The rise of smartphones has left many professional photographers wondering if their services have a future. However, it’s now having an impact on the industry in ways that many might not have anticipated.
The digital era has brought a twofold transformation: more people are able to create acceptable images with technology that’s in their pocket, and fewer images are required at print-ready quality. This double-edged sword has meant that while there are more images than ever, the future for photographers seeking to make a decent living from image-making is feeling increasingly uncertain. What few have realized is that this also has serious implications for the big camera manufacturers; the market is changing, sales of interchangeable lens cameras is all but falling off a cliff, and this will have an impact on how companies develop new products and bring them to market.
The smartphone doesn’t just threaten the future for professional photographers; it also threatens the technology that camera manufacturers are making for professional photographers to use.
This is already being demonstrated by Canon’s recent announcements for the first quarter. The Japanese giant just revealed that sales of their DSLR and MILC cameras have fallen by almost 20% in the first quarter of 2019, prompting them to reduce their sales forecasts for the year by over 14%. The company's new report also explains that Canon expects the camera market to continue to contract for the next couple of years, a trend that they attribute to the ever-increasing performance of smartphones. Trade friction between China and the U.S., the depreciation of the Euro, and economic slow-downs in China and Europe are also factors.
Among these worrying figures and revised forecasts is something that should make professional photographers sit up and take note: how Canon allocates its resources is starting to change. “There is a portion of the market that will remain,” the report states, “serving the needs of professionals and advanced amateurs.” However, it continues: “At the same time, we are taking measures to shift our business focus toward B2B, expanding our business sphere to automotive and industry use.”
While this sounds like a subtle shift, for a company as conservative as Canon, this may prove to have profound implications. Canon is a huge company producing a massive range of products, a portion of which are the consumer and professional-level equipment used in the camera industry. If the consumer camera market is contracting, Canon would be wise to invest its resources elsewhere, and this will have a knock-on effect on its capacity to innovate and the speed at which it brings new products to market.
As professionals, the changes won’t be felt immediately; what seems likely is that the incredible evolution that has been seen in the last ten or fifteen years will slow down. As noted by this insightful TechCrunch article, we’ve reached a plateau in terms of sensor technology and the next major steps in terms of progression will come largely through software, not hardware. We’re already seeing this happen through features such as autofocus performance, and camera companies will be seeking to optimize their return on software development in order to remain competitive.
Canon's downturn in sales and the industry's response to market trends mean that the mirrorless leap might be the last significant evolution of hardware that we see for some time. Innovations will continue to happen but they may no longer arrive as rapidly and at a time when smartphones will continue to offer ever-improving performance. The shift does not prompt the likes of Canon and Nikon to spend more money on developing new products; by contrast, they will become increasingly conservative, a change that may have more serious implications for Nikon given its smaller range of market specializations when compared to Sony and Canon.
The Sony a9. Its first iteration was something of a game-changer. The Mark II will almost certainly pack much less of a punch.
As professionals, we may have to get used to a rate of change that is significantly slower than what we've experienced in recent years. While this poses problems for the broader industry, there may be some unforeseen consequences. For example, this may be of benefit to many photographers who will suddenly feel less pressure to upgrade given that improvements in features seem incremental rather than revolutionary. A slowdown in technology might be kinder to our wallets, even if it comes at the expense of technological progress.
Whatever lies ahead, it feels that 2018 was a significant year for many reasons and the future seems increasingly uncertain. If you have thoughts on what the coming years hold for the camera industry, I'd be grateful to read your comments below.
Lead image is a composite using a photograph by Max Baskakov.
I used to worry when i would see these -the sky is falling- articles. My business hasn't really been hit by the advent of cell phones or mirrorless (i shoot DSLR). Business has actually increased because of otherwise "out of the know" business owners who want the types of pictures they see on SM for marketing purposes... and i don't live in a city.
The great thing is that you can still tell the difference between a professional photo taken by someone who knows light, composition, and settings and someone who is in full auto on their cell phone or entry level shooter.
insert age old saying >>at the end of the day, it's not the gear (to a certain point) it's the photographer.
Whatever may happen, will happen. It's just the way life is. I love photography. I believe that our ultimate goal is to reach other people. People require a sense of connection which could probably be simulated by advanced AI. Still, knowing that the work, however imperfect, is done by living and breathing human being is priceless. So, there is hope for all of us after all.
How many new things does one really need? Maybe if innovation is slowing down, we can take the fine tools that we have and continue to make the best possible pictures that we can produce...
BCN+R reported that Canon EOS RP sales nose dived from 35% to 15% from March to April . Canon needs to realized that it is better to canibalized their own product (such as DSLR) with a competitive mirrorless ILC than to have Canon customer defect to Sony.
There are very few of us whose ability to take superb photos is limited by our equipment, so a slow down in innovation is unlikely to do anything to harm image quality. Indeed, we may even see an improvement as we might concentrate on fully exploiting the capabilities of what we have and will not have to keep learning to use new equipment!
I have a feeling Canon's drop in sales is due to Canon's long-stagnance in the marketplace. I shoot a 5D MKII still and am not excited by much that has come out since. I shoot underwater and I have to ask myself, "Can I justify paying $3,000 for a camera body and then another $3500 for an underwater housing? Can the difference in cameras make up $6500 in value?" The answer is repeatedly "No". I have the latest, greatest iPhone and Portrait mode is a nice gimmick, but it's not the reason people are ditching Canon. Canon's offerings are the reason people are ditching Canon.
35 mm film cameras went for 50+ years with mainly incremental changes. The slowing down of the rate of change might not matter all that much by itself. What will be interesting is to see if some future technology supersedes what we think of as "photography" today.
I dunno , I am a a semi pro who shoots equine events a lot in Australia , I still sell photos. Mobile phones have so many limitations and trying to capture action shots with them is disastrous. The photos are awful. They buy of me.
The camera market is far too conservative and doesn't think out of the box.
I can use my dji osmo pro or dji osmo mobile to shoot a video, make simple edits on my smartphone and upload it blazingly fast. I can take raw pictures on my phone, edit them and post them all very quickly.
Try doing the same on our cameras. The functionality and ease of use for most young people isn't there.
I see what's coming as correction. And yes it would be uncomfortable but in the end it would be all ok.
Owning a SLR during film days wasn't as common as it is today. Even during the start of digital era, professional cameras were only in the hands of professionals. But then things changed. And as more and more people owned interchangeable lens cameras, many of them started getting seriously interested in photography.
But things are now shifting.
Because for the general public, in the end convenience wins and quality becomes secondary. Smartphones are convenient.
And many of them are guilty of not using their fancy DSLRs much.
So what I see is photography industry will be the way it was initially.
A serious photographer with a certain degree of skill, even if a hobbyist would not switch to a smartphone. And we all know the reasons for that.
Good photos that tell good stories will always have value. And also good photographers. And they would make a living too.
I would like to see a break-down of the lost revenue. I would imagine that it it mostly in the entry level DLSR cameras. If I was not an enthusiast, I too would choose one of the new smart phone cameras over dragging around all of the camera gear that I do. An entry level photographer sees a smart phone camera as "good enough." A serious photographer sees the shortcomings of photography with one. You can't compare the the two cameras in serious photography, which is all I care about. When SI does their swimsuit edition with just a smartphone camera, then I'll care.
Andy, why single out Canon when Nikon is also down approx the same amount and Sony is still to report sales? The entire SLR industry is in decline. Mirrorless is the future and innovation hopefully will mitigate the slide in sales. Canon is latest to the mirrorless party but not the reason the entire industry is in decline. I appreciate the tech coming from Sony, Fuji and others pushing the big two to adapt
I singled out Canon because they produced a press release announcing the change. I said it had "implications for big manufacturers," something that was "demonstrated by Canon". You may be right about mirrorless competitors pushing innovation but if Canon is specifically saying that it will focus on other sectors, it will have implications.
I'm guessing older folks will continue to stick with DSLRs like they stick with DVD players but for the future smartphones (should we call them phones anymore?) will rule because of their high cost, multi-functionality and processing power. The better approach for the future of Canon and others would be to create a way to attach the smartphone to DSLR quality glass. Either the camera companies move closer to smartphones or the smartphone companies will move closer to them and possibly deal them a death blow because if I have $1K-$2K to spend on a new device it's not gonna be on a new camera that does just 1 job. Why spend so much money on 2 devices with so much computing/feature overlap??? Time will tell us all.
Reports of photography's demise have been greatly exaggerated. Yes, cell phone cameras have killed the low end point-and-shoot market. But I still have clients hiring me for real estate interiors where a TS-E 17/4L (and TS-E 24/3.5L) render like nothing else, and I can keep all the lines parallel in the camera. Plus the way I light and the ease of working with me please them. So I'm not too worried about the mid- to high-end photography market going away. Granted, I'm not working it super-seriously, since I don't have to depend on it for my income at this point.
As long as there are still lens aberrations to be reduced or eliminated and demand for the best gear, I think manufacturers will stay in the game. Leica was supposed to die several times in their history, but they're learning more every year about how to thrive selling a premium product.
Canon and Nikon could learn something there.