Hi,
I would be pretty sure that the volume market has been washed away by phone cams. That's what folks carry all day, and they are perfectly capable for a wide range of needs. Let us not forget that full HD is about 2 MP and most images are displayed much smaller than HD.
Now, there will always be photographers striving for more quality, but also the flexibility of interchangeable lens cameras (ILC). And, we still have folks shooting film, even large format film.
I would also say that the ILC market is probably a bit saturated, but I still see some potential for growth.
- Photographers moving upscale from say phone cams to ILCs
- Photographers moving from APS-C to full frame systems. Margins are higher for full frames.
- There will be a transition from DSLR to mirrorless
- There will be new technologies making photography more attractive
Personally, the technology that was most important for me was live view, that I can use for exact manual focus. I bought three cameras just because of that single feature.
Video is also a great addition for me, but I feel there is much to do on that side. I got the impression that Panasonic has great video done the right way.
There is of course a giant market in Asia, something like four billion customers in China and India. Being to able to sell to those markets may be the key to survival.
Best regards
Erik
yes, that is a quite plausable and less gloomy explanation.
By the way, phones cannot replace system cameras in one important respect: lens choices for telephoto reach and handling low light and/or the need for high shutter speeds: for that, there is no substitute for large front elements (or to be pedantic, large entrance pupil diameter), so lenss that do those jobs well will never fit into a phone. But for the vast majority of what actually used to be done with consumer level SLRs (and a single lens, most often), pocketable phone-camera-computers are getting to be good enough.
