

I see. Well in the photographic world, that makes me think of a lot of plastic cameras like the Lomos, Holga/Diana, or stuff like the old 110 film and disk camera fads.

Iʻve had good and bad experiences with just about every brand including Apple, Microsoft, Sony, etc, but marketing has always had the job of selling snake oil OR creating a desire where there was no need.

The internet has become one big marketing tool. In fact, you probably didnʻt even realize Iʻm a Ricoh bot

[ffking]

in fact, you probably didnʻt even realize iʻm a ricoh bot

[newmikey]

Are we worse in PP than Sony users?
Are Sony users better photographers in general?
Do you think that it’s just because more talented Sony photographers use Flickr?
I can go on really but the main question for me is “what gives?”

This is merely an example of confirmation bias - you are seeing what you have been led by others to believe you would see. Some of this is attributable to sheer numbers of users by brand and the rest is filled in by your mind.

Remedy: just unbelieve what you think you're seeing, plant both feet firmly on the ground and do your damnest to shoot great images - you'll feel much better about it!

[clackers]

This is merely an example of confirmation bias - you are seeing what you have been led by others to believe you would see. Some of this is attributable to sheer numbers of users by brand and the rest is filled in by your mind.

Remedy: just unbelieve what you think you're seeing, plant both feet firmly on the ground and do your damnest to shoot great images - you'll feel much better about it!

Yep, just decode how a favourite picture was taken (such as a combined Milky Way and lightpainted barn) and really go out of your way to emulate it.

As somebody said, first you imitate then you innovate.

Note that nothing said above is brand specific.

[normhead]

This is merely an example of confirmation bias - you are seeing what you have been led by others to believe you would see. Some of this is attributable to sheer numbers of users by brand and the rest is filled in by your mind.

And how do you know I didn't already un-believe what I believe and come to independent conclusions?

This is a game people play. "I'm, not influenced by mass marketing but you are how do I know? You buy different stuff than I do." It's false logic. Many cultures have a tradition of teaching techniques to avoid becoming locked into mass mood swings and fads. If you want to be a shaman it it starts immediately. IN our culture , there are courses in critical thinking.

If you are familiar with critical thinking, you'd know that claiming everyone is influenced by mass marketing is itself a fad, and a sort of anti-commercial marketing form of mass marketing. Any time you claim everyone does anything or likes anything you ignore diversity, and the differences that make us unique. Whatever you think about people, there are a few somewhere who break the mold. IN the case of mass marketing, it's a lot more than you think.

Many of us grew up with the adage "Advertising is to sell you things you don't need to impress people you don't like." Many in my generation have been guided by throughout their lives. Stop thinking you know everything, you don't.

That does mean you don't buy anything that has mass marketing, that means you investigate to see if what is being marketed will be of use to you. IF it fits with your goals and needs, then it's not the mass marketing that determines your purchase, but you goals and needs.

Nothing is as funny as a Windows Android user claiming Apple users are influenced by mass marketing. Somehow because they are influenced by a competing mass marketer, they think they aren't affected. Clasic critical thinking use of the "other". Those other Apple guys are just influenced by mass marketing. Us Windows guys aren't.

If you can't see the hogwash of that position, you have absolutely no authority to be commenting on that type of issue. It is a serious field of academic endeavour. People have studied it extensively. And making amateur statements just makes you look , well, like an amateur.

Once you understand how marketing works, you are able to recognize it. That being said, marketing os based on the very human activity of define groups and cliques. You can avoid the effects of marketing. I'm not sure you can avoid the underlying social constructs that make it effective. Well, unless you want to be the kind of person that can live as a hermit in a big city.

Sometimes you end up being inspired by marketing, because the company produces something that you enjoy on a level much deeper than those affected by marketing. Humans have the ability to enjoy the things they are genetically programmed to find beautifull. Is life about never buying a heavily marketed product, about buying something to influence your friends or imagined friends, or friends you'd like to have. Any purchase can be more than that. You can discover things that make you genuinely happy, despite the marketing. It's not really much of a hindrance.

Most nights the wife and I sit and watch images from the last 10 years of our life go by while drinking a beer and discussing the day. That's what makes us happy. The technology that enables that is irrelevant. The marketing is irrelevant. We are just two people enjoying our lives. Marketing has nothing to do with it.

We could be watching other people's fake lives on T.V. the technology allows us to live in our own lives. That's worth paying for. The beer was marketed, the computer was marketed, the cameras I took the images with were marketed. Once you make the technology do what you want, marketing has nothing further to do with it. Then it's all just your enjoyment of the stuff you bought. And on a positive note, it you understand it, marketing will help you make those purchases.

All marketing is, is saying "We make this useful thing, you might like it."

Saying "Marketing is bad", is just as ridiculous as saying "marketing is good." For the educated, it performs a useful function.

[AyeYo]

Somewhere along the line those companies discovered, a superior product commands an exponentially higher profit, than offering the same old stuff everyone else does.

They both use the same, highly effective marketing tactics. The quality and tech level of the product doesn't matter. Apple uses inferior hardware to any similar priced product and Sony isn't using any tech that's vastly different or better than what everyone else is using. They simply create the perception (which you've perfectly demonstrated here), that their products are superior and cutting edge, then slap on a huge price tag to "prove" it. You now have a complete, self-supporting narrative of "cutting edge technology" and a cult like following of consumers that now need to buy into the cult to rationalize their overpriced and poorly/unresearched purchase. They sell the product for you as they push out to their friends and peers that anyone not using this obviously superior and cutting edge product is an uncool old fogy. We've seen this with Apple products for years and now it's the MO of most Sony Alpha users.

Sony has also taken the narrative building one step further with their heavily massaged RAW files (see the "star eater" issue) to help sell the "superior product" narrative to people that don't know any better.

The Alpha fad will pass. In the mean time, someone that's a good photographer with a K1 really needs to get some shots that do it justice up on Flickr.

[normhead]

The quality and tech level of the product doesn't matter. Apple uses inferior hardware to any similar priced product and Sony isn't using any tech that's vastly different or better than what everyone else is using. They simply create the perception (which you've perfectly demonstrated here), that their products are superior and cutting edge, then slap on a huge price tag to "prove" it.

That would be your opinion. And it's a product of Window's marketing. You are a slave to what you claim to be protesting against.

My school board ran side by side Windows and Apple media labs. After 6 months the Apple labs had made up the extra cost in lower maintenance costs. The windows media computers were reassigned and all media labs are now run on Apple computers.

As technical department head it took me 3 years to convince my school board to run those tests, because of people like you. And in the end, our whole IT department was wrong and I was right.

When the tests who'd Macs to be more dependable and cheaper in the long run, the head of IT came by and said "You're finally going to get your ******* Apple computers." What is with you windows dudes. I didn't care what I had, I just wanted it to be dependable. Windows dudes, even when they lose fair and square, they can't shut up.

Which is better depends on what you value. Since I bought my i7 quad core iMac 7 years ago, my gaming step son has bought 3 Windows computers. He wants the latest greatest gaming set-up, I want a dependable computer that will last me a long time. We want different things, we make different choices. Personally, it doesn't sound to me like you know enough to even make an intelligent choice. To do that you have to know the strengths of both sides. You clearly don't.

That kind of knowledge comes only with experience. There are reasons for paying the big bucks for Apple's, there are reasons for buying lots of other computers. You pick what suits you. The smart person pays for what they value and ignores folks like you telling them what's best for them. How are you different from any other marketer? Except you're a stockholm syndrome marketer. You got locked into a system and can't see outside of it. You're not even being paid.