there is no 10 year camera anymore, there might bee a 10 year system or glass but even that is questionable....as much as i love some old glass that i have, i use if for a certain look now....and not everything has to be perfectly sharp and detailed....
as far as bodies go....2 years is a good rotation...the old body is still valuable enough to get some money for it and the new ones usually just do just about everything slightly better then the one it replaces....D800, D810, D850....A7RII, A7RIII (even more so) ...nobody would work with the D850 and say "no the D810 is better" because it isn't...it might not be worth the hassle and extra cost to make the switch but in the end there are a lot of people out there who have the D800 and want the D810, so right now, that makes the choice easy....
switching systems is a much bigger deal: lenses (less so with mirrorless) and of course menus and handling....but even that is in reality not that big of a deal and (like i said) I and most people i know don't like any menu system...we all agree that it gets crazy and i am pretty sure that at this point i could probably do things quicker with my cameras if i would read the manual better and use some of the features better.....same goes for my computer/trackpad....i have to force myself to learn new shortcuts and gestures and when i do, the do make my life easier...that won't change, it will only get worse (or better depending how you look at it)...it used to be that one had to deposit checks at the bank, then the ATM, then mobile, now "who writes checks anymore?"
all these advances are just on a curve that never stops going up, steeper and steeper.....i already feel i missed a few points on that curve when i watch my kids interact with devices....they are also so much more open to accepting changes and new ways, as long as they are intuitive and make sense....funny enough they have zero tolerance for bad interfaces....
i don't think it is a coincidence that film and analog is making a big comeback....the simplicity of the act of shooting (very little settings other then iso, shutter and f stop) combined with the thrill of the unexpected and the coincidence and the piece of mind that there are limited options for post (at least if you stay analog and don't hire a master printer)....its liberating....
i am very excited that hasselblad got out of their "lets relabel sonys and sell them to idiots" phase and really hope that DJI will bring some real innovation because photography needs heritage and nostalgia....which is why i think what leica is doing is great as well...i love their boutiques, i love their angagement in the community, but they will have to at some point concentrate on actually producing semi competitive cameras, because right now (other then the Q) they do not....it starts with the sensor....it would bee so much harder to argue against a leica that has the same basic specs as pix, iso, dr and general speed but the magic leica sauce applied to it, wrapped in a magic leica body, combined with magic leica glass (which btw is the biggest let down for me right now, their glass isn't so magic anymore compared to everyone else) ....i would pay a premium for a A7RII leica with extra leica sauce (and i am not talking about a wood handle and ostrich leather skin)....hey, i am shooting a GFX, so i am paying a premium for slightly better IQ with lesser speed and handling (compared to D850 and A7RIII)!
I have a bit more time to write today (and apologies for my clumpsy english) and expand a bit my thoughts on this conversation because what you pointed is interesting.
The question to me, and many others as a growing movement (or countermouvement), is aimed to what kind of imagery this business is willing to go and for who and...if digital really simplified the workflows as we all claim or are there hidden aspects that in fact made it even more complicated and sometimes more costly? As photographers/videographers, there is no question: technology helps.
As viewer, art lover and consummer, not that sure.
In digital imagery, the incredible technological advances and complexities involved did not have the same impact in real life to the consummer it's aimed for.
It did mostly for the shooter and production costs, apparently and at first.
You take your car, a plane, a train, and the security aspect, ambiental, interface and performances has nothing to do with let's say the 90's. The evolution is extremely noticiable for both the client and the operator.
I take a vogue magazine from the 90's, I go to see a Branco exhibition huge prints in an art gallery and compare to what's being produced today, as a viewer, I don't notice anything except an extremely boring and repetitive HDR imagery, skin pores on models that I don't want to see.
The imagery today is pretencious, pompous and not better despite the enourmous amount of technology. Ask people (not photographers) in a movie theater, in a gallery about 50mpx, HDR and so on...they don't care. They are not interested in those things. People hardly notice the difference in a 2k dcp theater vs 4k. They enjoy the story when it's good, and the only ones who notice are professionals. So? We have a problem here already, but
This, is a much bigger problem that is comming:
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6OWs75BLCAAYou pointed to the fact that you have to learn new shorcuts, new workflows, new training every 2 or so years. True, we all bloody have. Is that really freedom? It's bondage! And we are all trapped. Bondage with not only photographical tools but all the post production aspect pressure that is getting more complex and expensive, and require constant educational upgrades. Wait until clients will ask 8 bloody k in HDR and we'll have to upgrade studios at the cost of a home to keep-up with the "inevitable flow of technology". And when we'll do, we'll be out of business 4 years later when the need for a new magical step will be imposed by the brand themselves. Is that the low cost of digital imagery roadmap?
It costs less first...then,
It costs more!
Brilliant! Economicaly geniouses. As you pointed Hassy, but to take a general picture and use a bit your phraseology,
Brands say: "let's sell new gear and standarts to those idiots every 2 years so they also have to renew computers, displays, softwares and we all make an enourmous amount of cash on those".
So they create the needs. And they really do.
This already is an enormous mess with proprietary curves, gammas etc...and the attempts of the academy to cure the sins on the fly has brought even more confusion in what was already a divine chaos. I join a screenshot of my studio with a red arrow to underline this current nonsense I'm talking about and it's just scratching the surface of a much bigger black hole as you know.
So the tech never ceses to grow as you pointed, and with the flow, the need to keep-up, which means that instead of enjoying our kids, wife or whatever, we, as idiots, will be obliged to learn more shortcuts, more menus, more softwares all the time.
And that is exponential as it grows.
But we still print the same size magazines don't we? and theaters have not trippled their screen sizes because of 8k.
The guy who was my photo teacher in Fine Arts does
Huge prints, 3, 4 and more meters. His work is on museums. I'm still waiting to see this quality with today's printer extremely oscur profiles and colour management jargon that became an affair only tech freaks understand...and the more hillarious of all that is, the art consummers/lovers, vogue readers, don't even care because what matters is the quality of the work, the emotion, the connection and none of those things.
Peter Lindberg could not care less about frequency separation gimmicks nor use MUAs and hates as much as I do the art directors of the agencies. He is the perfect example of a big name who said fuckoff to this industry madness and just shoots digital like in film days.
I'm not the kind of guy who like to live in the past. I love the now, I love the tech...but what is happening is 80% a big hoax
To make people buying gear and tv screens every 2 years.
To conclude, we have this never ending imagery tech, new super sensors, new AF...
What do they really brought? Marketing? Real? Both! This morning I did something for the fun I hate doing and actually never did. I took in imaging ressources the same boring image of a house from an old rusty uncompetitive outdated unapropriate dinausor Nikon D2x 12mpx, and the current micro 4/3 super mega hyper reffined sophisticated 20mpx sensor. I upsampled both to the exact same resolution. I was sure the enormous goodies of today's tech would smatch the old D2 in the face...I was blown away when I saw the results I link here. I was not expecting what I saw but it's real. It makes think...and think big!
What is happening in today's imagery? I don't know but for the viewer nothing ever happened.