I have had the original A7C for a few years now and still puzzled how no other maker wants this small body business. I know they are successful sales wise. What is it? Why doesn't Nikon or Canon not jump in the mix. Is it the smaller E mount making it easier?
MARKFER wrote:
I have had the original A7C for a few years now and still puzzled how no other maker wants this small body business. I know they are successful sales wise. What is it? Why doesn't Nikon or Canon not jump in the mix. Is it the smaller E mount making it easier?
I don't really know, but it may be that it is quite the engineering feat to put a high mpix sensor, an evf, an LCD, an advanced ibis, and an advanced autofocus with all the accompanying electronics into a very small body and still not have the thing get hot enough to cook on. Sony cherished compactness from its entry into mirrorless. The others are coming from the capacious (some might say engorged) DSLR tradition where you got your strength training while carrying your camera.
MARKFER wrote:
I have had the original A7C for a few years now and still puzzled how no other maker wants this small body business. I know they are successful sales wise. What is it? Why doesn't Nikon or Canon not jump in the mix. Is it the smaller E mount making it easier?
My guess would be that Sony is much bigger than other companies that also make cameras/lenses, so, they have more money to spend on R&D and more money to deal with business risks. This allows them to test the market with variants of products.
I'd think it's more long term business plan decision or decisions. I'd hesitate to suggest this is an engineering ability difference. Maybe Nikon has a resource allocation concern, being a smaller operation?
I am not an insider, but my understanding of high-tech manufacturing is that it's a top-down waterfall process. You invest money into R&D to build new tech. To recoup that investment quickly you launch an expensive high-status top-of-the-line product leveraging the shiny new tech. The high margins pay back your R&D but a flagship also elevates your brand and generates buzz. Then, if the flagship is successful, you start scaling by launching higher-volume, lesser-margin mass products. And when it's fully scaled up, you can begin experimenting with novel form factors. From digital cameras to electric cars and semuconductors - everyone appears to be on a similar product development lifecycle.
Canon and Nikon are simply behind in this cycle in the mirrorless world. They launched their first truly successful flagships relatively recently, with Nikon just now completing the "trickling down" flow to the Z5 II? Some would argue that Canon still doesn't have a true flagship with the R1.
Now compare that to Sony. They are even criticized for not inventing anything new, because they're enjoying the luxury of being the market leader and re-packaging the fruits of their past R&D into as many form-factors as the market would bear.
MARKFER wrote:
I have had the original A7C for a few years now and still puzzled how no other maker wants this small body business. I know they are successful sales wise. What is it? Why doesn't Nikon or Canon not jump in the mix. Is it the smaller E mount making it easier?
There are lots of MILC bodies smaller and lighter than the a7C if you consider APS-C and MFT sensors. The full frame Canon R8 and RP are both lighter but larger than the a7C. Sony has generally always made smaller cameras than the other brands. They've actually grown over each generation from the NEX to a7, II, III and IV. Nikon and Canon have never really made "small" cameras other than compact fixed lens models. Both brands still seems to equate size with quality. Even after shifting to mirrorless platforms, both are largely still trying to build mirrorless SLR's. Sony, Fuji, Panasonic and Olympus have never been culturally tied to the SLR design like Nikon and Canon were.
Nikon and Canon's base think that big and bulky equal "pro," as a holdover from the old days. Their lenses share that design philosophy for the most part.
Sony's lens design philosophy is the same as their cameras. Small and light as a priority.
Nikon and Canon are old companies, slow to adapt and unwilling to change.
