Is the price charged for lenses justified?

"David J Taylor"
wrote in message .uk...
Discussion topic:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

I.e. is the price a fair reflection of the design and production costs, or
are lenses a high-profit item?

David,
I may be wrong, but I sincerely think that the price of goods isn't fixed on
the cost + distribution + a profit + anything else I might have left out.
As far as I'm concerned, the price of goods has something to do with what
people are prepared to pay.
If you look at the prices of houses now, it's not the price of the land +
services + materials + labor + whatever... It's more with what I said
before. A thought.
Marcel

"Frank Arthur" wrote in message
.. .

"Andrew Koenig" wrote in message
...
"David J Taylor"
wrote in
message .uk...

Discussion topic:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

If you think the answer is no, there is an easy way to prove it: Make
your own lenses and sell them for less.

Excellent reply!

Frank,
I'm not sure it's good reply. I'll grant you it's an *easy* reply.
The cost of a lens includes many more things such as research, factory,
assembly, tools, employees (and all the benefits), distribution and what
not, that a person doesn't have at his disposal, at least short term ;-)
To say: "Make your own" is.... well... you can draw your own conclusions.
Cheers,
Marcel

Celcius wrote:
"David J Taylor"
wrote in
message .uk...
Discussion topic:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

I.e. is the price a fair reflection of the design and production
costs, or are lenses a high-profit item?

David,
I may be wrong, but I sincerely think that the price of goods isn't
fixed on the cost + distribution + a profit + anything else I might
have left out. As far as I'm concerned, the price of goods has
something to do with what people are prepared to pay.
If you look at the prices of houses now, it's not the price of the
land + services + materials + labor + whatever... It's more with what
I said before. A thought.
Marcel

Oh, I do agree with you, but I find it interesting that some lenses appear
to be far better value for money (example: Nikon 55-200mm VR). I found
some of the other contributions most interesting as well.

Cheers,
David

On Nov 7, 12:04 pm, "Frank Arthur" wrote:
"Andrew Koenig" wrote in message

... "David J Taylor"
wrote in
nder.co.uk...

Discussion topic:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

If you think the answer is no, there is an easy way to prove it:
Make your own lenses and sell them for less.

Excellent reply!


No it's not. It's a circumstantial ad hominem argument.

It's an argument of the form: "of course you don't think the price is
justified; you're not a lens manufacturer."

There's also the ubiquitous Usenet tactic of demanding proof going on
here - a form of the Argumentum ad Ignorantiam fallacy. Namely,
arguing proposition X is true unless and until someone proves not-X.

"Celcius" wrote in message
...

"Frank Arthur" wrote in message
.. .

"Andrew Koenig" wrote in message
...
"David J Taylor"
wrote in
message .uk...

Discussion topic:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

If you think the answer is no, there is an easy way to prove it:
Make your own lenses and sell them for less.

Excellent reply!

Frank,
I'm not sure it's good reply. I'll grant you it's an *easy* reply.
The cost of a lens includes many more things such as research,
factory, assembly, tools, employees (and all the benefits),
distribution and what not, that a person doesn't have at his
disposal, at least short term ;-)
To say: "Make your own" is.... well... you can draw your own
conclusions.
Cheers,
Marcel

Well Marcel.
I ground and polished my own lenses and designed and machined the
mounts for them.
Over many years I developed a number of mechanical & optical
components and devices.
I know exactly what goes into producing and selling these things and
the chances of
these being successful and profitable.
I often people talking about how simple things are and are seem
puzzled by how costly
they seem. One item in particular, a camera extension tube for a Nikon
autofocus lens.
"Why should they be so expensive? It's only a tube with a hole" they
say.
I give an answer very similar to Andrew's. I say, "Just make an
engineering drawing
for it". When a person is actually faced with how much work is
involved in even a
simple product they sometimes become aware of what is actually
required.

Celcius wrote:
"Wolfgang Weisselberg" wrote in message
David J Taylor

The 50mm f/1.8 from Canon certainly is excellent value for the
money, the kit lens (18-55mm f1/3.5-5.6) is more on the cheap side.

You're the second person to recommend this lens.

You cannot do much wrong with $100.
I didn't like the haptics and the AF was not what I wanted it
to be, so I got myself the f/1.4.

I already have two lenses (17-85 IS USM, 70-300 IS USM).
How useful would this lens be for me?

That depends on what you are shooting.

In what circumstances?

- focussing on composition instead of framing with the zoom
- very shallow DOF[1] (though the bokeh fo the f/1.8 isn't what
you'd call good).
- low light photography.

-Wolfgang

[1] f/1.6:
http://www.shooting4joy.com/gallery/...109045799-A-LB

wrote in message
ups.com...
On Nov 7, 12:04 pm, "Frank Arthur" wrote:

No it's not. It's a circumstantial ad hominem argument.

It's an argument of the form: "of course you don't think the price is
justified; you're not a lens manufacturer."

No it's not. It's an argument of the form: "A price for an item is
justified if both a buyer and a seller are willing to conduct the
transaction at that price."

If you think that an item is being sold for an unjustifiably high price, but

1) Buyers are willing to buy it at that price, and
2) No potential sellers are willing to sell it for less than that price

then which is more likely--that the market is wrong, or that you are?

Douglas wrote:

Pretty clearly the purpose of creating "Image Stabilized" lenses instead of
put the gyro in the body is a profit driven decision.

It *could* not be because a film is a bit hard to move around,
because in September 1995[1] and March 1997[2] *everyone* was
using digital.

Especially, since everyone by then was using the EOS DCS 3,
the _first_ digital Canon EOS (a EOS 1N with Kodak adding in a
1.3MPix(!) sensor and a 260MB hard drive), which had been out
for *TWO* months --- since July[3].

After all, at 2mio Yen (for which you'd get more than 9 (nine!)
top-of-the-line EOS-1N bodies, with 6 fps) you get a huge,
ungainly EOS-1N with a Kodak digital backend mounted in and below
the camera, capable of 2.8 frames per second, incredible 1.3MPix
resolution and 260MB hard drive for storage. A shutter lag of
_only_ a quarter second is not a problem.


Yes, I am sure it was just a money ploy from Canon to not build
stabilisation into film bodies. Money grubbing *******s.


[more completely 'Elvis lives' quality conspiracy crap, based on
not understanding cameras and flash at all]

You don't need your head shrunk, you need a completely new one.


-Wolfgang

[1] EF75-300mm f/4-5.6 IS USM
http://www.canon.com/camera-museum/c...~56is_usm.html
[2] EF300mm f/4L IS USM
http://www.canon.com/camera-museum/c..._4lis_usm.html
[3] http://www.canon.com/camera-museum/c...crn&page=1995-

Rita Ä Berkowitz wrote:
David J Taylor wrote:

Is the price charged for lenses justified?

I have found what Canon charges for their wide-angle offerings are
borderline criminal since they have extremely poor performance.

They probably show too much wide angle.

-Wolfgang

On Nov 7, 1:48 pm, "Andrew Koenig" wrote:
wrote in message


No it's not. It's an argument of the form: "A price for an item is
justified if both a buyer and a seller are willing to conduct the
transaction at that price."

If you think that an item is being sold for an unjustifiably high price, but

1) Buyers are willing to buy it at that price, and
2) No potential sellers are willing to sell it for less than that price

then which is more likely--that the market is wrong, or that you are?

I don't disagree, but that's not what you wrote.

There are different issues associated with the OP's question.

1. Is the price justified in terms of added benefit to the
photographer?
2. Is the price justified in terms of development and manufacturing
costs?
3. Is the price justified from a market economy point of view?

For me the answers to 2nd and 3rd questions are "usually". The answer
to the first one is less clear. In photography you are always paying a
lot for a little extra.