Why is Canon SO Frustrating?!

[Mattias Burling]

I think the 6Dmkii is fantastic, great upgrade. Miss the image from it tremendously. Will buy one again when they are cheap.

[Django]

Canon are very good at segmenting/crippling products but others do too. The 128kbps audio crippling inside S1/S1R is a good example of that.

You gotta look at companies with no cine line to protect like Fuji or Nikon for unrestricted video features. Or dedicated video companies like BMD or the Chinese cams.

That said politics aside, I'm a happy Canon owner. The IQ & shooting experience always puts a smile on my face despite the limitations.

[Mokara]

Most of those "crippling restrictions" are due to hardware compromises in the name of cost, or licensing issues (again, to reduce cost). A company makes a judgement call on what consumers of a particular product will actually use versus the costs of adding features, and design their products around that. At the lower end of the market margins are relatively small, so even the small cost of individual features can turn a product from a money maker into a money loser. And remember, it is the manufacturing cost we are talking about, not the retail cost (which incorporates things such as middleman overhead, marketing and such).

Camera companies compete against other camera companies, not themselves. Leaving features out which would otherwise make their products more competitive against similar offerings from the enemy for no real reason is just plain stupid. That does not happen.

[mercer]

I don’t know, it doesn’t make much sense to include clean external 4K 10bit 4:22 but not have 24p 1080p. So if Canon is leaving features out for certain product segmentation then why leave such a glaringly higher end feature in?

[plucas]

 

 

1

On 5/28/2019 at 7:58 AM, Andrew Reid said:

 

Canon are also a bit of a dinosaur, with senior Japanese management in their 70's and 80's who don't understand the modern tech world very well.

 

It's like Bernie Ecclestone's final years at the helm of F1. F1 still had little or no presence on social media.

[Django]

Yet speaking of F1, I was in Monaco for the GP last weekend: 90% of the camera gear was from Canon. Go figure.

[Andrew Reid]

16 hours ago, Mokara said:

Most of those "crippling restrictions" are due to hardware compromises in the name of cost, or licensing issues (again, to reduce cost). A company makes a judgement call on what consumers of a particular product will actually use versus the costs of adding features, and design their products around that. At the lower end of the market margins are relatively small, so even the small cost of individual features can turn a product from a money maker into a money loser. And remember, it is the manufacturing cost we are talking about, not the retail cost (which incorporates things such as middleman overhead, marketing and such).

Camera companies compete against other camera companies, not themselves. Leaving features out which would otherwise make their products more competitive against similar offerings from the enemy for no real reason is just plain stupid. That does not happen.

Another Crapon apologist. Oh dear.

EOS R is not "low end of the market"

The manufacturing cost issue and tech capabilities excuse has been disproven many times. Magic Lantern shows what even the very old and cheap bodies are capable of... see EOS M (first model) and even the 50D from 2008 which had no video mode. Tech has always been there for much better features implementation.

Fuji X-T3 packs in plenty of nice tech for half the price of an EOS R... please do compare the video performance between those two. The manufacturing cost of an X-T3 seems to work for Fuji's bottom line. Canon manufacturing costs I have no idea and couldn't care less about. Maybe their factories have fallen behind and need upgrading and they cannot buy the latest processors from big rival Sony? Who knows. But if Fuji can make a profit on the X-T3, so can Canon on a similar spec body, I would have thought.

9 hours ago, plucas said:

It's like Bernie Ecclestone's final years at the helm of F1. F1 still had little or no presence on social media.

Yes, when you have very old management, what worked in the 1980's may no longer be relevant today. That's Canon. In many ways they are the essence of what made Japan successful in past times, in other ways they are what happens when marketing people get too powerful, then get too old, and yet still end up running the company.

All I can say is the engineers must be very bored and thinking of leaving.

2 hours ago, Django said:

Yet speaking of F1, I was in Monaco for the GP last weekend: 90% of the camera gear was from Canon. Go figure.

Nice, hope you enjoyed the race. However, not too hard to figure out that Canon have biggest established presence in the pro sports market for stills. Nothing changed there. Not sure what that has to do with the consumer or video market though.

17 hours ago, Mattias Burling said:

I think the 6Dmkii is fantastic, great upgrade. Miss the image from it tremendously. Will buy one again when they are cheap.

I do recognise the appeal for a classic style DSLR with very good live-view, good AF for stills, an easy to use video mode, nice feel, etc.

Measure it on a technical level against competition though and the video mode doesn't hold a candle.

[Mako Sports]

6 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Nice, hope you enjoyed the race. However, not too hard to figure out that Canon have biggest established presence in the pro sports market for stills. Nothing changed there. Not sure what that has to do with the consumer or video market though.

 

As someone that basically only shoots sports the only people I see shooting Canon are the photographers, never seen Canon used higher than the high school market for sports broadcasting or sideline video that goes direct to web. 

Think ive seen a c300mkii used once for behind the scenes web content. 

[Mokara]

8 hours ago, Andrew Reid said:

Another Crapon apologist. Oh dear.

EOS R is not "low end of the market"

The manufacturing cost issue and tech capabilities excuse has been disproven many times. Magic Lantern shows what even the very old and cheap bodies are capable of... see EOS M (first model) and even the 50D from 2008 which had no video mode. Tech has always been there for much better features implementation.

Fuji X-T3 packs in plenty of nice tech for half the price of an EOS R... please do compare the video performance between those two. The manufacturing cost of an X-T3 seems to work for Fuji's bottom line. Canon manufacturing costs I have no idea and couldn't care less about. Maybe their factories have fallen behind and need upgrading and they cannot buy the latest processors from big rival Sony? Who knows. But if Fuji can make a profit on the X-T3, so can Canon on a similar spec body, I would have thought.

Yes, when you have very old management, what worked in the 1980's may no longer be relevant today. That's Canon. In many ways they are the essence of what made Japan successful in past times, in other ways they are what happens when marketing people get too powerful, then get too old, and yet still end up running the company.

All I can say is the engineers must be very bored and thinking of leaving.

Nice, hope you enjoyed the race. However, not too hard to figure out that Canon have biggest established presence in the pro sports market for stills. Nothing changed there. Not sure what that has to do with the consumer or video market though.

I do recognise the appeal for a classic style DSLR with very good live-view, good AF for stills, an easy to use video mode, nice feel, etc.

Measure it on a technical level against competition though and the video mode doesn't hold a candle.

I don't see how I am a Canon apologist when it should be pretty clear from my posting history that I am very critical of them. That said, I try to be objective, and what I tried to explain is the reason why they do the things they do. I don't like their products in general, but I understand why they are like that. There is no conspiracy to screw over consumers.

I don't think you understand the economics of manufacturing. The difference between list price and what the manufacturer actually gets is pretty substantial. Even what might seem to you to be small differences in cost of materials can have a significant impact on margin for the manufacturer.

There is a difference between what is possible, what is reliable and what can be supported. No manufacturer with half a brain is going to include features in a product that may be unreliable, may shorten the working life of the product or requires some hobbyist approach to use the results. That is just begging for service calls and unnecessary returns, which literally results in a loss for when it comes to that particular sale. Canon (and every other camera manufacturer for that matter) is a business, they are not there as a charity to pander to consumer whims, their products have to make a profit.

Doing something like what Magic Lantern were doing might be possible for a hobbyist, but would introduce too many uncertainties to be feasible for a commercial product. EVERY product on the market is capable of doing MUCH more than the specs, but doing so would kill the profit. So, they go for what is reliable and useable for the target audience.

[Mattias Burling]

2 hours ago, Mako Sports said:

As someone that basically only shoots sports the only people I see shooting Canon are the photographers, never seen Canon used higher than the high school market for sports broadcasting or sideline video that goes direct to web. 

Think ive seen a c300mkii used once for behind the scenes web content. 

The last year Ive seen roughly 50/50 FS7 and Canon Cx00 amongst the pros shooting for the big names and networks in the arenas I've worked.

But on the lower end and straight for Webb it's been 50/50 Smartphones/Osmo and A7x.

And interestingly. A couple of XC10/15. First I've seen in the wild.

I'm of course talking video only. For stills it's been 90% Canon, 9.99% Nikon and one single Olympus

 

[plucas]

How we feel about Canon sometimes:

 

[Robert Collins]

I think Canon has lost its enthusiasm for the Camera market. If you read their IR reports they discuss pretty much everything apart from cameras and, when they do, they are especially negative on the camera market. I think they have been under investing for years in tech like sensors and image processors and it tends to show in their products.

It is hard to blame their approach when the market is shrinking rapidly.

[Mako Sports]

51 minutes ago, plucas said:

How we feel about Canon sometimes:

 

Thats possibly the funniest thing i've ever watched

[Mako Sports]

7D line possibly on its deathbed 

https://www.canonrumors.com/rest-well-canon-eos-7d-series-cr2/ 

[plucas]

On 5/29/2019 at 6:25 PM, Django said:

Yet speaking of F1, I was in Monaco for the GP last weekend: 90% of the camera gear was from Canon. Go figure.

 

[wolf33d]

On 5/28/2019 at 11:38 AM, Mattias Burling said:

I think the 6Dmkii is fantastic, great upgrade. Miss the image from it tremendously. 

Hahahaha. Each time I want to have a good laugh, I open EosHD forum and make sure to read one of Mattias post.

 

[Mattias Burling]

If you can't get great images from a 6Dmkii it just means that you are an awful operator. Just terrible. 

[Mako Sports]

1 hour ago, Mattias Burling said:

If you can't get great images from a 6Dmkii it just means that you are an awful operator. Just terrible. 

Fair statement for just about amy camera, but you'd be a fool to say it was worth its initial launch price of $2,000. 

$1200 fits that camera a lot better, even though I think its a $950 camera at its core..

[Mattias Burling]

6 hours ago, Mako Sports said:

Fair statement for just about amy camera, but you'd be a fool to say it was worth its initial launch price of $2,000. 

The only thing that's foolish is calling people fools just because they don't order the same ice cream flavor as you.

If the competition offered the same features/price it would have been at least debatable. But even then there would be enough difference that some would choose the Canon.

I don't even own a Canon but aren't allowed to say I like them without being jumped by fanboys... sigh.. foolish indeed..

[Oliver Daniel]

I'd advocate Canon for stills. Even when my wife had a 700d, her images smoked my Sony A6/A7 whatever just from pure image rendering. nearly every photographer I work with uses Canon. 

For video though, even though they have a few of industry leading features (reliability, DPAF, colour) - they've fallen way out of favour in the UK. Nearly everyone in the low and mid tier are shooting on Sony or Panasonic. Some Blackmagic. My local rental house has had to sell on their C300 II's because no one wants them. 

This is all because, and you can't deny it, that their video pipeline is an absolute mess. From the C700 bazooka to the immensely crippled EOS R - barley anyone wants them for video here because they lack features that Canon could easily include. They could wipe the floor in the sub-£10k market if they gave the C200 a 10bit (non-RAW) codec and better 120fps. But that camera has a major split personality and it puts potential buyers off (like me, who went for the EVA1 instead). 

Additionally, as most professionals own A,B and C cameras - their video lineup is a mess here too. Panasonic lead the way here and this to me is a huge selling point. 

There's no doubt you can create stunning images with whatever Canon - but their decisions in video features have had a severe impact on their universal attraction (for video in the UK). 

To the point of the post, they are SO frustrating because we all have a soft spot for them, and want them to deliver what we want. But they won't, and probably never will.