Sans Mirror — mirrorless, interchangeable lens cameras  

First in a series of sansmirror promotions

I'd like to promote the visibility of sansmirror by increasing the use of the social link options that appear on most pages (e.g. Facebook Like, Twitter retweet, Share This button—see right column), and I'm going to reward someone at random for helping me do that. Some lucky person will get a Sigma 30mm EX DN lens for m4/3 (value US$199). 

Normally, Web sites do giveaways via what they call a contest or promotion. Unfortunately, the most common methods used (e.g. retweet this page and we'll pick one of the tweeters as a random winner) fall victim to FTC regulations regarding sweepstakes.

So here's the thing: we're going to try to do this legally, and thus I have to trust the honor system. I humbly ask that you use one of the social media links on one of the sansmirror pages to share that page with someone else before entering this giveaway. If you've shared a page before, share a new page. But I don't require this: you can enter the giveaway without doing what I ask. If your own morals support doing that, so be it, even if it defeats the purpose of what I'm trying to do.

Sorry, but due to the wide discrepancies in applicable laws, this sweepstakes is only open to US residents. You must have a US address to win.

But if you're a US resident looking for good karma:

• Use one of the social links in the upper right column to share a sansmirror.com page, any page, with someone else. It doesn't matter which link you use. Like a page, Tweet a page, email a page, or Google +1 it (additional choices are in the Share button).
• Read the Official Rules, below, so that you understand all the fine print.
• Then click on this link to enter the information I'll need to process a winner.

Official Rules
No purchase is necessary. Only one entry per person will be considered. Anyone found to have entered more than once will be disqualified. Sweepstakes is open only to US residents over the age of 18 only. Employees and contractors of byThom may not enter this sweepstakes. Sweepstakes begins May 16th and ends May 31st. 

You enter this sweepstakes by clicking on the link above. You may also enter by sending your name and address on a postcard to byThom, Sansmirror Sweepstake, PO Box 811, Emmaus, PA 18049, postmarked by the last day of the sweepstakes. You are absolutely not required to use one of the social media links on one of the sansmirror pages to enter, though it would be appreciated. You are not required to buy anything. The only requirement is that you submit an entry via one of the two free methods indicated (click on link, or send postcard).

The winner will receive a Sigma 30mm f/2.8 EX DN lens for the micro 4/3 system, valued at US$199. Prizes will be awarded at random to eligible entrants. All prizes will be awarded, and shipped to the winners via USPS. If a winner provides false information or fails to provide the information necessary to ship the prize when requested, an alternate winner will be selected.

The number of eligible entries received determines the odds of winning. Winning names will be posted on this site after prizes are awarded and thus available to all entrants to see. You agree that sansmirror.com may use your name and likeness for promotional purposes should you win. All submitted information about all other entrants will be destroyed and discarded and not used for any purposes unless you checked the box that indicates otherwise. We cannot guarantee that the simple act of entering might not expose your identity to others, as we do not control traffic on the Internet, nor can we control who sees a postcard before it reaches us.

Lost or delayed entries for any reason are not the responsibility of sansmirror and will not be considered; we do what we can to avoid technical issues that may cause this, but we cannot guarantee that there won't be any. All disputes will be subject to litigation in Pennsylvania and decided under that state's laws.

Entrants release sansmirror and its employees, contractors, and owner from all liability entrants may incur by entering this sweepstakes or winning it.

 VOID WHERE PROHIBITED BY LAW.

This sweepstakes is conducted by byThom, PO Box 811, Emmaus, PA 18049. 

Along with the NEX F3 announcement, Sony also announced a new version of the 18-200mm  superzoom for the E mount. Pay close attention, as there are many small changes, though Sony didn't offer quite enough information to fill out a full spec list.

The new black 18-200mm is 12% lighter than its sliver predecessor, and it's also a bit smaller in diameter and slightly cheaper. Those are good differences for the small NEX camera bodies. The differences that might trip you are that close focus is now .5m (20") instead of .3m (12"), and that the optical stabilization isn't quite the same, particularly for video work.

Because the new specs that we do know (and photos Sony has supplied) match up with the Tamron 18-200mm, many are assuming that the new lens is just a rebranding of the Tamron. Given the relationship between the two companies (Sony is an investor in Tamron, and Tamron has previously made lenses for other companies), that's entirely possible.

I made a passing comment about Nikon picking too small a sensor for their mirrorless system, and that got a fair amount of feedback from site readers, so perhaps I should put some more flesh on my comment. 

There are two primary views of the mirrorless world:

1. Mirrorless sits between compact cameras and DSLRs
2. Mirrorless will eventually replace DSLRs

Personally, I think both are true. Though the first statement is clearly true today I don't think the second statement will be true for at least a few more generations, maybe more.

Compact cameras themselves are being squeezed upwards. With competent cameras in most current smartphones, a compact camera can only distinguish itself by "bigger sensor, more lens, more performance." The compact camera makers are attempting to meet the smartphone challenge in three ways: (1) tough cameras (waterproof, crushproof); (2) big lens cameras (10x or wider zooms); and (3) larger sensors (e.g. the Canon G1x, the upcoming Sony, and more to come). 

It's that last bit that's the Nikon 1's problem. With m4/3 sized sensors in compacts and APS sized sensors coming, the top end compacts end up being bigger sensored than the Nikon 1, and by a tangible amount. Sure, Nikon will have a slight price advantage (which they haven't yet shown they're willing to take advantage of), but the bigger sensors will have advantages they can't match. 

Indeed, think about the Coolpix P7100 followup. With Canon now having the G1x with its basically 4/3 sensor, a Coolpix P7200 with a Nikon 1 sensor seems just a bit small (especially with Sony coming into this game with an APS sensor). True, Nikon has phase detect on the sensor and that makes for fast autofocus. But that's a temporary advantage. Others will put PD on the sensor, too. At that point we're stuck with small versus large.

Meanwhile, Nikon appears to be putting more emphasis on FX sensors. Come fall, we'll a D600 (entry FX), D800 (megapixel FX), and D4 (performance FX) DSLR from them, it seems. That entry FX DSLR will come in at a price point that was originally where the high-end DX camera sat (and adjusted for inflation, even lower). The clear implication is that Nikon thinks they can apply economies of scale to bring FX prices down. Personally, I didn't think that would happen until 2015 at the earliest, but it will happen—it's inevitable in tech for parts costs to come down, though and entry FX DSLR would mean Nikon is pushing faster than the predictions. 

So let's extend out a couple of years and try to guess at the landscape:

• Compact cameras: high-end uses large sensors ranging from Nikon 1 size to APS
• Mirrorless: Canon, Olympus, and Panasonic are in the m4/3 size range, Pentax, Samsung, and Sony are using APS (and may tinker with FX)
• DSLRs: APS/DX still around for true entry models, FX mostly for the rest

Where does that leave the Nikon 1? Competing as a compact camera, basically. They're running one stop or two stops smaller than the rest of the competition. That's exactly the position that Olympus was in with 4/3 back in the last decade: one stop smaller than the rest of the competition. As I wrote then, it's not the right strategy. 

Perhaps Nikon knows something the rest of us don't. They did get to phase detect on a big sensor faster than anyone else. Perhaps they see a technology on the near horizon that means that they won't be so deficient, after all. For example, if Nikon could put their patented non-Bayer design into a 10mp Nikon 1 sensor (with phase detect, too ;~), that would be a strong move as long as everyone else stayed Bayer. 

Does my comment about Nikon picking too small a sensor mean that the Nikon 1 is going away any time soon? Not at all. Nikon has a lot of ways of dealing with this. As I just noted, the may have a technological solution (slightly doubtful), they could use price (likely), or they could just try and tough it out by iterating the sensor quickly, amongst other possibilities. 

In short, I believe Nikon put themselves in a slightly awkward position. They'll need to execute well to make up for that.

As long-rumored, Leica today announced a monochrome version of the venerable M9 camera, the M-Monochrom. While this may perplex some, there are three substantive gains to removing the Bayer pattern from a sensor:

• There's an approximately 1.5x increase in resolution (no demosaicing means no invented data).
• More light gets to the sensor so the base ISO is higher (ISO 320 on the M-Monochrome).
• Less noise is produced at higher ISO values because there's no demosaic interpreting values.

I've been a long-time advocate of monochrome-only options for our cameras. Indeed, ever since using the Kodak DCS760 briefly back in 2002 I've been a convert to non-Bayered cameras.

It's a shame Leica didn't take the time to make a few other adjustments on the camera. A 2.5" 230k dot LCD really is a throwback, and a camera like this is just crying for TIFF output. I'm also not clear as to why Silver Efex Pro is thrown in for free (along with Lightroom), unless Nik has worked on altering monochrome data in a new version. Price is US$7950.

Originally I had written that we needed more exposure tools. I had missed the point about the camera first displaying histograms from the JPEG but then correcting that to display the raw histogram.

The Wall Street Journal is reporting that Samsung is gradually reducing its compact camera production at its factory in China and replacing that with mirrorless camera production. To put that in perspective, IDC reported in 2010 that Samsung held fourth place in the global camera market (~11% share, which represents over 10 million units) mostly through compact cameras. Meanwhile, as Reuters reported earlier this year, Samsung only sold 120,000 mirrorless cameras in 2011.

Obviously, Samsung thinks a major change is afoot. 

Certainly so. Kodak, which held a 7.4% market share in 2010 is out of the business now. Both Olympus (6.1%) and Pentax (1.5%) have said that they'll de-emphasize their compact lines in the future. So let's just play a little statistical game for a moment, shall we? If the overall compact market declines 10% but Kodak is gone, Olympus and Pentax pull back by half and Samsung by a quarter, doesn't that open up a "hole" that others will step into? By my count, yes, it does, by at least 5% of the market. Most likely Canon, Sony, and Nikon (#1, #2, and #3 respectively in overall camera sales) will gladly step in to fill that hole.

The issue isn't market share, it's profit. 

Some analysts believe that only three of the top ten camera makers actually show a profit on their compact camera lines. In recent financial filings, we've seen three of the ten specifically claim losses in compact camera lines and two others of the ten claim market share loss. In a flat or declining market, holding share and restoring profit is nearly impossible. Something's got to give.

But don't expect to see a huge Samsung mirrorless push here in the US because of their announced shift. The primary thrust of their initial change in tactics will be centered on Korea, China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan. 

I first wrote about the strong need for a shift in compact camera designs in 2005. We're now well into the period I foresaw, and we're starting to see casualties (Kodak) and shifts in strategy (Samsung, Olympus). That said, I didn't predict that compact cameras would go away, only that they would be squeezed by smart phones and DSLRs in ways that would require a complete rethink of the product in between. The current group-think by the camera companies seems to be that mirrorless (the mini-DSLR) will replace high-end compacts, but I don't actually believe that to be completely true. Mirrorless is just as likely to encroach upon low-end DSLRs, I think. Compacts are a tricky design problem because they're being squeezed in so many directions, but that doesn't mean that there isn't a demand for a pocketable and competent camera.   

Update: I had forgotten Samsung's statement in 2010: "determined to be #1 in mirrorless..by 2012" and "best-selling camera brand by 2015." At present, they're #5 in mirrorless and #4 in cameras, but they're also starting to transition out of the cameras that make them #4 (compacts). Compare this to Nikon, who expects to sell more compacts and gain market share in 2012. Moreover, they're almost an order of magnitude behind being #1 in mirrorless at the moment.

Not that Samsung's been the only company to make such bold statements of future progress. Virtually all of the camera companies have proclaimed that they'll achieve 20% or higher share in various camera markets. Sony and Pentax in DSLRs. Panasonic and Fujifilm in overall camera sales. The list of these "we'll be a leader" forecasts is nearly endless. I think I'm going to have to imitate John Gruber and institute a Claim Chowder list.       

Update 2: a week later, Engadget reports that they've talked to a senior VP who said they simply made manufacturing adjustments to build NX models. Sounds a bit like gobblygook to me, and doesn't exactly contradict the original Wall Street Journal statement. Again, I'll point out that #3 (overall camera share) Nikon is increasing compact camera production and expects to gain market share, while #4 Samsung has apparently removed some compact camera production, even if temporarily.