Sans Mirror  

Fujifilm's camera strategy still seems somewhat suspect to me. They appear to undercut themselves for no clear reason. Today's new cameras introduced at the Fujifilm X Summit in Sydney, Australia are excellent examples of that. 

The new X-T50 replaces the X-T30, and basically is an all-new body with much of the X-T5's specs, including the 40mp sensor. The primary difference in the higher model lies in the Rear LCD adjustability, the higher resolution EVF, the larger battery, ability to use battery grips and fan accessories, and the inclusion of second card slot. Given the US$300 price differential, the changes in the X-T5 might not seem worth the money the some. In essence, the X-T50 undercuts the X-T5.

Meanwhile, the new GFX100S II becomes the lowest priced 100mp medium format camera at US$5000. With a US$1000 lower price the new version manages to get a few clear advantages over its predecessor: 8 stops IBIS, X-Processor 5 and all the abilities that come with that (including subject detection focus), a bigger EVF (5.76m dots), more images per charge, and a slight reduction in weight. Compared to the more expensive GFX100 II, what you really give up is a few Fn buttons, a CFe slot, and a few megapixels in the EVF (still upgraded from the previous model, though). Frame rate and buffer size is lower, and the video specs are also more modest. Again, an undercut. 

I suppose this is "build market share" strategy, but it has to come at a cost to gross profit margin, and I'm not sure that Fujifilm isn't hurting themselves. For example, we now have a number of cameras using the 40mp sensor, but one of those (X100VI) is in extremely short supply compared to demand. Unless Fujifilm has turned on the spigot for 40mp sensors, they run the risk of not being able to take advantage of the popularity of the cameras they've already introduced. Indeed, my guess is that X100VI demand is already dropping, even before Fujifilm has managed to meet backorders.

Fujifilm also announced two new lenses at the summit: the 16-50mm f/2.8-4.8 R LM WR for the XF mount, and the 500mm f/5.6 R LM OIS WR for the GFX mount. The former becomes the new "standard" zoom lens for the APS-C bodies (X-S20, X-T50, X-T5), while the latter is a near 400mm equivalent telephoto for the large medium format sensor bodies.

Before we get started, we need to recap where we are with APS-C mirrorless:

• Canon — Basically re-iterated the bottom of their previous Kiss/Rebel idea, plus a topper camera (R7).
• Fujifilm — All in on APS-C, but now with a proliferation of “different” cameras and similar primes.
• Nikon — Had triplets and then stopped birthing anything.
• Sony — The NEX to A6### story is one of decline. 

Full frame is not an issue for anyone: the entry, mid-range, and top cameras are there for all brands that participate—though Sony uses older models for low-end entry pricing—well defined, and now multiply iterated. One would conclude from examining Canon, Nikon, and Sony full frame mirrorless lineups that each has a plan, knows what they’re doing, and is deep in iteration of that. Panasonic has a mini-plan ;~).

Not so for APS-C. I’ve heard so many varying and confused explanations from Japanese executives about their crop sensor lineup now that I’ve come to the conclusion that they simple don’t know what to do. 

Fujifilm is probably in the best position with APS-C mirrorless, mostly because they skipped full frame and rely on APS-C for the bulk of their sales. But even with Fujifilm I get puzzling explanations of why their models are what they are, how they differentiate them and why, plus what they think a “complete” lineup actually looks like. 

To me, it seems like there are too many pet projects at Fujifilm, as well as some too-strongly held beliefs. I’m not sure why they think they need to make the X-T50 a 40mp camera, for example, or why a new X-TPro needs to be developed. It’s really difficult to say what the entry point is for the Fujifilm lineup (probably X-S20), and the top end in the X-H2S has virtually no sales energy in the market, meaning it was a swing and a miss.

On the lens side, we have a full range of Fujifilm primes that seem to be going through regeneration, while the X-H2S isn’t getting much of the lens support it really needed. There’s simply no clear hand guiding the Fujifilm offerings in a way that someone who doesn’t already follow Fujifilm would understand, which inhibits their growth. 

That said, Fujifilm looks like the gem in APS-C mirrorless world compared to the others. 

Dropping over to the other long-term player in APS-C mirrorless, Sony, we also find large potential for user confusion. The wide, deep, and quickly iterated days of NEX models are long gone now. The A6000, A6300, A6500 trio looked like a strong start to the post-NEX days, but things have been limping since, and are now confused with the ZV-E10 evolution. 

The A6100, A6400, and A6600 showed up as modest iterations five years ago, and since then, we’ve only seen the A6700 add to the iteration, so generations are taking longer, and no longer appear synced. 

We did see Sony produce a few more E-mount lenses, but mostly centered around the uses that ZV-E10 users would appreciate. 

What it feels like to me looking back at the Sony APS-C mirrorless history is that they started with great energy and excitement and quick responses, slowed some as they introduced full frame, and now are completely distracted with “other things.” 

Canon and Nikon, the late entrants, have taken different paths. Canon, for instance, seems to have taken their decontented model Kiss/Rebel idea even further in the mirrorless world, with the R100 being so basic even Canon doesn’t ever talk about it in positive terms. The R10 and R7 at the top of the lineup have had more success, but “success” in this instance doesn’t mean “strong seller.” 

Now it appears that Canon is ceding RF-S lenses to the third parties (Sigma has announced six lenses for Canon APS-C, Tamron one). Meanwhile Canon has just a total of four kit zooms, and hasn’t bothered to bring other M-mount lenses over to RF-S. Parental neglect, for sure.

Nikon is the worst of the bunch so far, having a five year old camera that they “iterated” by giving it cosmetic surgery to create a new body, twice. Somehow, the optical side of the company managed to give those three near-identical cameras five lenses, which is one more than Canon managed. Still, it’s a pretty limited, small scale offering from Nikon, with no clear indication what the future may bring.

One thing I see in all four APS-C players is that their engineering teams aren’t really giving their marketing teams a story, just a few random options to try to figure out how to explain to customers. Which the pathetic marketing teams in Tokyo can’t manage to do. 

/Sarcasm ON

Canon: We Made the Kiss/Rebel worse.

Fujifilm: Don’t Try to Use Two of Our Bodies Simultaneously.

Nikon: Choose a Body Style for Your Five-Year-Old Camera.

Sony: Sorry, but We’re Running Out of Gas.

/Sarcasm OFF

To a large degree, the Japanese companies see APS-C as the last defense line against smartphones. All retreated from 1/2.3” sensors. Most have given up on 1” sensors. So it’s APS-C where the line between smartphone image quality and dedicated camera image quality is being drawn. 

And the line is being drawn poorly. Heck, is it even a line? More like a dotted line in faint gray. If I squint I can almost see it. 

(I said Sarcasm OFF!)

This is a real problem. APS-C is the entry point for dedicated cameras now. But it’s not much of an entry point, and I don’t see any of the Japanese camera companies getting marketing messages out that are clear, direct, and define the expectations. 

As I’m wont to point out, all of the APS-C cameras still have issues with getting images to where the user wants them. I’ll give Fujifilm some credit for getting their camera-to-smartphone software closer to what is needed, but in general it appears that the Japanese companies are so afraid of smartphones that they don’t want to mention them, ever, let alone integrate with them. 

The sum of the parts (smartphone, camera) should be greater than the sum of the parts. Instead, trying to use them together today is a lesson in subtraction, not addition. 

Getting APS-C right should be a critical strategy at every camera company. None seem to be seeing it the same way that I do, so I’m predicting more customer erosion, not a growing customer base.

Next up in the CIPA release queue is the OM-1 II. 

Up front (literally) we have a name change. The original OM-1 had an Olympus name plate on the viewfinder front, while the new model gets an OM System replacement. 

In terms of what really makes this new model a new model, the list is short, but potentially significant:

• The internal memory buffer has doubled.
• An updated IS system improves the CIPA rating to 8.5 stops.
• The camera is blackout free at slower frame rates.
• The camera can now record in 14-bit raw in the high-resolution (sensor shift) mode.
• A virtual graduated ND filter is available (computational, not mechanical), and regular ND can now be up to ND128.
• The focusing system gains a full human recognition to its autofocus AI, and the focus system overall has been consolidated and improved.

Overall, the changes to the camera are welcome, but after two years with the original camera feel more like a firmware update than any real change (other than the extra memory). A significant update, to be sure, but still, some things I believe still need addressing aren't changed in this new camera.

Along with the OM-1 II, OMDS also introduced two lenses, the 9-18mm f/4-5.6 II and the 150-600mm f/5-6.3. Both appear to be rebadging jobs. The wide angle zoom takes away the Olympus markings and replaces them with OM System ones as well as a newer external design ethos, but the optics appear to be the same as the original Olympus lens. The latter zoom is a bit of a controversial one in that the lens appears to be the Sigma full frame telephoto version in an m4/3 mount. The thicker OM filter layer on the top of the image sensor requires a slight tweak to how the focus is projected rearward, but otherwise this seems to be a Sigma optic being rebadged.

Commentary: When OM Digital Solutions took over the Olympus camera group I mentioned several issues with their naming decisions, and now you can see the result of that. If you accidentally type in omsystems.com in a Web browser instead of omsystem.com, well, you don't get the company making the camera. Heck, if you type in omdigitalsolutions.com, you get a Go Daddy "get this domain" page; you need to actually type om-digitalsolutions.com. This is a bit of marketing 101 failure. 

The existing customers aren't going to have any real issues with this, as they've already re-pointed their Web browsers at the new pages, but for someone seeing or hearing the name for the first time, slight misses on what they type into a search engine aren't going to bring up the relevant pages. This is one of those things I call a "friction." In business, you want as few frictions as possible, as each tends to rob you of sales, and if you pile up enough of them, that could be enough to start a downward glide in your results.

Meanwhile, rebadging a Sigma optic means I need to come up with a new name. When Nikon did the same thing with some Tamron lenses back in the F-mount days, I began calling them Tamrikon. I guess now we have Sigmoms. (When I come up with these names, I first do a search to make sure that they're unique. Then it's fun to follow what happens next. You'll see that Tamrikon on Duck Duck Go brings up zsystemuser.com references first, then Internet fora posts, for instance. In other words, I can follow my word usage from my site to Web fora. A fun game for all. Well, okay, for me.)

Here's the problem with the Sigmoms just introduced: it's the same size and weight as the full frame version. In essence, OM Digital Solutions is saying this: we'll give you a 4:3 aspect 2x crop that's 20mp. Okay, but you'd get 26mp out of a Sony A7R Mark V with the same lens ;~). The question then becomes is the OM-1 body smaller and lighter than the A7R Mark V? Well, there's a 2 ounce (66g) advantage to the OM-1, but with that lens on the camera you're also at a minimum of 300mm effective. In other words, you get 300-1200mm at 20mp versus 150-900mm at 61 to 26mp. Oops. I'd rather have the Sony. I first warned about this problem back in 2003 with the introduction of the E-1: if the size/weight and capabilities are near identical, you don't want to be bringing the smaller sensor to the fight.  

As usual each year around the holidays, I do a bit of maintenance and updating of my sites. It's taken me much longer than usual to get this done this time around, as the number of changes in the mirrorless market last year coupled with some inattention on my part made quite a few bits and pieces needing some loving attention. A quick summary of what's progressed so far:

• The 2021 and 2022 news/views has been archived into a sub-folder. Pre-2021 news/views lives here. That's 12 years' worth of news that needed to be dealt with in a more permanent home that doesn't clutter the top menus.
• The Articles section has been gone through, and I've updated comments and recommendations to be up to date. That includes the System Guides for the five major mounts, as well as my small travel camera recommendations.
• The Cameras section has been updated, with new charts and information where needed. Some missing Z System reviews have been brought over from zsystemuser.com. 
• The Books section has been simplified, with the Z System books all now pointing over to the zsystemuser.com site where their information is maintained on a more regular basis.
• About Sansmirror got a bit of editing and fixes.

Which leaves me with...

Lenses. I've got a lot of work to do to bring this section up to my standards. We've got a dozen years' worth of collected information, some of which is no longer accurate (e.g. lens no longer made, change in specifications/price, etc.). What I'm doing is going through all the autofocus lens databases and making them "current" one by one. Unfortunately, some of the lens makers have been "fiddling" with available lenses/mounts, changing prices with currency fluctuations, and in some cases, finally providing full details on a lens. So I've got a lot of work to do on these sections, and it will take me awhile to do it. My priorities in updating this section are: (1) camera maker lens data, (2) autofocus third party lens data, and (3) manual focus third party lens data. I also need to take another pass at the articles in the lens section. I'll let you know when all this work is complete. For now, I've updated the Canon RF, RF-S, Fujifilm GFX, Nikon Z (DX and FX) sections, and am currently working on the Fujifilm RF section. I'll probably tackle one section each week, but that's at least three months work.

Once I've completed getting most of the lens section up to snuff, I'll start adding new reviews to the site. 

(Disclaimer: I haven't yet been able to do more than quickly handle an A9 Mark III, and that's probably all I'll be able to do until it becomes generally available later this year. However, for the purposes of this discussion, I don't need to have an extended session with the camera.)

Now that dpreview has given credence to all the measurebators' fears (lower dynamic range) and provoked even more misinformed discussion, it's time to adjust people's views.

Simply put, the Sony A9 Mark III buyer would not typically be all that worried about maximum dynamic range. Never was, never will be. 

The primary technology change in the A9 Mark III is the global shutter. Global shutters have basically three benefits at the expense of two drawbacks, all else equal:

#1 Benefit: No rolling shutter, LED banding, or display line mismatch effects.
#2 Benefit: Potentially higher bandwidth (higher frame rate).
#3 Benefit: Flash sync at any shutter speed.
#1 Drawback: The extra electronics involve decrease well capacity, which triggers a gain adjustment that increases base ISO.
#2 Drawback: The same changes basically lower dynamic range compared to a non-global shutter version, due to noise.

That's really it. For general purpose photography, the two drawbacks would make it unlikely that you'd buy an A9 Mark III. For particular use cases, particularly in sports and wildlife photography, the benefits might make it so that you do want an A9 Mark III.

Here's the thing: if I were a full-time working pro sports photographer running from venue to venue, that #1 benefit would easily outweigh the two drawbacks. That I'd also get that #2 benefit might come into play every once in awhile. The #1 drawback isn't really a drawback, as I'm rarely at base ISO for this type of work. The #2 drawback might come into play in a few situations (ironically, including when LED displays are backlighting the action on the field, so instead of a scrambled display I'd get a blown out display). 

Putting on my hat as a full time wildlife photographer, benefit #2 starts to become more interesting, though with small birds in flight I could see some benefit to #1 when it comes to wing tips. Unfortunately, the #2 drawback starts to come into play, particularly as a lot of my work these days happens in very low light (and no direct light) but high contrast conditions. 

I'm still trying to figure out just how much of a benefit #3 actually would be to anyone. Granted, flash sync at 1/200, as it is on the Nikon Z9, is too slow. I encounter plenty of situations where I need that to be higher. However, even being to sync at 1/500 would be enough, and I'm sure that's coming soon in a non-global shutter camera. (Actually, coming again. We had 1/500 flash sync during the early DSLR era with CCD image sensors.)

Dpreview's test results aren't surprising. As I wrote when the A9 Mark III was announced, this was definitely a technology play by Sony, and one that seemed timed and presented in a way that suggested more than it was. The A9 Mark III is going to have customers, for sure, but it's a fairly small subset of the market. Nikon's Z9 followed by the Z8 has taken quite a bit of wind out of Sony's sails (and sales), but I'm not sure the A9 Mark III really gets them to the mark in first place.

I wrote that we need to adjust some folk's views. That's very true with all that I see from the comments that are proliferating. 

For example, that dynamic range thing. Basically, we measure that from some "noise floor" to saturation. I've already noted that the extra electronics at the pixel level reduce the maximum saturation, so the noise floor starts to become very important. Almost everyone (including dpreview) that I see commenting about A9 Mark III noise tendencies seems to be doing it from "what I see." Have you tried measuring their samples? In particular, use a largish area on one of the ColorChecker patches and observe the standard deviation. Curiously, the Sony A6600 has a slightly lower standard deviation in every same ISO sample I took. But then again, that 24mp APS-C sensor in the A6600 was essentially Exmor state-of-the-art, so I don't find that surprising. 

The question is whether the A9 Mark III has enough dynamic range for its intended use(s). My answer in looking at others' results so far is, "yes if the image is properly exposed." All sports venues are lit, for instance. Sure, some of that lighting is low in value and has a fair amount of fall-off from the central point, but it's direct light. If you're accounting for the difference in images taken, say, in the far corners of a poorly lit soccer field versus the center field with your exposure, you should be fine with the A9 Mark III. About as fine as you'd be with the A9 Mark II, which I don't hear any of my pro friends complaining about. Moreover, there's the issue of frequency with some lighting, and the global shutter is going to deal with that, too.

The fact that a lot of pro sports output is JPEG means I'd be looking at how Sony tweaked BIONZ for the A9 Mark III, too. Judging from dpreview's examples, that seems to be fairly strong JPEG noise reduction with only modest edge softness at ISO 12800. Indeed, with those settings, the standard deviation is now lower than the A6600, and the A9 Mark III seems to be retaining edges a little better. I also look at the A9 Mark II results against those from the Mark III, and see similar things, so I'm just not seeing that the intended audience for this camera is likely going to be disappointed in it.