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| You don't need an expensive camera to make decent pictures. I used a budget travel zoom Panasonic TZ80 for this. One of the latest smartphones would also do a good job. |
By ‘compact camera” I mean a small fixed lens modelnot the larger type usually known as “bridge camera”.
Here is a quote from the 18 November 2017 Digital Photography Review analysis of the photographic capability of the Google Pixel 2 smartphone:
“Few would argue that in 2017 the mobile device industry is a major driver of imaging hardware innovation. Long gone are the days when the size of the image sensor and the aperture were the major determining factors for image quality. Instead, phone manufacturers have turned to software and computational imaging methods to achieve better detail, wider dynamic range and lower noise levels, as well as high-quality zooming and DSLR-like bokeh effects.
High-powered chipsets with built-in image signal processors and sensors with very fast read-out times make it possible to combine image data that is captured by dual-lenses, or several frames recorded in quick succession, within milliseconds. These methods produce image quality that would have been unthinkable on a smartphone only a few years ago and often surpasses basic compact cameras.
Thanks to those advances in software, but also new hardware concepts, such as dual-cameras, hybrid AF-systems and more powerful image signal processors, current smartphone cameras are better than ever before.”
Actually most of the opinionistas writing about compact cameras are not predicting anything.
They are just looking at the charts of year-on–year production figures for fixed lens cameras, showing a steep decline over the last few years. Extend the chart line down and you hit the bottom somewhere around 2020.
Compact cameras gone, smartphones win.
Is that the way it will be ?
Maybe, but maybe compact cameras will survive as niche products which might appeal to two kinds of buyers.
One is the premium/prestige group who want something really expensive to show off to their friends.
The other is the camera enthusiast/traditionalist/geeky mob who persist in wanting to take photos with a “real camera”.
Consider the following: film and film cameras, vinyl records and turntables, analogue watches and prestige motor cars.
* Film and film cameras are dead, right ?
Well…..not quite. Rumors of the death of film have been slightly exaggerated. There is in fact a mini revival of film within the niche market of retro camera enthusiasts, with new film cameras being announced recently.
Oh and by the way just in case we should forget, one of the most popular cameras on the market today is the Fuji Instax which uses instant film and produces tiny little prints in a few seconds.
The Instax range of cameras are cheap, cheerful and easy for children to use.
* Vinyl records and turntables. These things died out years ago, right ?
Not quite. They remain popular with an enthusiast user group who support a small market for turntables and vinyl records.
* Mechanical analogue watches. When digital watches arrived I well remember many confident predictions that the end of the mechanical watch was nigh and the death of the Swiss watch making industry was imminent. This was many years ago.
It did not happen. Mechanical analogue watches moved upmarket and became prestige items.
I was recently conversing with a gentleman who sells these things. He told me that he might agree to sell me one if his management approved my application to purchase (seriously, he said that) and if I was able to meet the price which started at $10,000 for an entry level model.
My Casio basic waterproof digital watch cost $60. It keeps perfect time and runs for years on a single battery. I could buy 166 of these for the price of an “entry level” prestige mechanical model.
* Luxury cars. If people bought stuff based on logic and practicality and value for money the luxury/prestige car industry would not exist. I live in Sydney. In some parts of the city you can see lots of very expensive Range Rovers driving about in congested suburbs with perpetual stop-start traffic. These vehicles with a high level of off road ability never get out of the suburbs. You could buy a whole fleet of small cars like my very capable, practical Honda Jazz for the same money as one Range Rover.
What do film cameras, vinyl records, mechanical watches and prestige motor cars have in common ?
* They are (with the exception of the Fuji Instax which is completely rational) totally irrational.
* But people want them and buy them at sometimes ridiculously inflated prices because they are “special” in some way significant to the buyer.
The nature of that special quality is not the same for each of these things.
Vinyl records and film cameras appeal to the enthusiast/counter technology/nerdy mob.
Fancy analogue watches and prestige cars appeal to those seeking status symbols.
So, where does the compact camera, or indeed any kind of camera fit into this scenario ?
Readers of this blog will be aware that I have recently been testing and reviewing the Canon G1X3 compact camera.
It makes good pictures, fine. But so do most of the other cameras I have tested in the last few years.
In fact once photos are printed up or output on the web I find it very difficult to tell which camera made which picture and that includes cameras which use the very small 7.67mm diagonal sensor up to those which use the much larger 27mm diagonal (APS-C) sensor.
When I think about the G1X3 it comes to me that there is nothing “special” about it. It is competent within its design limitations but is not particularly interesting or exciting, either to behold or to use.
Its best feature is the reliable autofocus, but that should be a given, a necessary but not sufficient capability for a camera that anybody would want to buy.
Digital Photography Review is currently running readers choice awards for various categories of photo device. In the “Best high end compact” section readers gave top billing to the Fujifilm X100F which attracted almost three times as many votes as the Canon G1X3.
I have used one of these X100 cameras (I think it was the original version) and found it to be verging on ridiculous from an ergonomic point of view. The handle and thumb support are rudimentary, the controls a confusing mix of arcane and modern, the monitor is fixed and the lens does not zoom.
There are odd little dials here and there to fill in the functional gaps left by the traditional controls.
The clumsy system for changing ISO setting is borrowed from mechanical SLRs of the 1960s and is absurdly anachronistic on a modern electronic camera.
I could go on but in terms of the user experience this is one very compromised, not-so-little compact. It is also expensive for what you get.
So what’s the appeal ?
It doesn’t appeal to me in the slightest so at this point I must guess.
I think it has that “special” factor for some buyers. I suspect the main attraction for enthusiast camera buyers is the style of the X100 cameras. Within the camera genre the X100 models do in fact have a classical rangefinder style.
By comparison the G1X3 is just an oddly shaped little black blob of no recognisable style at all.
I doubt the G1X3 will engender much pride of ownership in buyers.
Functionally the G1X3 is a much better, more versatile, more capable camera but it is not getting the love from camera enthusiasts, at least not those on DPR.
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| G1X3 on the left with Mockup 15 on the right |
Can the compact camera survive ?
I think it can but camera makers have to step up with the right products. Ideally they would produce something which can appeal to all the potential buyer groups, the fashionistas, the gear snobs and the geeky mob (the ones who actually like using cameras) who value capability, performance and ergonomics.
As it happens I have already designed this camera for them.
This is my Mockup 15 which I built two years ago as an exercise to see how much camera I could get into a small camera pouch.
I think that if properly implemented a camera built to this design could make lots of users happy and make really good pictures into the bargain.
Purely by chance Mockup 15 has about the same box volume (width x height x depth) as the G1X3 although the proportions are slightly different.
It looks larger than the G1X3 in the photos (although it is actually slightly smaller) because
a) it is silver so it stands out more and
b) it “fills the box”. The width, height and depth are carried right through almost to the corners.
It has a distinct style derived entirely from its ergonomic development. Compared to the G1X3 it has a much greater lens diameter and a much larger, fully anatomical handle with quad control set and twin dial on top and a thumb stick on the back.
It looks like something special and if built properly would provide a really special user experience.
Canon once made cameras in this “fat handle, fill the box” style. For example the well regarded G6 of 2004 which also had a very similar box volume to the G1X3.
I want to see Canon regain the courage it once showed and return to this basic concept, with better implementation of course, the G6 had some weird control locations.
I want Canon to stop its current cautious, conservative, focus group driven, design-by-committee approach to product development and go all out for the best camera that any maker could possibly produce.
Lots of buyers might really like that.
As for Mockup 15, any of the mainstream camera makers could turn this into a production model right now.
Do they dare ? probably not.