The Online Photographer

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People are fine with growth. We love it when things are getting bigger, richer, more powerful, more vigorous, more prosperous. But for some reason we don't seem to be able to handle the opposite. We don't even seem to have many good words for it. What's the opposite of growth? Shrinkage, with apologies to George Costanza? I guess the best word is decline. Whatever you call it, deterioration, decline and diminution throw us into disarray. We're flummoxed by it. Most often, we simply try to pretend it isn't happening, or we act like it isn't. Weirdly, even when we need to downsize—even when something smaller and more efficient would be more to our advantage—we still can't handle it. Even when we know it's coming we have a hard time preparing for it and managing it in an orderly way.

I have to say the following is mostly at the level of rumor. The rumor is that Canon has laid off, mostly in the form of buy-outs, a sizeable chunk of its global workforce, in response to a 5% drop in profits since 2017 and a decline in sales of 3% over the past year. Apparently only 60 people were let go in Melville, New York, Canon's USA headquarters since 2013; however, most of those were in the camera division, and anyway, Canon can't let employment in Melville drop too far because it has to fulfill promises it made to Suffolk County to get public aid for the relocation.

WTFingly, among those let go is Rudy Winston, who was, up till now, one of the most high-profile liasons between Canon and the professional and advanced-amateur customer base. In the USA at least. If you've been around for the whole digital thing, think "today's Chuck Westfall." PetaPixel has a whole article about it. The cynical thought occurred to me that maybe Rudy was at too high a range in payscale or was about to qualify for some level of pension/retirement.

Even if so, that's not the guy you let go. Thom sees the first gyre of a downward spiral:

I've written the following for almost all my career: when companies cut back on key knowledgable personnel that were effective in creating things or working directly with customers, they lower the quality they provide their customers. Lower the quality, and over time you'll lower your sales. Lower your sales, and you'll be downsizing again in the future. It's a death spiral if you think this is the plan to execute ad infinitum.

Canon's new Z8 fighter

Meanwhile, Canon has just introduced two new models: the long-awaited top professional R1 and the R5 Mark II. Both cameras are "new" along the lines of recent times: kinda new but kinda not. The R1 turns out to be fairly similar to the R3, and the R5 Mark II is obviously the refresh of the R5, although they've put a lot of new goodies into it. Respectively, the two models will cost $6,300 and $4,300, which struck me as roughly double what they might cost if the camera market were still vigorous and sensible. But, as we know, it was about a decade ago that the "we might sell fewer of them, but we'll charge more" strategy took hold of the camera market at the higher end. About four years after the iPhone appeared.

But...you charge more to goose profits, but then you sell fewer; you sell fewer, so you charge even more; because you're charging even more, you sell even fewer. And so forth. Let's hope not, but that does sound a bit like the kind of spiral that must ultimately impact terrain, unfortunately.

Mike

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Featured Comments from:

Mark Sampson: "Corporations...if you're not an executive, you're an interchangeable part. Unless you've been around a long time, then you're an 'expensive' liability—even if they aren't paying you much. I don't know Mr. Winston, or his work, and it's obvious that the upper-level bureaucrats don't either. Luckily for him and us, he'll land on his feet. Best of luck to him! 

Tom Burke: "I'm not sure about this. I wonder if we still haven't fully grasped the existential threat to the camera companies that smartphones (and possibly other devices) present? They are just getting better and better...I use both an iPhone and a Canon R7 for my photography, and I would have to say that as far as I'm concerned, quite a lot of my more memorable recent images were taken with the phone. It's also the case that I can't see myself ever wanting to upgrade from the R7. It's far more capable than I am; any limitations in the images that result are down to me, not the camera. The R7 is ASPS-C, of course, and I can't see that moving to full-frame would, in and of itself, make any difference. And I certainly can't see myself ever affording an R5 or higher-spec camera. Besides, who knows what smartphones will be capable of in, say, five years' time? So while I agree that it sometimes looks as if the traditional camera firms are making stupid decisions, I suspect that we haven't appreciated the degree of panic, possibly despair, that they are feeling."

Thom Hogan: "One thing I didn't write about is the balance of automation/employees. Canon has been heavy into making their products via robotics. That means that the only people you can cut to lower expenses are the ones who market and sell them. As for 5D II and R1, this is exactly where I saw a difference this round: the information available to the press was not as good as it has been on earlier high-end launches. The way Canon achieved the 'cross sensor' focus, for instance. It's apparently a 90° rotation of the masking on certain rows. It's not quad-pixel, nor is it technically cross sensor. It's a mix of masking orientation. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but when the rumors were quad-pixel, you claim cross sensor, and the truth is below that, you start to lose credibility. That's exactly where people like Rudy used to be able to provide insight and manage the discussion."