APS Sucks.

Michael Benveniste :

wrote:

Replace? For any one individual, perhaps not. Compete with the L1?
Yes, and very successfully at that. The Stylus Epic, Canon S10, and
Pentax S4 all capture the same angle of view at f/2.8. Each offers
the advantages and disadvantages of its own format. But we're looping
here.

The key feature of the L1 is it's quality in combination with it's
size.

As I stated earlier, if you're scanning a whole roll APS is more
convenient. But I read your response as saying the faster scan time
was the reason, which doesn't make sense.

No, I always want to scan the roll. We're living in the digital age :-)

the L1 for a reasonable (that means: reasonable to me) price, I will
quickly replace it. When the films in my fridge are empty in some
years, I will replace the SLR. But there is really no need to hurry.
Cool. No one is asking you to change.

I really want to. Digital is the maximum ease of use, IMO. But it's
still too expensive for the extra it provides to me.

I really wonder why a lot of people spend 300 Euro for digital point
and shoot these days who would never ever have been willing to spend
the same amount in a classic camera. People who often gain close to
nothing from digital. It must be the coolish effect of digital
technology.

It's always the masses who influence the markets. So I would have
to care for everything.
Only the markets for goods and services which impact you.

You can ignore a lot of the impact. For example I'm not scared by the
dead of APS. I really know people who switched to 35mm because the
realised that APS is a dying format. In 3-4 years they will switch
again to digital. And they even don't have to fill the fridge, they are
just using the consumer ISO 200 films anyway. Those will last longest.

And it can be nice to use a dying format: I have the fridge full of
decent slide film I've bought for 5 Euros the roll.

All three formats are feeling the impact today, as Kodak's quarterly
report shows. APS is getting hurt the hardest, though.

The camera dealers hate APS. Reasons are simple: It brought high cost
for them. Neither the camera dealers nor the camera manufacturers were
willing to push the format on their cost, so it had to loose against
the cheaper 35mm.

Since medium format is predominantly a pro format, and the workflow
advantages of digital are greatest for professionals, I expect medium
format to lose market share at least as fast as 35mm. Here in the
U.S., wedding photographers have embraced digital at an astounding
rate.

Here in germany, wedding fotographers used 35mm before switching to
digital. Same goes for journalists and other professionals. Only in
studios medium format was used professionally. Everywhere else, 35mm
was used for it's easy handling compared to medium format.

35mm will loose 100% of the point and shoot market. It will loose most
of the hobbyists. This will make it more expensive. The day it's close
to beeing as expensive as middle format, the amateurs will flee from
35mm.

Let's come back here in 3 years and see who was guessing best :-)

Once Canon has gotten all the cream out of the market this Christmas
season, Nikon will follow suit with a "me too" offering, probably
based on the N75. Given the pattern of the last 15 years or so, you
expected anything different?

Not really. But I will keep complaining some years that there is no
Pronea SD I can use my IX-lenses on. And everyone will believe Kodak
and Olympus had the brilliant idea to use smaller lenses and smaller
"negatives" to get smaller and lighter cameras...