Smartphones Will Kill Off the DSLR Within Three Years, Says Sony (techradar.com) 203
Smartphone cameras and DSLRs have been moving in opposite directions for the past few years, and image quality from phones will finally trump that of their single-lens reflex rivals by 2024, according to Sony. From a report: As reported by Nikkei Japan, the President and CEO of Sony Semiconductor Solutions (SSS), Terushi Shimizu, told a business briefing that "we expect that still images [from smartphones] will exceed the image quality of single-lens reflex cameras within the next few years." Some fascinating slides presented during the briefing were even more specific, with one slide showing that, according to Sony, "still images are expected to exceed ILC [interchangeable lens camera] image quality" sometime during 2024. Those are two slightly different claims, with 'ILCs' also including today's mirrorless cameras, alongside the older DSLR tech that most camera manufacturers are now largely abandoning. But the broader conclusion remains -- far from hitting a tech ceiling, smartphones are expected to continue their imaging evolution and, for most people, make standalone cameras redundant.
*Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:*Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:*Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Informative)
There are quantum limits to what you can do with a small sensor, but it's less of a limitation than most people think.
The amount of light gathered is limited by the size of the front lens element, which is the real limitation. It also happens to determine the maximum resolution, so it gets you twice.
Re: *Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: *Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, if you want to photograph a fast-moving object far away in dim light (hockey game maybe?)... you still have a physics problem on your hands.
Incorrect: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs Canon R6 (Score:5, Insightful)
I have a Canon R6, a middle of the road full frame camera. I have the best camera phone presently made from Apple. They don't compare in any light.
In dim light, the Canon blows the iPhone out of the water. There's more detail, less noise, and more vivid colors. Even in bright light, the difference goes down, but on a 5k monitor, there's a lot more detail and more vivid color on the camera photos.
DSLRs are largely dead now. MILC, particularly medium format or full frame beat anything Apple or Google has put out. I don't believe this rep. The sensor size makes too much off a difference.
Comparing a phone to a real camera is like comparing ear buds to studio headphones. Ear buds sound nice and are good enough for many situations, but you'd never want earbuds if a nice set of headphones are available. The same applies to photos. If you have no camera, a phone will do, but you'd never want a phone image over a camera one.
Unless a MAJOR MAJOR unprecedented sensor advancement is coming in 2024 and NO ONE has leaked a rumor about it, because I haven't heard about it, the physics just don't work out. The larger sensor will take better images with today's sensor technology. There's no way around it. The features like sensor size that make for a good camera make for a cumbersome phone and the features that make for a good phone make for shitty image quality on a camera.
Re:Incorrect: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs Canon R6 (Score:5, Informative)
In dim light, the Canon blows the iPhone out of the water. There's more detail, less noise, and more vivid colors. Even in bright light, the difference goes down, but on a 5k monitor, there's a lot more detail and more vivid color on the camera photos.
Not to mention being able to partially refocus after the fact on some Canon cameras (dual-pixel), etc. (which you can sometimes fake a bit with machine learning, but it only goes so far).
Comparing a phone to a real camera is like comparing ear buds to studio headphones. Ear buds sound nice and are good enough for many situations, but you'd never want earbuds if a nice set of headphones are available.
I would when out walking. :-)
The same applies to photos. If you have no camera, a phone will do, but you'd never want a phone image over a camera one.
In much the same way, there are occasionally situations where a phone image beats a real camera. Specifically, when shooting through a fence, the cell phone will win almost every time, because its smaller lens isn't obstructed, whereas the real camera's lens is.
But for the 99% case, I agree.
Unless a MAJOR MAJOR unprecedented sensor advancement is coming in 2024 and NO ONE has leaked a rumor about it, because I haven't heard about it, the physics just don't work out.
Even if an unprecedented sensor advancement is coming out in 2024, the physics still don't work out. I've used long zoom lenses on an iPod Touch to get the equivalent of ~900mm focal length, and I've used a 2x teleconverter on my 5D Mark IV with my 100–400 L II lens to get an 800mm focal length on that. The difference? With the iPod Touch, I experienced:
I actually ended up building a mounting bracket for the lens, and fastening *that* to a tripod, because the device was so much lighter than the lens, and that was the only way to keep the mount point flex from making it unusable. And even then, it was just *barely* good enough *most* of the time.
The image quality from a 100–400L with a 2x teleconverter stacked on top of a 3x teleconverter still massively exceeds the iPhone image with a 30x telephoto lens (if you ignore how carefully you have to prop the thing and how hard it is to get it to focus), and that's at about a 2220mm focal length versus 900.
So when anybody actually suggests that cell phones will make real cameras obsolete in a couple of years, I pretty much assume that the person has never actually used a real camera.
Re: Incorrect: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs Canon R6 (Score:2)
So when anybody actually suggests that cell phones will make real cameras obsolete in a couple of years, I pretty much assume that the person has never actually used a real camera.
It doesn't matter. You camera nerds sound just like me a few years ago when everyone started buying sound bars instead of a proper surround sound system.
Real speakers and propers amps are better in every way. Almost anyone can tell the difference.
But nobody actually cares. There is a thing called "good enough" and phone cameras have already passed that threshold.
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It doesn't matter. You camera nerds sound just like me a few years ago when everyone started buying sound bars instead of a proper surround sound system. Real speakers and propers amps are better in every way. Almost anyone can tell the difference. But nobody actually cares. There is a thing called "good enough" and phone cameras have already passed that threshold.
I'm laughing really hard now. Phone cameras aren't even in the same country as "good enough". Wake me up when I can realistically sit in the back row of an auditorium and get close-ups of performers. Wake me up when I can shoot photos of bald eagles in their nests from a road a quarter mile away. Wake me up when I can shoot football players running down the field at night, lit only by high-school-level stadium lights, or basketball players in a poorly lit gymnasium. Wake me up when...
You get the idea.
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You still don't get it. The average person doesn't give a shit. That's all that matters to the market, and the market only cares about sales.
You still don't get it. This guy claimed that phones would kill off DSLRs. They won't. We've already reached the point where almost nobody whose needs can be realistically met by a cell phone is buying DSLRs or MILCs. The standalone camera market bottomed out way back in 2020. The 2021 numbers are basically at 2020 levels. There's no reason to believe that phones will steal much of the remaining market at all, because the people who are still buying this expensive gear are the ones who can't possibly
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So when anybody actually suggests that cell phones will make real cameras obsolete in a couple of years, I pretty much assume that the person has never actually used a real camera.
It doesn't matter. You camera nerds sound just like me a few years ago when everyone started buying sound bars instead of a proper surround sound system.
Real speakers and propers amps are better in every way. Almost anyone can tell the difference.
But nobody actually cares. There is a thing called "good enough" and phone cameras have already passed that threshold.
The cameras built into phones aren't replacing interchangable-lens cameras or bridge cameras, they're replacing point-and-shoots.
Those who want a camera with real optical performance characteristics wouldn't have used a typical point-and-shoot anyway, or would have used a high-end point-and-shoot that has more in common with a DSLR or mirrorless than a low-end point-and-shoot anyway.
I took a photo today of a communications tower that I had just had equipment installed onto. I used a 300mm lens on an APS-C
Re:Incorrect: iPhone 13 Pro Max vs Canon R6 (Score:5, Insightful)
Go all the way, or go home!
The phone will cover most situations, and the DSLR a few more edge cases. But if you really want to move to another level, there are two choices:
1: large format cameras. You can still buy the film, but they have gone digital now. Behold the 8"x10" sensor bellows camera! [thephoblographer.com]
2: The other way is to go with a cryo-cooled CCD for low noise.
However, it should be acknowledged that the primary use of large DSLR cameras today, is to help convince your model that you are a serious artist, and the photos will be tasteful.
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They could, you know. There's more surface area on the back of phones than there is in the lens of full-frame cameras. Sure they'd have to capture with some kind of dragonfly eye and combine the images, but there's plenty of surface area there for phones to beat single-lens full-frame cameras. (That does sound like a major major advance over current phones that I haven't heard anyone proposing.)
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Unless a MAJOR MAJOR unprecedented sensor advancement is coming in 2024 and NO ONE has leaked a rumor about it, because I haven't heard about it, the physics just don't work out. The larger sensor will take better images with today's sensor technology. There's no way around it. The features like sensor size that make for a good camera make for a cumbersome phone and the features that make for a good phone make for shitty image quality on a camera.
And even if such a breakthru happens, I think that DSLR manufacturers will also use the same or similar tech (maybe need to licence). At which point DSLRs will have an advantage over phone cams again.
Same if there is some breakthru for lens tech as well.
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You are still down to physics. A 4x increase in sensor size is a 16x increase in incident light. You aren't going to make that up in software or stacking (unless you have a tripod). Add in optics to the mix and the advantage to a (mirrorless) camera keeps growing.
Re: *Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Insightful)
And any software stacking (or other) trick you can use to make cell phones work better as cameras, you can also use to make cameras work better as cameras.
And while SLRs and mirrorless equivalents are way behind on applying that technology, largely, I suspect, because phones have more powerful processors that cameras have ever had, there are add-on devices like the Arsenal [witharsenal.com] that automate a lot of the Photoshop tricks that are routine for serious hobbyists, and apply many of the same tricks that cameras do.
At which point, it does, as you say, come down to sensor size (and type), and the bigger sensor will always provide more raw data to work with than a smaller one. (And interchangeable lenses will always provide more versatility than fixed lenses.)
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Actually, smartphones are going the way of computational photography - using multiple sensors to capture the image and then processing it into one big image to accommodate the lack of sensor size.
It gets purists mad, but it's doing a pretty good job. I wouldn't say it's dSLR quality, but I think for the non-professional, it's good enough.
Smartphones have already killed the point and shoot camera. Sony might be right in that they're going to kill the low end dSLR market in 3 years. I doubt they'll kill the p
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They seem to be forgetting one big thing - the zoom functionality of smartphones suck.
I’m a non professional, and no smart phone is going to replace my 600 mm lens (which with a 1.5 crop factor on my DLSR gives me a 900 mm equivalent zoom)
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There are phones with optical zoom now. The have a motorized lens at a right angle, and a mirror.
50x zoom and no need for a tripod.
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Uhhhh that's nonsense. All that matters is the lens to sensor ratio. Small sensors mean you can have a small telephoto lens.
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Sure, if you like making very detailed pictures of Airy disks.
Re:*Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Informative)
You might be able to do something by having two lenses on opposite corners of the camera case, and then using interferometry to combine them like a phased array, but I'm not enough of an expert to know if you need an optical path between the two to make it work, or just a digital one.
Re:*Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:4, Informative)
You absolutely need an optical path. You can avoid this with radio waves because electronics can record the actual waves and do the interferometry digitally. Visible light has a frequency over 10E14Hz (100 terahertz) so it's not even close to being possible. Observatories that do multi-telescope visible-light interferometry have elaborate arrangements of moving mirrors that need to precisely bring the light captured by different telescopes together.
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Bruh... people aren't buying smartphones or DSLRs to photograph Jupiter. Within the normal range of telephoto lenses that DSLRs use, it's perfectly fine in a periscope smartphone lens.
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Yeah that was my first thought (Score:2)
I mean, good enough is always good enough, but I question if that's the case when you're trying to stand out in a competitive market and you want to best pictures you can get to hock your wares.
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"but I question if that's the case when you're trying to stand out in a competitive market and you want to best pictures you can get to hock your wares."
When selling stuff online, you're selling a photograph. Better take the absolute best possible picture you can get.
Re: Yeah that was my first thought (Score:2)
The cell phone replaced the point and shoot. The point of such systems is to provide the consumer with a high quality image that conforms to expectations yet requires no technical skill.
Physics dictates that the lens of a cell phone cannot produce an image that can be useful to the professional. The image is a creation of software, not actively created by the imagination of a human. I use c
And smartphones have tiny lenses (Score:2)
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They seem to be forgetting one big thing - the zoom functionality of smartphones suck.
True. my Magic Drainpipe is ancient but still amazing. I suspect what Sony is saying is smartphones will replace the very low end dSLRs much as they have many of the P&S. dSLRs will remain around for the serious hobbyist and no doubt incorporate some of the tech that is used in smartphones; just as medium format hasn't been killed by dSLRs either.
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They make lens attachments for smartphones, which is mainly how all those “shot on iPhone” images are taken.
I think computational photography, with the ability to mimic different conditions, is what will kill the DSLR, not sensor or lens improvements. Apple didn’t change anything about the new iPhone SE camera from the previous version, yet because of the newer chip, it takes better photos.
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DSLR is dying because there's no need for a flipping mirror anymore. But phones will never be as good at taking photos as a good camera, no matter how much digital manipulation of the image the phone does.
Re: *Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:5, Interesting)
Don't know the mirrorless cameras will probably kill DSLR. Having a mirror for a viewfinder between the lens and the sensor compromises the optics massively, and with digital viewfinders displaying exactly what you are about to take the need for an optical viewfinder goes away. The rangefinder never died for this reason and the mirrorless digital cameras will finally kill the single lens reflex camera for good.
Re: *Maybe* for the non-professional (Score:4, Informative)
Don't know the mirrorless cameras will probably kill DSLR. Having a mirror for a viewfinder between the lens and the sensor compromises the optics massively
I don't know what camera you're using, but every camera I've ever owned, the mirror flips up when it is taking a photograph.... If it didn't, then viewfinder light would bleed in and wreck the photos.
and with digital viewfinders displaying exactly what you are about to take the need for an optical viewfinder goes away.
This is arguable. For one thing the resolution of digital viewfinders can't even approach analog resolution. For another, when shooting in low-light conditions (e.g. concerts, plays, dance programs, basically anything involving a stage and dimmed house lights), electronic viewfinders tend to be too bright (though I have not yet tried any of the OLED viewfinders in those conditions).
So I tend to favor actual DSLRs. That said, Canon has already said that they aren't going to design any new DSLRs, so I guess the market has spoken.
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Don't know the mirrorless cameras will probably kill DSLR. Having a mirror for a viewfinder between the lens and the sensor compromises the optics massively
I don't know what camera you're using, but every camera I've ever owned, the mirror flips up when it is taking a photograph.... If it didn't, then viewfinder light would bleed in and wreck the photos.
After thinking about it more, there is one negative side effect of the mirror. By forcing the rear lens elements to be farther away from the sensor, it makes wide-angle lenses larger, and may *slightly* impact image quality.
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Why aren't there zoom improvements in smartphones?
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And without interchangeable lenses, so it's an optical zoom, it always will.
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What if the comment refers to the "R" in DSLR?
Just put a screen on the back and remove the viewfinder and all the optics and mechanics required for the viewfinder. It's no longer a DSLR.
Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same technology? (Score:5, Insightful)
Surely, a phone is always going to have smaller lenses and sensors than you can have on a DSLR. Therefore, if you have a new phone and new DSLR both of which have these wacky new sensor and processing technologies then the DSLR is still going to have the advantage in areas like long lenses, low light performance and depth of field control.
This seems to me to be the classic fallacy that my product is going to beat the opposition because mine will improve whilst they just sit and twiddle their thumbs.
I don't dispute that for very many people modern phones provide all of the photographic capability that they can imagine wanting, but that doesn't mean that there won't be plenty of customers for new - presumably mirror-less - advanced DSLRs.
Re:Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same technolo (Score:5, Interesting)
There can't be a mirror-less DSLR, because "DSLR" stands for "Digital Single-Lens Reflex", and the thing that does the "Reflex" bit is a mirror.
It makes a lot of sense for DSLRs to die because they're an inferior design in many ways. The mirror increases size and puts constraints on the design of wide angle lenses. A mirrorless is just a better design that doesn't force any compromise on the optics.
The only reason why DSLRs aren't completely dead yet is that the mirror system happens to allow for better focusing, but that seems to be going away with phase focusing in the sensor.
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The only reason why DSLRs aren't completely dead yet is that the mirror system happens to allow for better focusing
And tiny 4K OLED screens are pretty expensive and may still not be bright enough to see in direct sunlight so you get a much better preview of your shot with a mirror.
Better focusing doesn't matter if you have a complex subject and you need to actually see which thing is most in focus.
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They're called 'EVIL' cameras (Electronic Viewfinder, Interchangeable Lens), and they have effectively already made DSLRs into dead/niche products. You're not using the screen on the back though -- the camera still *looks* like a DSLR, it's just that instead of a mirror mechanism you've got a small screen inside the viewfinder that gets the image data electronically from the sensor. This solves the 'direct sunlight' problem because the screen is inside the shaded viewfinder box. and also provides three po
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The mirror is there to allow the photograph to see exactly the picture the lens sees right now. Every secondary view has parallax issues, has focusing issues, has framing issues etc.pp.. Each processing and displaying introduces lag, artifacts and degrading of colors.
Only if you overcome those limitations, the mirr
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There are other advantages to DSLRs. If you don't have a mirror you have to decide whether to permanently give up a stop of light for a beamsplitter, or go with an electronic viewfinder. Electronic viewfinders depend on LCDs, which don't have the same dynamic range or resolution as, uh, reality.
The focusing issue you mention is related. In a DSLR you can steal a bit of light from the viewfinder for a dedicated focusing system. In a mirrorless with electronic viewfinder you can't. You can use software and th
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I know have a brand new example of DSLR (Canon T7) and mirrorless (Canon M50). DSLRs are far from dead yet, but they are dying. The practical difference is that Canon makes about 10 times as many different lenses with the EF mount as they do for the EF-M mount. There are adapters available from several companies, and they work very well even with stabilized lenses, but the EF lenses are bigger and heavier for the equivalent focal length. Enough so that the adapters have a tripod mount on them so that the he
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There seem to be only 8 Canon EF-M lens models, introduced from 2012 to 2018. In comparison, their RF models for full-frame mirrorless cameras, have 28 models introduced from 2018 to 2022. It's RF that's going to overtake EF.
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Sony just has a tiny market share in the DSLR market But they have nearly half of the smartphone camera sensor market. Certainly they're comparing today's DSLRs with tomorrow's smartphone cameras to paint themselves in the best light.
If you take that same sensor and make it bigger, and give it more light and then add all the same AI processing you're going to end up with an extremely powerful DSLR or mirrorless camera. Really only the highest in photographers need something at this level at that point.
I
Re:Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same technolo (Score:5, Interesting)
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That's what I want to know. Why can't I buy a DSLR with phone levels of automation, but a much bigger sensor?
I think Sony doesn't have the technology. Their phone cameras are like DSLRs, loads of manual adjustments but the auto mode isn't very good.
Re: Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same technol (Score:2)
DSLRs tend to have limited fps due to the mirror. That makes taking multiple exposures for every shot to do computations on them more challenging.
I think with an MILC, there is no technical reason why you couldn't have as good or better automation than a smartphone. It's a matter of someone investing in that to actually do it. It won't be Sony, apparently. I hope someone will do it. The pictures from my S22 Ultra still suck compared to anything I get out of my Pentax K1 II. But that's a big piece of kit tha
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I was under the impression that most were mirrorless now. Maybe I'm using the wrong terminology.
Re: Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same techno (Score:2)
You are. The R in DSLR stands for Reflex, which means there is a mirror.
DSLRs have lost market share to MILCs, but are still sold and widely used by professionals.
My third camera is an MILC, a Panasonic GX85. It's great for videos, which something my K1 II DSLR sucks at. But in terms of still picture quality, the GX85 still vastly inferior to the DSLR still, mainly due to the much smaller sensor size. The GX85 lacks computational photography also.
I use my S22 Ultra for photos most of the time, as that's wh
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With Canon, at least, the range of lenses available for mirrorless is still pretty limited. You can use the DSLR lenses with an adapter (at least for EF lenses on an EF-M mount), but they are a lot bulkier and heavier.
It's only a matter of time, though.
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If you're taking multiple exposures you flip up the mirror, take all the exposures, then flip it back down again.
Re: Why can't DSLR's benefit from the same techno (Score:2)
Not the way my DSLR works with multiple exposures modes, except in the Pixel Shift Resolution, which is too slow to use most of the time. There isn't enough processing power in the camera, or I/O bandwidth. I think there are also issues with heat with large sensors such as full-frame, which may preclude this scenario. But the sensor in my Pentax is not a modern one. Perhaps current full frame sensors have solved this.
Where the Pentax wins hands down over any camera I have seen is the ergonomics. The OVF, so
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The limitations of your particular camera are not the limitations of a camera design. I doubt very much any of the factors you mention are the issue, it's probably just software. It may be your camera is old enough that the designers didn't think it could shoot multiple frames fast enough to leave an acceptable period of time when the viewfinder was blacked out.
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Actually, overheating is a well-known problem that affects a lot of cameras, but especially ones with large full-frame sensors. Even the current Sony flagship A1 MILC suffers from this issue. https://www.dpreview.com/forums/thread/4601639 .
Overheating is actually a more common problem with MILC, as most have smaller body than DSLRs. But it's especially prevalent on Sony cameras, and they make their own sensors.
The smaller sensors in smartphones don't tend to overheat the same way, at least not the current g
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That's what I want to know. Why can't I buy a DSLR with phone levels of automation, but a much bigger sensor?
Because so far, nobody had decided to test the market with a camera that has all the expense of high end camera hardware plus the expense of a high end phone processor. Cameras have a lot less capable processors.
So far.
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Cameras have a lot less capable processors.
Because pros tend to want to process "in post", i.e., on a computer after the shots are all taken. They generally stick with RAW image files which have the data largely unprocessed, straight off the sensor. It's consumer model cameras that feel the pressure to do more automatically, particularly as they're also the ones most in danger from smart phone competition.
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As the sensor gets better you just make it smaller
Where are you going to get those tiny photons?
In fairness, Japan sucks with camera innovation (Score:3)
The article is all about how phone image quality will get better because of better sensors and better processing. But, why can't exactly the same sensor and processing technology be applied to new DSLRs?
In fairness, have you used modern cameras? Canon JUST got USB charging. You still can't cloud sync your photos in any convenient manner. They're about 20 years behind the American companies in innovation. I find that about most Japanese products. The are masters at refining technology, but stumble at innovation lately. With my phone, I can take a picture, wait an hour or so, and its up in the cloud with no action on my part and I can view it on my computer or iPad. I still can't do that on my Canon.
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why can't exactly the same sensor and processing technology be applied to new DSLRs?
Because of the "good enough" principal. You usually only need "enough": resolution, dynamic range and sensitivity but not really any more.
And if both can attain the same product, you're going to reach for the one that's cheaper, lighter, has lightroom built in and can back up your photos in real-time to the cloud. Then you get into a downward spiral as less people use DSLRs so there is less investment. Less investment means less R&D which means lower quality which further pushes customers to the ph
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I don't dispute that for very many people modern phones provide all of the photographic capability that they can imagine wanting, but that doesn't mean that there won't be plenty of customers for new - presumably mirror-less - advanced DSLRs.
I think the more technically correct term you should be using is in the summary: ILC (interchangeable lens camera). But yes, the benefits from improved smartphone cameras should filter down to mid-range and high-end standalone cameras. Recent models of bridge cameras (e.g. midrange cameras with optical zoom lengths that would require a back pack when featured in a DSLR) already feature wifi and GPS.
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The real world difference, so far, is that phones have much more powerful processors. That means they can do a lot of automated processing to improve picture quality. To get the same advantages (and then some) in a camera, you use Photoshop after the fact, or invest in something like the Arsenal [slashdot.org] device to automate a lot of is in real time on the camera.
In short, yes, you certainly can get the same benefits, but camera manufacturers haven't done so yet because cameras with cell phone level processing power w
Uh . . . yeah . . . sure . . . (Score:2)
DO ANOTHER CAMERA PHONE SONY (Score:2)
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They have. It's the new $1600 Xperia that was recently reviewed by MKBHD on youtube
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My last experience with Xperia was terrible, a complete crap phone that was dead in 18 months. Never again a Sony.
You can't do better than the lens (Score:2)
And the lens of a dedicated camera will always be better. Nor can you capture more light than the aperture will permit, and dedicated cameras capture more light.
Sony... (Score:4, Insightful)
DSLRs are being killed by... (Score:5, Informative)
... mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras
Smartphones have already killed snapshot cameras. No matter how good phone cameras get, there are always the physical limitations of tiny lenses and sensors.
Serious photographers are a minority, but we demand real cameras
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Serious photographers are a minority, but we demand real cameras
But how many are you and how much are you willing to pay for them?
The DSLR market is shrinking, more people are just using smartphones. Vendors (like Sony) will eliminate products and perhaps exit the market entirely, and the few that remain will be for the exceedingly niche market that "demands" them and will pay.
You want to be buying your camera from a medical imaging equipment suppliers at medical imaging equipment supplier prices with requisite service contracts?
Other markets have gone a similar route.
T
Another prediction about trump and 2024 ... (Score:2)
That probably won't come true either. :-) I mean... zoom, sensor size and interchangeable lenses (and probably a bunch of other stuff) are severely lacking on smartphones vs DSLRs.
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Not to mention the ridiculous depth of field on such a tiny sensor...
However they are doing some pretty amazing computational photography work at Google and Apple. They can "fake" it to the degree that most people don't need anything but their modern phone.
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Not to mention the ridiculous depth of field on such a tiny sensor... However they are doing some pretty amazing computational photography work at Google and Apple. They can "fake" it to the degree that most people don't need anything but their modern phone.
Great, so all smart phone photos will be depth fakes. What could go wrong? :-)
Apples 'n' oranges (Score:2)
When a phone can do these things, then sure (Score:2)
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Yes, although I'm not really sure what you mean by "control framing through focal length (Not zooming)".
An optical system is an optical system. The limitations in a smartphone are physical dimensions and weight. A smartphone can never achieve the same image quality as a larger camera because higher resolution, greater light gathering, decreased chromatic aberration, pretty much everything that goes into "image quality" is fundamentally limited by the size and number of optical elements you're packing.
Wrong again Sony (Score:2)
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Re: Wrong again Sony (Score:2)
They might kill the market (Score:2)
But you can't gather more photons with small pixels, there will always be a physical limit. I guess if you could detect photons with 100% accuracy, then maybe, I think there are noise and other limits there also. So no, a sub 1" sensor will never be better than a full frame sensor. But, I don't carry around a DSLR as often as I used to, because my phone will do most of what I want and it's way easier to use a crappy sensor than lug a camera around.
Doubtful (Score:2)
I call BS (Score:2)
I'm certain I'm not the only one who has a hell of a time trying to see frame a subject on a phone display in bright sunlight. I discovered years ago that LCD displays are absolutely horrible when trying frame an image in anything but dim light. It was bad enough when trying to do that with a small point-n-shoot camera. It's even worse when you're working with a phone where the shutter is on the damned display and pushing on it ruins the framing you have set up. (Plus, most of the time, by the time you are
SONY was right 51 years ago, & is right today! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
1981 was only 41 years ago.
Feels like yesterday.
Already has for most people (Score:2)
My first SLR was a Pentax K1000, which didn't even need a battery to operate. Back then, you couldn't get that kind of image quality from other types of cameras. These days, my $200 Moto G phone camera takes far, far better pictures than that Pentax, especially in low light. I ditched my SLR and DSLR cameras long ago. It's hard to even find them in stores anymore.
Bullshit (Score:4, Insightful)
The DLSR camera is already dead to the mirrorless, not to the phones ....
kill Sony (Score:2)
Now if smartphones could kill Sony we'd be getting somewhere.
Imminent Death of DSLR Predicted; H.264 at 11... (Score:2)
I'm not sure why Sony (or anyone else) felt the need to slag on DSLRs yet again, particularly when all such previous predictions have proven to be purest bafflegab, and I'm not seeing anything on the horizon to suggest that's going to change.
I feel more qualified than most to comment on this, because I just bought a new phone and a new DSLR -- a Google Pixel 6 Pro, and a Pentax K-70, respectively. The K-70 replaced a Pentax K-S2 and, except for a few minor spec upgr
Yay (Score:2)
Nothing but portrait-oriented photos from now on, regardless of the subject matter.
Aperature, Glass Quality (Score:2)
There are good reasons why photographers spend +$1,000 on a single lens, even us amateurs. OTOH, maybe people will stop caring about well composed photographs, which are not the same as pictures.
Phones won't replace DSLRs anytime soon (Score:2)
There isn't a smartphone camera on the planet that can replace a $10K Canon EOS 1DX with a $15k high-end telephoto lens.
Re: (Score:2)
I haven't seen any DSLR that gives you control over focal length. That's usually fixed for lens attachments. You mean focal depth and range?
Re: (Score:2)
in the timeline of film
What kind of film? Smaller film formats are essentially dead. 35mm is about the smallest worth using. But that is a large "sensor area" compared to some DSLRs or mirrorless cameras. A medium format film camera Rolleiflex SL66 for example [sl66.com] has an image area of 6x4.5 cm (or more).