[BigMackCam]

My points are more less addressing the original post. At Some point the cellphone camera may make me forego a big heavy camera.

Sure... Just as I've found that the K10D / GX-10 developed ten years ago mostly does enough for me, and much of the time I forego using newer equipment. But we only have to look at threads on these forums and on other sites to see that many other folks will continue pursuing "better", no matter how far things develop. Indeed, the market for any product depends on that very desire...

My point here is, no matter how far cell phone imaging develops, if a more capable (e.g. larger sensor camera) is avaiable, there will always be folks who want it...

[surfar]

I've found that the K10D / GX-10 developed ten years ago mostly does enough for me

Yes and the 200d(its little bro).Just cant find the video button?

[swanlefitte]

My point here is, no matter how far cell phone imaging develops, if a more capable (e.g. larger sensor camera) is avaiable, there will always be folks who want it...

Fully agree.

[monochrome]

50 years ago an Instamatic was in virtually every household in America. In High School I had one. My grandmother had a YashicaMat and a Yashica rangefinder and a Polaroid Land camera. My father had an Argus for years, then an SX-70. After college I had a KX and K50/1.4. My younger brother had an OM-1 in High School (my father’s income went up a lot in the 70’s).

I kept the KX and even added an MESuper but In the 80’s I also had a series of automatic film cameras because they were convenient. I found a Canon, a Yashica and a Minolta in a box a couple months ago.

By the 90’s most people were throwing away the compact film cameras and buying compact digital cameras in plastic clamshell packaging hanging on end-aisle displays at Best Buy. Just like they bought Instamatics at Target in the 70’s. Despite the advances of Canon and Minolta, SLR sales were moribund by 2000.

Then soccer moms and the digital camera kit happened (at Target and Costco), the internet became workable and Apple took first-mover advantage in June, 2007 - just 12 years ago. The problem with the digital SLR explosion is the capital cost of the plants has yet to be recovered, but the soccer moms have moved on - their soccer children have grown up. They’re embarrassing their children posting smilies in text messages and Liking their Instas now.

We make a big deal about improved phone cameras but they’re wasted on 99% of the people who replace their smart phones. They might as well be Instamatics. Instagram might as well be InstamaticGram. The half-life of an Instagram post is only slightly shorter than that of a print from One-Hour Photo in the grocery parking lot. I don’t think the better phone cameras have changed anything. I think because the internet works, what we take pictures of and what we do with the images has changed, and a camera in a multi-function device that’s always in your pocket or purse is better suited to the change than an ILC.

ILC sales will settle down to whatever level suits the enthusiast community. A few more brands will disappear (Panny? Oly? Pentax? or - earthquake - Nikon?) during the next recession when capital costs can’t be met. Pentax will either survive because the capital costs might be low enough or Theta profit might be high enough - or Pentax might be sold to the Chinese next quarter.

---

Last edited by monochrome; 05-11-2019 at 06:21 PM.

[derekkite]

Click... Search Google photos and Instagram for the location and find the best photo that matches the view... Insert people and other details that are different now... Wow, what a wonderful photo you took.

[Wheatfield]

Problem is the source material is compressed, CDs/LPs played on a decent audio system can bring out details that are missing from downloaded music files. (Unless you pay extra for uncompressed versions or upload CD's in an uncompressed format to your cellphone.) No comparison in music quality really and the difference is like watching TV with "coke bottle" glasses on.

However most people don't seem to buy CDs/LPs & audio components any longer, so yes the vast majority must not care.

I always enjoy having any visiting "Millennial" relatives listen to a CD/LP on my home reference audio system and see their reaction. Priceless....

Phil.

Yeah. And by the time they are in their mid 30s there hearing is getting to the point that they couldn't tell the difference if you smacked them in the face with it.
Such is the problem with being an audiophile.

---------- Post added 05-11-19 at 08:19 PM ----------

Bottom end bridge cameras,definitely....I think it might take a while till the Nikon P1000 is under threat.[.

Perhaps. All that needs to happen is for enough sales to be eroded to make them unviable to continue manufacturing.

[texandrews]

50 years ago an Instamatic was in virtually every household in America. In High School I had one. My grandmother had a YashicaMat and a Yashica rangefinder and a Polaroid Land camera. My father had an Argus for years, then an SX-70. After college I had a KX and K50/1.4. My younger brother had an OM-1 in High School (my father’s income went up a lot in the 70’s).

I kept the KX and even added an MESuper but In the 80’s I also had a series of automatic film cameras because they were convenient. I found a Canon, a Yashica and a Minolta in a box a couple months ago.

By the 90’s most people were throwing away the compact film cameras and buying compact digital cameras in plastic clamshell packaging hanging on end-aisle displays at Best Buy. Just like they bought Instamatics at Target in the 70’s. Despite the advances of Canon and Minolta, SLR sales were moribund by 2000.

Then soccer moms and the digital camera kit happened (at Target and Costco), the internet became workable and Apple took first-mover advantage in June, 2007 - just 12 years ago. The problem with the digital SLR explosion is the capital cost of the plants has yet to be recovered, but the soccer moms have moved on - their soccer children have grown up. They’re embarrassing their children posting smilies in text messages and Liking their Instas now.

We make a big deal about improved phone cameras but they’re wasted on 99% of the people who replace their smart phones. They might as well be Instamatics. Instagram might as well be InstamaticGram. The half-life of an Instagram post is only slightly shorter than that of a print from One-Hour Photo in the grocery parking lot. I don’t think the better phone cameras have changed anything. I think because the internet works, what we take pictures of and what we do with the images has changed, and a camera in a multi-function device that’s always in your pocket or purse is better suited to the change than an ILC.

ILC sales will settle down to whatever level suits the enthusiast community. A few more brands will disappear (Panny? Oly? Pentax? or - earthquake - Nikon?) during the next recession when capital costs can’t be met. Pentax will either survive because the capital costs might be low enough or Theta profit might be high enough - or Pentax might be sold to the Chinese next quarter.

I agree with so much of what you've said.....except I think I am guardedly hopeful about Pentax. I think it's possible that their conservatism---which we all rail against to a greater or lesser degree---might just be a boon in a downturn as the company might not be so overextended by over-reaching.

[texandrews]

I think most of the reasons I lug around a bigger camera than my smart phone (an iphone 8) have been covered. Suffice to say that in perfect situations (I actually want a 28mm focal length, the light is good, and I only need a couple of shots), the iphone is adequate. But I don't enjoy shooting with it. The viewfinder doesn't exist, the ergonomics are terrible and if I get into low light situations, want to use it with a tripod, want to shoot with any other focal length, I am in trouble. Furthermore, the more I am shooting with my phone, the less battery life I have for other things I actually use my phone for, like the GPS or actually making phone calls.

I am afraid that the premise of the thread is backwards. To me, it is easier to list the situations where I think a cell phone can be adequate for the job (because the list is short -- mainly landscape and selfies in good light) than where I think an SLR is better because that list is very long.

In a sense, my list would start with every lens I own -- DFA 24-70/70-200/15-30/etc followed by the accessories that I can use easily with my Pentax cameras but can't with my cell phone. I would just leave it that I enjoy using the K-1 and so it isn't that I "have" to take it with me. I get better results with it than I do with my iphone (without pixel peeping) and I like the lenses I have. If I really couldn't see a difference and I enjoyed shooting with a cell phone, perhaps it would be different, but since I don't live in that world, I guess I'll keep shooting with a K mount camera and lenses for the time being.

Excellent post.

[CarlJF]

BTW guys, you could just buy a Q! Problem solved!

[pepperberry farm]

interesting article that resonated with me on why I don't use the camera on my phone nearly as much as many people do:

The problem with camera phones that nobody talks about - DIY Photography

[photoptimist]

interesting article that resonated with me on why I don't use the camera on my phone nearly as much as many people do:

The problem with camera phones that nobody talks about - DIY Photography

Yep!

The supreme irony of phone cameras is that when the light is great for getting decent IQ from an under-sized sensor, the screen is washed out and when the light is dim enough to really see the screen, it's substandard for the sensor.

Personally, I much prefer composing with my eye looking through a viewfinder. Not on does that make the camera more stable and controllable, but it also lets me see details, framing, and composition much better than staring at a small screen at arm's length.

[pepperberry farm]

Yep!

The supreme irony of phone cameras is that when the light is great for getting decent IQ from an under-sized sensor, the screen is washed out and when the light is dim enough to really see the screen, it's substandard for the sensor.

Personally, I much prefer composing with my eye looking through a viewfinder. Not on does that make the camera more stable and controllable, but it also lets me see details, framing, and composition much better than staring at a small screen at arm's length.

agreed - I also find all the attachments for a smartphone to make it more ergonomic do nothing but increase its bulk and more like an actual camera (go figure)....

[Wheatfield]

I disagree. The research going into sensors benefits all formats, from tiny phone sensors to large full frame and medium format cameras. As such, my assumption is that however advanced small sensors become, larger sensors with larger photo sites will always remain ahead of them, assuming they leverage the same advances in technology...

The theory that a rising tide floats all boats is a good one, but in this instance, diminishing returns will hit large sensors pretty hard. The rising tide will raise the small boats far more than it will the large ones in this instance.
All that has to happen is for cell phone cameras to get good enough for people to stop seeing enough benefit of carrying a large camera (as well as their cell phone) to stop carrying the large camera in favour of what they already carry all the time.
We have seen this time and again in the camera world, and equally often in other areas.
No one would try to argue (at least I hope they wouldn’t) that 35mm film gave a better image than medium format, yet 35mm became the most popular format and pushed medium format to the fringes of photography, to be used by an increasingly small number of pros and enthusiasts.
This was after medium format had done the same thing to large format.

In my travels in the 1980s and 90s, I spent a lot of time in the American southwest, a region that is a landscape photographer’s nirvana. In something like a dozen trips to Utah and New Mexico, I only once saw a large format camera other than my own. For that matter, I almost never saw a medium format camera either.

Fast forward to the late 1990s, and along came the digital revolution. Actually, it was more like a tidal wave. People took up digital cameras in droves. It didn’t matter to them that the quality of the early digital couldn’t even hold up to a throw away single use camera, the convenience of not having to drop a film off at the lab was more important than quality.
Even pros, a normally pretty conservative lot adopted digital early on, even though they were trading quality for other criteria.

In other areas of technology we saw the same thing. Reel to reel tape decks gave better sound than cassettes, but guess what won the market? CDs are poorer quality than vinyl, but they killed the record industry anyway. MP3s that can be downloaded from the internet aren’t as good as CDs, but CD sales aren’t what they used to be.
Of course most people can’t hear the difference anyway. By the time we hit our late 30s, we’ve lost enough range of hearing that we are kidding ourselves if we think we can tell the difference between a well pressed LP and an MP3.

It’s not about quality, it’s about good enough.

[texandrews]

interesting article that resonated with me on why I don't use the camera on my phone nearly as much as many people do:

The problem with camera phones that nobody talks about - DIY Photography

I don't know what the hell he means "nobody talks about". Ummm, all serious photographers talk about that.

[monochrome]

I don't know what the hell he means "nobody talks about". Ummm, all serious photographers talk about that.

Serious photographers must be such a tiny share of the total ‘all photographers’ set as to be rendered nobody. We’re on a serious photographer Forum; and in the context of those, we are associated with a rather insignificant brand. Consequently we pretty much qualify as nobody.