Today there was news that Olympus was going out of cameras (again). For those of us with memories longer than 3 minutes, they did this before then returned to cameras.
Back in the 1980s or 1990s, a friend of mine had an Olympus OM4ti. It was a lovely camera that could be used to take some spectacular photos. The lens was good enough to render exceptionally sharp images when paired with the right film. When the world went autofocus, Olympus did not commit the money into R&D then found that their market had dropped and basically got out of film photography.
A few years later and digital photography became popular. Olympus moved back into photography and developed some really quite good digital cameras. I had one and it was excellent. Then the mobile phone market exploded with some really good cameras on the phones. That was when Olympus's compact camera market began to die.
Meanwhile Olympus had developed their four thirds digital SLR which did really well. That was then redeveloped into micro four thirds and the lens mount shared with Panasonic. I think they did this because they knew they were likely to abandon the camera market at some point.
Today we hear that Olympus is selling its camera division and getting out of consumer photography. They cite the loss of market to phone cameras. While I will agree that phone cameras are really good and convenient, that argument is old hat. I rather suspect Coronavirus has put a big dent in sales and that lack of R&D has had the division floundering for a while.
The big problem with most camera companies is their business model has changed. In the old days of film cameras, a new camera would come out every few years. With the digital world they're bringing out a new camera every 6 months. That's utterly ridiculous! They're spending all their money on developing and marketing newer cameras without realising the market they're selling to is getting slowly smaller.
Where Olympus went wrong... Instead of following the model of almost all the other manufacturers they should have developed a new camera every few years rather than every 6 months. Who cares what the megapixel size of the camera is anyway. Seriously - show me the difference between a 45 megapixel image and a 14 megapixel image on a Facebook page. There isn't any! Olympus believed its own bullshit about megapixels being important which is largely why they had to follow the new standard of a new camera every 6 months.
OK. Let's look at who buys cameras....
Mom and Pop - they just use their smartphone. They don't want to have to lug a camera bag or even a camera around. They just want to enjoy life.
Kids - they just use their smartphone and likely cheap smarphones because they're rough on things.
The rest - well only a minority will want to use a "proper" camera because to most, the image from a smartphone is good enough.
So, we have a very small camera market. Now let's try to sell a new camera with more megapixels to the same person every 6 months. Nope - not happening! I regard myself as a typical digital camera owner..
I use an elderly Olympus micro four thirds camera. I'm not even sure how many megapixels it has. I could look it up but can't be bothered. That tells you how much interest I have in megapixels. I also have an even more elderly Canon digital SLR. Near 15 years ago, that was new and I paid something like $800 for it. Now, XTs regularly go for about $20 on eBay. The only reason I don't use the XT much is because of the size and weight. In fact the XT I keep for sentimental reasons though I sold everything else that I had with it. That was an 8 megapixel camera.
So, my Olympus I paid $75 for secondhand. I have two lenses with it and can do pretty much any photography that my heart desires. I do use the Olympus but not that often. I use my smartphone most days for photos.
What camera companies are fighting a losing battle against is that nobody now much cares about cameras. Image quality is good enough on just about any camera whether from a smartphone of anything else. Lenses, sensors and software have combined to render the difference between a $2,000 camera and a $20 smartphone camera moot. The sole difference between a smartphone camera and an independent camera is versatility. I can add longer lenses or take longer exposures on an independent camera.
Another thing that really does demolish camera companies is the sheer quantity of free images available. Why should I buy a spiffy camera to shoot photos of Machu Pichu when I can go there, have a good time and just download pics from the internet later of exactly where I've been?
In the old days, if somebody went somewhere exotic, the photos would be taken and then put into a big album that guests would be subjected to. That was why people didn't visit each other - nobody wanted to be subjected to the accursed photo album. Now they just stick it on Facebook and their friends just click "like" on the whole album without looking at the pictures and everybody is happy. As I've said before, great megapixel counts are not needed for online publication.
Camera companies need to realise that they can't survive any more by selling new cameras all the time. They need to go back to their roots where they sold new cameras occasionally but survived by selling lenses and other accessories. Camera companies lens selections are just awful. Nikon used to have a hundred different lenses. Now, barely 20. Updating lenses every couple of years is just a scam too. It's pretty much spitting on their customers because if somebody buys V1 of the lens then they come out with V2, the owner of the V1 won't be able to sell it for as much as if there wasn't a V2. That leads to the owner just buying minimal lenses and keeping it like that or just buying secondhand and keeping the kit minimal or just going over to smarphones.
Where the micro four thirds line really lacks is longer lenses. There just aren't that many affordable long lenses. Nikon manages to produce a compact camera with a 24-3000mm zoom. That is just about every lens range ever needed by anybody. That compact is horribly overpriced at $1,000 but offers everything the Olympuses can offer including a long lens that Olympus doesn't offer.
So, Olympus produced good stuff. They rested on their laurels, followed the wrong path and now decide to leave the room. Bye, bye Olympus - don't let the door hit you in the ass on the way out. Maybe see you back in a few years (again).
