Canon Launches New Cropping Guide for Select EOS Cameras for $120USD

#41
Quack said:
Neuro, I think you will have to copy and paste this reply to everyone who just doesn't get it - unfortunately that means a lot of people on the internet and social media. I bet not a single one of the complainers would need, or be interested in, this particular feature. Just your typical ignorant Canon bashing.
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Canon doesn't care about the whining and gnashing of teeth on the internet over this, because they know the people complaining aren't the target market. Same story with the R1 having 'only 24 MP'. Same with a lot of the ignorant bashing that's gone on for years. Somehow, the people doing it are too clueless to grasp the implication of the fact that Canon's market share has remained essentially flat at just under 50%, even as the camera market first cratered then shifted from DSLR to MILC. The people buying Canon gear go on buying it, and the people complaining about it on the internet go on complaining.
 
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#42
neuroanatomist said:
Sometimes, it really does seem like people on this forum have the business acumen of a bowling ball.

For those who don't get it, I'll try to simplify:
  • This isn't targeted at your average person taking pictures with the camera, or even at your average portrait photographer taking pictures with the camera.
  • This is targeted at businesses doing high-volume portrait photography – mall studio chains, school yearbook companies (LifeTouch, Jostens, etc.), cruise lines.
  • These are businesses that pay their photographers low wages, turnover is high and training new people costs time and money.
  • With this feature, you put a camera in the hands of a new hire and say, "Point the camera at the subject, put their face in this box, say 'smile' and press this button."
  • That's a huge time (and thus money) saver and yields better consistency (yearbooks in particular will have everyone lined up like a contact sheet).
  • As such, $120 is a nothing burger in terms of real cost, because the result is actually a significant savings to the business in time and money.
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If the target group is indeed businesses, then you are right. However, given that the firmware guide is for the R50, R10 and R7, which are essentially consumer, at best prosumer, cameras, I am not so certain. I would imagine, could well be wrong, that most businesses would be using primarily higher end cameras? In fact, if my assumption is not too far off that these three cameras, particularly the R50 and R10, are bought mainly by individuals rather than businesses, then the volume of sales for this firmware guide might not make business sense for canon. Of course, I do not know what Canon's business plan is, so they would know best for their own benefits.
 
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#43
neuroanatomist said:
Says something about what Canon knows about the use cases for these cameras. I recall from when my kids were young, high volume portrait studios usually used an entry-level APS-C DSLR with a kit lens, along with some mid-grade strobes (PCB Alien Bees, for example).
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Good point. I don't see this as pay to play so much as a customer service issue. The portrait studios and photo booth people will love this but grandmas would find it confusing.

Anything that increases calls to customer service is avoided by good companies
 
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#44
HMC11 said:
In fact, if my assumption is not too far off that these three cameras, particularly the R50 and R10, are bought mainly by individuals rather than businesses, then the volume of sales for this firmware guide might not make business sense for canon.
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The last time I was at the DMV, the cameras were T8's. Passport control is also using the budget Rebels. Every photo booth was in the T3 thru T7 family.

I think I've seen one govt agency use the cheap Nikon's in the last 10 years.

I think this is a way for Canon to make returning customers.
 
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#45
neuroanatomist said:
Sometimes, it really does seem like people on this forum have the business acumen of a bowling ball.

For those who don't get it, I'll try to simplify:
  • This isn't targeted at your average person taking pictures with the camera, or even at your average portrait photographer taking pictures with the camera.
  • This is targeted at businesses doing high-volume portrait photography – mall studio chains, school yearbook companies (LifeTouch, Jostens, etc.), cruise lines.
  • These are businesses that pay their photographers low wages, turnover is high and training new people costs time and money.
  • With this feature, you put a camera in the hands of a new hire and say, "Point the camera at the subject, put their face in this box, say 'smile' and press this button."
  • That's a huge time (and thus money) saver and yields better consistency (yearbooks in particular will have everyone lined up like a contact sheet).
  • As such, $120 is a nothing burger in terms of real cost, because the result is actually a significant savings to the business in time and money.
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Thank you for your clear summary about the target audience for this ‘feature’.

To support your argument: this appears to be a Canon USA initiative rather than a Canon global initiative. There is nothing about this feature on Canon Europe’s website.
 
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#46
Zadak said:
Lol! Imagine having to ship a camera just for a firmware update? What the hell?

And they chose this and not something like... have an option to be able to set a password to protect your camera in an event of theft, which might be useful?

Also imagine having to pay for something that should be a free update throughout the R ecosystem, like isn\'t that enough of a reason anymore to push software updates? Wtf?

Before some of you might say "Software costs money", yes it does, and sometimes it should be free. A clear example of this is graphics cards. New features get added and backported (within reason) thorugh software updates. And no you don't pay more for it.

This is just complete greed and I hope the community gets crackin' on the firmware once it's out there. Enough is enough, enough subscriptions/pay-to-update features.
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Imagine selling 1 guy a download of it, and he gives it to all his buddies! Its only about canon protecting their business model. And they are not the only ones doing it as evidenced in this thread. I think bug fixes and global feature additions like we saw with some of the previous bodies are still a possibility. And this does not seem to be a $120 annual subscription but rather a one time fee.

Brian
 
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#47
HMC11 said:
I would imagine, could well be wrong, that most businesses would be using primarily higher end cameras? In fact, if my assumption is not too far off that these three cameras, particularly the R50 and R10, are bought mainly by individuals rather than businesses, then the volume of sales for this firmware guide might not make business sense for canon.
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Those cameras are commonly bought by consumers because they are cheap. They are bought by high-volume businesses for the same reason. We're not talking about high-end or individual business portrait/wedding photographers, who are likely to have higher grade gear (FF bodies, fast lenses),

Walk into any mall portrait studio (JC Penny, Portrait Simple, Picture People, etc.), and you won't see them using FF cameras and fast lenses. There's no need, since there are pull-down backdrops and ceiling/wall mounted soft boxes. They shoot with entry-level APS-C cameras and slow, variable-aperture kit lenses.

This ad for a job as a Lifetouch photographer (one of the bigger yearbook/school photo companies covering the US and Canada) pretty much sums it up. Small (APS-C) camera, small (slow, variable aperture) lens, and the hood mounted in reverse consistent with the requisite skill level.


Want a job?.png
 
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#48
For $120 Canon should sell a tool to create guides (plus some starting guides) and upload them to the camera. Software license could be tied to the camera serial number - or any built-in cryptographic ID- but Canon should have thought before about some kind of protection baked into the camera and firmware/software.

They should be nostalgic of the times when they can sell you focusing screens to change the guides and focusing aids....
 
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#49
HMC11 said:
If the target group is indeed businesses, then you are right. However, given that the firmware guide is for the R50, R10 and R7, which are essentially consumer, at best prosumer, cameras, I am not so certain. I would imagine, could well be wrong, that most businesses would be using primarily higher end cameras? In fact, if my assumption is not too far off that these three cameras, particularly the R50 and R10, are bought mainly by individuals rather than businesses, then the volume of sales for this firmware guide might not make business sense for canon. Of course, I do not know what Canon's business plan is, so they would know best for their own benefits.
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If you hang around a lot of those businesses, you'll be surprised to learn you probably have better gear than they do. Its proof in the pudding that the IQ and sensor tests we agonise over in places like this are mostly irrelevant to real world use and performance. They want the cheapest camera that does the work they need it to do. They may buy hundreds or thousands of them, and the cost delta from an R10 to an R5 brings them no additional capability or revenue for what they do.

Brian
 
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#51
CanonGrunt said:
Well, they did charge for the clog addition in the 5D MK IV… but def not a fan of the paid upgrades via firmware. Especially not paying to upgrade firmware on a crop body that has a short replacement cycle in the first place. And if they ever do paid firmware to R1 that would be a massive mistake. I can’t imagine a lot of people would pay for this firmware, especially at that price, and have to send it in. A lot of people with these cameras it’s their only camera besides their phone. Might be good if you are doing school photos. Something high volume of the same position. I.E. hundreds of students in a day sitting on a stool. Other than that it seems like a tool that takes a good bit of the artistry away.
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The CLOG addition on 5Div needed a hardware upgrade... probably attaching another heatsink - until it was added for all new buyers at a price increase.

These low end cameras are bought in bulk by government, cruise lines are others. They will probably negotiate the price way down and effectively be a different model number when buying direct from Canon. Lighting is more important than megapixels and fast lenses

No artistry involved. Standardisation is the key to this feature. That said, it is a high price relative to the cost of the cheaper cameras but the photographers buying them are high-volume low-cost models where USD120 isn't a major cost
 
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#52
Zadak said:
I'm a software developer, such a feature would be developed in a month or two tops. 1q if I'm very generous. That's a total cost of probably $250k for Canon to make.
How many people will buy this? Let's be generous and say 100.000 people. From those $120 I'll be generous and say it's $50 in profit after labor shipping and excluding the development cost which is fixed.
You're looking at 5 million in profit, at best? For a company as big as Canon it is chump change. Canon had a 30 billion profit last year. With a B
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Big corporate/government will be buying direct to Canon in bulk and will probably have a different part number for each model with a slightly higher price than normal.

Canon is likely made this upgrade more widely available for users outside of the big corporate/government but the cost of installation would be the main cost rather than the firmware development IMO.
 
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#53
HMC11 said:
If the target group is indeed businesses, then you are right. However, given that the firmware guide is for the R50, R10 and R7, which are essentially consumer, at best prosumer, cameras, I am not so certain. I would imagine, could well be wrong, that most businesses would be using primarily higher end cameras? In fact, if my assumption is not too far off that these three cameras, particularly the R50 and R10, are bought mainly by individuals rather than businesses, then the volume of sales for this firmware guide might not make business sense for canon. Of course, I do not know what Canon's business plan is, so they would know best for their own benefits.
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I would say that the bulk of users will be bigger businesses and government who need to minimise costs and maximise standardisation.
Cruise ships are a classic volume driven market and they don't want to do anything in post so this would be a major benefit for them. They use very cheap cameras but reasonable lighting so that lower quality sensors/lenses are not the limitation. No action shooting, weather proofing or low light needs for them.
 
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#56
I think Canon should sell their camera bodies for 50% of the current retail price, combined it with a subscription service per month, a fee for every hour turned on, a fee per picture, an extra fee for burst mode, a fee when we push a button and last a 20% commission when we sell a used camera. All this based on last year's IRS report.

For commercial use, they could add an extra 10% service fee for every $ you make with the camera.
 
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#57
I think Canon requiring to send the camera's in for this update is because for this generation they have no way to only install the update for those who have paid for it, they don't want the firmware update to leak for free.

Next generation camera's should be ready for these kind of paid updates and you will be able to pay, download and install the unique firmware generated from your serial number that will only work for the individual camera body.

I personally think $120USD is too much for this update but I understand what others are saying that it would save a business time and money in the long run.

Also I do think we are entitled to free firmware updates for at least bug fixes and new lens releases, and I think adding new features for free can keep the camera competitive with the competition, extend it's life and encourage people to buy a camera now instead of waiting for the next generation.
 
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#59
Zadak said:
...

The vast majority of people don't need this anyway, why not spend resources making something useful for everyone?
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I think that is the point. The majority of people don't care about the feature, so in general terms it wouldn't be worth spending the resources on it because many users, and (perhaps more importantly to Canon) potential buyers of the relevant camera models, won't value it. However, there is a group of users who would like the feature and, in this case, that group use their cameras to generate revenue/profit and the feature may be very valuable to them in that it may assist them to generate much more than $120 in increased revenue/profit. No doubt Canon has a good idea how big that group is. So, it seems to me it is possible that from a business point of view, offering the feature by way of a paid update means it is became a sensible business option for Canon to make it (when perhaps it wouldn't have been otherwise) while also being good value for the users who will buy it.

I don't know what Canon will do with future firmware updates, but I don't assume that Canon charging for this particular one necessarily means Canon is going to start regularly charging for firmware updates.

EDIT: Or perhaps Canon is just trying to make a (greater) profit by essentially offering certain cameras at two spec levels: the standard spec suitable for most users and a "higher level" spec for those who want to pay for it. That would hardly be an unusual selling tactic!
 
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#60
Now we need to wait until they offer some really useful paid features by demand but not this crap. For example, I'd pay extra to enable mechanical or at least EFCS for focus bracketing mode on my R6m2.
 
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