Smartphones Killing High-End Camera Sales – Report
InformationWeek’s Eric Zeman reports that many of today’s leading smartphones offer not only high megapixel counts, but astounding software that lets them shoot in a wide variety of different modes, and that while the appeal of camera-equipped smartphones has led to a decline in point-and-shoot camera sales for some time, and now it appears that these uber-devices are impacting sales of high-end, professional cameras, too, with research firm IDC predicting interchangeable-lens cameras (dSLR)shipments will drop 9.1% from 19.1 million last year to 17.4 million this year, forcing major dSLR makers Canon and Nikon to lower forecasts for the year, and third-party lensmaker Tamron’s shipments dropping by as much as 22% during the first three quarters, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.
Not really a shock here. Your editor used to make part of his living back in the day as a wedding and portrait photographer, using middle-high end 35mm SLRs and medium format twin lens reflexes. These days I use either a point and shoot, or surprisingly often the rear-facing camera in my iPad. As the adage goes, “the best camera is the one you have with you at the time – or something like that. CM.
For the full report visit here:
http://goo.gl/204fuK
More from IDC on interchangable lens camera market here:
http://www.idc.com/getdoc.jsp?containerId=242987
