Samsung open to new camera system, joins forces with Fujifilm

[Gordon Zernich]

So, what is the cost & profit margin for Samsung with this full frame sensor? Sure Samsung could supply other manufacturers ... however, a full frame bridge camera with a fast telescopic lens is undeserved in the marketplace. For the right price it would be a great travel camera and certainly better than a smartphone. I'd buy it quickly.

[webrunner5]

5 hours ago, Márcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

 They are leaders in smartphone camp, which makes MUCH more money nowadays than stand alone cameras. And profit margins are MUCH higher in this camp too.

I think Smartphones sales is going to slow down pretty big time in the near future. China for one is really pushing that if it is not a Chinese Cellphone company you are not going to be able to sell it in China at all in the near future. That is a HUGE market cut off. And they have got to the point that they are just costing too damn much money for the gains you see each year now. People in India and Africa are not buying 1000 Dollar phones. If you are not into big time photo, video output a 5 year old phone gets  the job done yet. I see the market dropping off not moving up.

But yeah I agree with your statement. Samsung and Apple are the leaders in the world. I see Apple is going to start making stuff "in house" since the move of China is to cut off sales of Apple products there, and even the manufacturing of them also.

11 hours ago, IronFilm said:

Depressing to think their 1" cameras are so expensive yet they still lose money on them?! I kinda doubt that.

 

I think they are not, and have not sold as many RX10 mk III, mk IV as they have hoped. They are just too damn expensive. Sure they are pretty impossible to beat if you have small ass hands to hold the damn thing for a vacation lets say, or even using them for wildlife shooting.

But since they are not selling them by the millions I would bet overall it is a dead end street profit wise. I would not be surprised the mk IV might be the last version they ever make. I think they lost their way when they went to a variable Aperture lens and got rid of the ND filters. I can't even use my RX10 because the Aperture ring raking the hell out of my finger. It must to have been designed for 12 year old girls is all I can guess??

[Damphousse]

3 hours ago, Gordon Zernich said:

So, what is the cost & profit margin for Samsung with this full frame sensor? Sure Samsung could supply other manufacturers ... however, a full frame bridge camera with a fast telescopic lens is undeserved in the marketplace. For the right price it would be a great travel camera and certainly better than a smartphone. I'd buy it quickly.

An RX10 with a 1" sensor and only 1080p recording costs $800 new.  So a full frame bridge camera is going to cost waaayyyy more.  Not many people want to pay that price and be stuck with one lens.

Consumer electronics is a low margin business.  A few companies like Apple make nice profits but have you seen how much they charge and what features they leave out?

These people aren't stupid.  If they were going to come out with a full frame in house camera they would have done it BEFORE they destroyed their reputation with photographers.

[ntblowz]

15 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

I don't think Sony is going to loose any sleep with Samsung or anyone else in the Sensor business. Sony is the King of video. They have been pretty much since the start. The have the best engineers in the business. And they have plowed a crazy amount of Billions of dollars into their sensor Fab plants. 

Well same thing have been said to Sony TV, Walkman etc back then.. Nokia, blockbuster too I guess? ?

[webrunner5]

Just now, ntblowz said:

Well same thing have been said to Sony TV, Walkman etc back then

They are just too big of a company to have a few missteps bother them much financially. They have been pretty aggressive as of late other than TV's.  I have no clue why. They used to be the top dog on TV's years ago. Seems like Samsung, LG have taken that crown as of late. Even Panasonic TV's seem to have faded. And wow they were great years ago!

[Tim Shoebridge]

7 hours ago, Márcio Kabke Pinheiro said:

Samsung will not come back to professional camera market. Period. 

Nor will supply sensors to this market. Smartphone sensors are much more profitable (better yields, more volume). They pŕobably already repurposed the NX1 sensor factory line to make smaller sensors - if they are willing to sell that amazing NX1 sensor to other vendors, they would done it a long ago. I doubt that Nikon, Panasonic, Olympus, Fujifilm like to be in Sony's hands when it comes to sensors.

About this collaboration with Fujifilm: Fujifilm still have a very strong chemical arm, and I remember some time ago an announcement of a plastic film designed to enhance sensor's performance - this collaboration with Samsung is just it, supplying a product to enhance their sensor performance, and that's it.

Samsung coming back to professional cameras is just wishful thinking. They are leaders in smartphone camp, which makes MUCH more money nowadays than stand alone cameras. And profit margins are MUCH higher in this camp too.

I do agree with you. But the reason they exited the market was bizarre, based on the desicion of a man now in prison. So there is hope :)

[Mokara]

On ‎6‎/‎27‎/‎2018 at 1:22 PM, webrunner5 said:

Really good bridge camera are like the high end Point N Shoot stuff, Way to damn expensive to sell many for making a profit in the long run. I think Sony just keeps updating them to show off their 1" sensor improved tech that seems to be used by everyone. I would not doubt they loose money on them.

You can buy a damn good camera for 1300 to 1500 bucks new or used. Sure you are not getting the fast lens but most people in that price range have some lenses anyways.

Plus I think Samsung would be crazy to get back in the camera market. It is a sinking ship down the road. No room for small market camera company's in the future other than Leica, Digital MF stuff. But I guess it is a good way to show off your Sensor Tech!

The reason for them doing it would be the same reason Mercedes has a formula 1 team. It is advertising for their bread and butter products, it shows off their technological prowess and it provides a test bed for innovative engineers to try out new technological ideas. 

There can be other reasons for a company to do a particular thing beyond the bottom line.

For Samsung I think that the camera division was largely not doing this prior to the NX1 and that is why they got canned. The NX1 was probably a last gasp effort by the engineers on the project to convince management that they could produce a flagship like that, they threw everything except the kitchen sink into it, but by the time they delivered there was a power change at the senior management level and the new guys saw things differently. The decision had already been made and it was too late no matter what the NX team did.

23 hours ago, Tim Shoebridge said:

A return by Samsung to the camera manufacturing business would be very difficult, the one thing they need which they lost so spectacularly is trust. But making sensors for other manufacturers makes a lot of sense, the sensor in their NX1 was ground-breaking. Are there any other 28Mp APS-C sensors even out there yet.....?

It would not be difficult at all. They have done the same thing with computers before.

The biggest issue of course would be lenses, but if they could get Sigma or one of the lens companies to support their mount then that problem would go away. Samsung could return to the market relatively easily if they had a collaboration with a leading lens manufacturer put in place.

[Trek of Joy]

3 hours ago, Tim Shoebridge said:

I do agree with you. But the reason they exited the market was bizarre, based on the desicion of a man now in prison. So there is hope

If you're talking about Vice Chariman Jay Lee, son of Samsung's chairman, that was convicted on bribery and embezzlement charges, then no he's not in prison. The courts freed him earlier this year and he's back at the helm as Director of Samsung Electronics. It wasn't a bizarre decision, Samsung is focused on growth industries, digital cameras are not a growth industry, and they haven't been one for almost a decade.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-samsung-lee/samsung-scion-lee-walks-free-after-jail-term-suspended-faces-leadership-challenges-idUSKBN1FO0R9

https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachelpremack/2018/02/06/samsungs-de-facto-leader-is-out-of-jail-now-what/#310b2f257354

So no hope for the fake news NX2, since he's the one that axed the NX line.

Chris

[Mokara]

5 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

I think Smartphones sales is going to slow down pretty big time in the near future. China for one is really pushing that if it is not a Chinese Cellphone company you are not going to be able to sell it in China at all in the near future. That is a HUGE market cut off. And they have got to the point that they are just costing too damn much money for the gains you see each year now. People in India and Africa are not buying 1000 Dollar phones. If you are not into big time photo, video output a 5 year old phone gets  the job done yet. I see the market dropping off not moving up.

But yeah I agree with your statement. Samsung and Apple are the leaders in the world. I see Apple is going to start making stuff "in house" since the move of China is to cut off sales of Apple products there, and even the manufacturing of them also.

I think they are not, and have not sold as many RX10 mk III, mk IV as they have hoped. They are just too damn expensive. Sure they are pretty impossible to beat if you have small ass hands to hold the damn thing for a vacation lets say, or even using them for wildlife shooting.

But since they are not selling them by the millions I would bet overall it is a dead end street profit wise. I would not be surprised the mk IV might be the last version they ever make. I think they lost their way when they went to a variable Aperture lens and got rid of the ND filters. I can't even use my RX10 because the Aperture ring raking the hell out of my finger. It must to have been designed for 12 year old girls is all I can guess??

They will have newer versions of the RX10. But the improvements will be incremental, similar to what is done with the RX100. Development costs will be contained by keeping the body/mechanicals largely the same and just updating the internal electronics as silicon is improved. There is a market for high end small sensor extreme lens cameras.

5 hours ago, Damphousse said:

An RX10 with a 1" sensor and only 1080p recording costs $800 new.  So a full frame bridge camera is going to cost waaayyyy more.  Not many people want to pay that price and be stuck with one lens.

Consumer electronics is a low margin business.  A few companies like Apple make nice profits but have you seen how much they charge and what features they leave out?

These people aren't stupid.  If they were going to come out with a full frame in house camera they would have done it BEFORE they destroyed their reputation with photographers.

Sony already have a FF bridge camera. It is called the RX1. 

[Damphousse]

21 minutes ago, Mokara said:

Sony already have a FF bridge camera. It is called the RX1. 

The RX1 does NOT have a zoom lens.  Read the post I was responding to.

Also how much does the RX1 cost?  How many do they sell?

All sorts of niche weird and wonderful things are made.  That doesn't mean they are mass market hits or profitable.

[cantsin]

6 hours ago, webrunner5 said:

I think Smartphones sales is going to slow down pretty big time in the near future. China for one is really pushing that if it is not a Chinese Cellphone company you are not going to be able to sell it in China at all in the near future. That is a HUGE market cut off.

Up to now, nearly all smartphone manufacturers buy their sensors from Sony or Samsung. This is where Samsung's market for sensors lies. 

[IronFilm]

21 hours ago, Gordon Zernich said:

So, what is the cost & profit margin for Samsung with this full frame sensor? Sure Samsung could supply other manufacturers ... however, a full frame bridge camera with a fast telescopic lens is undeserved in the marketplace. For the right price it would be a great travel camera and certainly better than a smartphone. I'd buy it quickly.

A full frame bridge camera would be HUGE  both in size and in cost. 

[Gordon Zernich]

14 hours ago, Mokara said:

They will have newer versions of the RX10. But the improvements will be incremental, similar to what is done with the RX100. Development costs will be contained by keeping the body/mechanicals largely the same and just updating the internal electronics as silicon is improved. There is a market for high end small sensor extreme lens cameras.

Sony already have a FF bridge camera. It is called the RX1. 

that's what I'm talking about FF, include 4k video + IBIS, fast zoom lens: bridge

[IronFilm]

2 minutes ago, Gordon Zernich said:

that's what I'm talking about, but include 4k video

RX1mk2

[Gordon Zernich]

3 hours ago, IronFilm said:

RX1mk2

no 4K video, no IBIS, no telephoto lens on the RXmk2 unless I'm missing something

[Mokara]

21 hours ago, Damphousse said:

The RX1 does NOT have a zoom lens.  Read the post I was responding to.

Also how much does the RX1 cost?  How many do they sell?

All sorts of niche weird and wonderful things are made.  That doesn't mean they are mass market hits or profitable.

Never the less, it is still a FF bridge camera.

"The term "bridge camera" was originally used to refer to film cameras which "bridged the gap" between point-and-shoot cameras and SLRs"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridge_camera

[webrunner5]

2 hours ago, Mokara said:

Never the less, it is still a FF bridge camera.

"The term "bridge camera" was originally used to refer to film cameras which "bridged the gap" between point-and-shoot cameras and SLRs"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bridge_camera

And Every one of the examples on Wiki show a camera with a zoom lens that has a huge range! You conveniently only read the first paragraph. Nobody on here relates a bridge camera to something that used film, Nobody. Hell you must be 30 years older than I am to think that LoL. ?

[Mokara]

37 minutes ago, webrunner5 said:

And Every one of the examples on Wiki show a camera with a zoom lens that has a huge range! You conveniently only read the first paragraph. Nobody on here relates a bridge camera to something that used film, Nobody. Hell you must be 30 years older than I am to think that LoL. ?

Bridge cameras have nothing to do with zooms. They are fixed lens cameras with advanced controls similar to what you find on SLRs. It may be that most of them have zoom lenses, but that is not a requirement for the type.

[webrunner5]

Nobody has used the word SLRs in 15 years. ? You have to be 100 years old LoL. And when I think of a bridge camera it has a Zoom on it. If not it is a fixed lens camera. And that does not harken any thought of a bridge camera to me.