What’s up with Samsung, Canon and Nikon?

Sony, Olympus, Panasonic and Fuji are fully pushing their mirrorless system while big companies and Samsung, Canon and Nikon seem to not have a clear vision about their future strategy. This is the situation:

Samsung: They should announced the NX20 successor in January-February. In general Samsung will focus on new High End Camera and Lens products.

Nikon: The Nikon 1 system isn’t selling as expected and the future seems uncertain. With the new Nikon DF announcement they once again confirm that DSLR is their present and future strategy. There is no rumor about any APS-C or FF mirrorless camera release in 2014.

Canon: DPP (Digital Photo Professional) already had listed the EOS-M2 but it seems like Canon is delaying the camera release. Like Nikon also Canon sees the mirrorless camera industry as a “non-serious” market.

Of the three companies Samsung is the only company really investing and believing in mirrorless. But it looks like they still didn’t find the way to make their system successful.

 

New Olympus and Sony mirrorless cameras to be announced in late January and early February.

The last announcement of the year will be that Nikon DF DSLR camera (yep, it’s not a mirrorless!). The next bunch of mirrorless cameras will be announced in late January, early February 2014. And according to some trusted sources there will be certainly a new Olympus MFT camera (not a PEN!) and a couple of Sony cameras. This should include the long overdue NEX-7 successor.

P.S.: I still don’t know if that Nikon looks good, bad, weird or what :)

Mirrorless news roundup…

Samsung NX 60mm ƒ/2.8 Macro lens review at SeriousCompacts.
Fuji X-M1 review at ThePhoBlographer.
Fujifilm Fujinon XF 27mm f/2.8 (Admiringlight).
Using Manual Focus Lenses on Mirrorless Cameras (Admiringlight).
Pentax Q7 review at Trustedreviews.
First Impressions: Leica X Vario (ThePhoBlographer)
Fujifilm X-M1 review at Dpreview.
Samsung NX300 review at Sonyalphalab.
Carl Zeiss Touit 12 mm f/2.8 review at Lenstip.
Fuji X-A1 image samples at ePhotozine.
Fujifilm X20 review at CameraLabs.
Review: Pentax Q7 SR (ThePhoBlographer).
Samsung Galaxy NX review at ePhotozine.
Sony E-Mount Lenses Field Test (Riflessifotografici).
Leica C type test at Digitalversus.
Fuji X-E2 first look by Ron Mart.
Nikon 1 AW1 Review at ePhotozine.
Nikon 1 Nikkor 10-100 mm VR f4.0-5.6 lens review: Ultimate travel companion? (DxOmark).
Leica M type review at ThePhoBlographer.

Yes, there will be even cheaper and smaller Sony Full Frame E-mount cameras!

It took four years to get a first non Leica and affordable Full Frame camera. And now that we have the A7 and A7r Sony will not stop at all! Egami found that Sony patent describing an ultra compact Sony NEX-5 Full Frame camera! And according to one of our sources Sony will indeed launch more bodies 2014 including some that will be cheaper and smaller than the A7. It almost sounds like Full Frame and not APS-C will become the mainstream mirrorless system sensor. If Sony can keep the price down than this makes sense to create a clear advantage over the competition. The one big issue is that FF lenses will be big. On the other side you can use smaller APS-C lenses in crop mode if you care about size. Sounds intriguing!

Fuji will challenge Sony’s RX1 and A7 cameras!

Image courtesy: Camerasize.

Now I am 100% sure that Fuji will likely be the first company to challenge the Sony FF mirrorless cameras!

1) Next year (2014) they will launch a new X200 Full Frame fixed lens camera that will compete against the Sony RX1. But unlike the RX1 the X200 will have a built-in hybrid viewfinder.

2) In early 2015 Fuji will then launch a complete new Full Frame mirrorless and interchangeable camera. It will compete against the Sony A7-A7r (and future A9) series.

It’s also 100% clear that Fuji will develop their own Organic sensor for these cameras. They will not borrow the sensor from Sony!

Because We Just Can’t Get Enough of them: New Pentax FF mirrorless LX rumor.

Damn, it’s a long time we didn’t post some weird Pentax Full Frame camera rumor. So let’s keep the dream well alive with some more (likely fake) Pentax FF rumors :)

Apparently Pentax Russia said there will be certainly a Pentax FF camera in 2014 (Source: Pentax Russia forum).

And on the usually very (un)reliable dpreview forum you can read that entry:

The rumour mill is busy with talk of a retro style Pentax LX full frame coming soon. Pretty similar in fact to the anticipated new Nikon retro F3 coming in two weeks. Both of these old cameras looked fairly identical actually as well as also featuring interchangeable viewfinders, so will that carry forward into the new digital versions? The main difference with the retro-Nikon F3-D (for want of a name at this point) in the speculation as far as I can see is it will be standard SLR F mount, while the new retro-Pentax LX-D will adopt a whole new shorter flange A-mount (A for Ace, after K and Q), which will allow two adapters for legacy K mount lens – one for manual focus with metering etc, and a more expensive motorised adapter for auto focussing as well. So basically the Pentax will be able to take short-flange lenses while the Nikon will not, so the question for all us Ricoh users is will this become the successor to the GXR we’ve been waiting for?

Don’t worry, next fake Pentax FF rumors coming in a couple of months ;)

The Fuji strategy: X-PRO2 as next, f/2.8 zoom and Full Frame in two years

Sony shaked the camera industry with their A7 camera series. And the first to react on a “rumor” level has been Fuji. According to our sources and info from Fujirumors and Photorumors this is what we can expect for the future:

– Next camera to be announced is the ASP-C X-PRO2 (no full frame as rumored on other sites!)
– X200 Full Frame camera with fixed prime lens coming in 2014
– New XF lens roadmap to be unveiled early 2014 (liekly along the X-PRO2 announcement).
– The new roadmap contains some weathersealed lenses, a f/2.8 constant aperture zoom, a mid and tele zoom
– A Full Frame interchangeable camera is likely coming after Photokina 2014 (on market 2015).

Sounds pretty amazing!