Digital SLRs and Point-and-Shoot Cameras Go On Vacation Too
Digital SLRs and Point-and-Shoot Cameras Go On Vacation Too
Summer’s officially over, Labor Day celebrated, so welcome back to work. We hope you had the chance to follow Mr. da Vinci’s advice we offered up last month and take some time off yourself to “go some distance away and put your work into perspective.”
Most people who went-some-distance on vacation likely captured their time with photographs. Of course, when we say ”photographs” we don’t mean film, we mean pixels. Digital. So consumers were out using their digital SLRs and point-and-shoots (PAS) to immortalize their time and space whatever distance they went.
But sad to tell for that industry, fewer consumers than in years past. With smartphone technology constantly improving, and the quality of smartphone photos and videos virtually indistinguishable from dedicated digital devices like SLRs, combined with the smartphones’ ability to review, edit, and transmit immediately, the dedicated digital imaging devices are rapidly becoming obsolete. In fact, Brand Keys estimates that this year 55% of photos and video are now being shot with smart phones, up nearly 20% from last year.
OK, you can look at the other side of the usage ratio and say that 45% of photos and videos are still being shot with traditional cameras, and this year, in our Customer Loyalty Engagement Index, we did track digital camera brands. But with newer smartphones in sight and consumer expectations constantly on the rise, one cannot be precisely sure for how long the category will remain – in retail or in our survey. So for those of you waiting for the sales to begin, here’s how the current range of digital camera brands rank:
Digital SLR Cameras
1.Canon
2.Nikon/Olympus/Leica
3.Sony
4.Pentax/Panasonic
5.Fuji
Digital Point & Shoot Camera
1.Canon
2.Nikon
3.Panasonic
4.Sony
5.Casio
6.Samsung
7.Fuji
8.Pentax
9.Olympus
10.Kodak
The photographer Ernst Hass, once noted, “there is only you and your camera.” But with the increase in picture quality and the ubiquity of we-do-everything smartphones taking the place of dedicated digital cameras, we expect we may soon have to amend that to “there’s only you and your phone.” Which puts the category’s continued presence into perspective too.
Welcome back.
September 4, 2012