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Changes Coming Hold on to your seat

I totally agree that Hasselblad has lost a whopping share of the market to DSLRs. Not just them, but all of the MF makers ... some of which no longer exist. But don't you think that process has run it's course?

Yet, with the move to Imacon, and recent integrated systems, it seems they've chosen to primarily cater to the professional commercial photographer ... accepting a smaller market, but one that financially can keep pace with the expensive strata that high end MF digital photography represents.

I am a member (albeit a mostly silent one) of a professional blog dedicated to Hasselblad commercial digital solutions. I think the "by invitation only" membership is something like 500 worldwide. Incredible talent and knowledge base (which is humbling). The commonality is the striving for excellence in their works and the adoption and application of technological advancements as they are made available. From what I can tell, this type of group wields significant influence with Hasselblad.

The point is that it isn't what it used to be and probably never will be again. The question is
will they prevail in their chosen area of focus: the professional market.
 
"But don't you think that process has run it's course?"

No, the market is volatile, the one thing that's certain is that change is inevitable.

"The question is will they prevail in their chosen area of focus: the professional market."

I sincerely hope so but do worry that they are targeting such a small proportion of the professional market.
 
G'Day:

I think it is very savvy for Hasselblad to use the elite professional Hasselblad users to fund the research and development of ever changing digital technology. As Marc writes, the elite Pros strive for excellence - of necessity. They also get tax breaks via write offs for investing in new product and will always want to be at the leading edge - for very good commercial reasons. So, Hasselblad gets a ride.

And, of course, the non-commercial peasants, like me, get the R&D benefit at little or no cost. I can easily catch the second wave, because I don't have to be the first at the beach. And besides, I have more private work than I can comfortably do as it is - with old generation technology. For me, at least, everything old is new again. My biggest advantage right now is 'retro': negatives, paper, monochrome. (The customer is always right.)

I hope, however, that Hassleblad will remember to acknowledge the truly vast number of keen and savvy non-pros who feed at the tail end of the pool. Although they may not be rushing to get the new (and expensive) technology, they are keeping alive the resale market in many cases - which in turn provides the leading edge with a decent 'trade-in' value. The group also fosters or spawns new and upcoming pros, who will in turn need the new technology. And they represent the best (or worst) of all advertising: talking heads.

I hope 'we' continue on an even keel, but if not, so what. There's plenty of other nice shells on the beach. And I'll still have what I have.

Cheers,

Colin

PS. BTW, I also strive for excellence. :)
 
Sadly, Mercedes have lost their high reputation for reliability, at least in the UK, where Ford and Toyota have good names. BMW is still V.G.
 
"PS. BTW, I also strive for excellence. :)"

Of course, but your children do not go without shoes or food if you don't.

Upon reading Canon's full press release I now think perhaps Keith is right. They are targeting professional photographers directly and actually mention "areas of photography" once the territory of MF. The spec's are pretty impressive. $8,000. for the body.

To bad most of their lenses under 50mm suck (except maybe the 35/1.4 : -)

People who invested in converting their Zeiss/Contax N glass to fully funtional Canon AF mounts will have the most kick DSLR kit out there. I sold my N stuff to soon. See, NEVER sell any Zeiss gear ... people will find a way to make it work no matter what.
 
G'day Marc:

I wrote :"PS. BTW, I also strive for excellence. :)"

You wrote: "Of course, but your children do not go without shoes or food if you don't."

Not quite sure what you are implying here. If you check up on trait theory you will see that a trait is without borders and applies across any given situation. My trait is to strive for excellence. If I swept streets, I would strive for excellence. Such a personality trait is not confined to the rich and famous. Having said that, I agree that those professional elites who have reached the pinnacle likely all have such a trait. The only alternative option (not a trait), probably, is a silver spoon.

None of the above, of course, is about Hasselblad's market strategy. If Hasselblad is to move to just supporting a smaller group of professional users, I'm OK with that. I'm sure the infinitely larger group of serious amateur and part time pros will be somewhat saddened, but move forward anyway. If you miss one bus, you just have to wait a little for the next one, or hail a cab.

Cheers,

Colin
 
Agreed Colin. I strive for photographic excellence and my livelyhood is NOT tied to my photography or my photographic company ... except to produce incremental income to fork over to the camera companies, and pay for the luxuries my wife extortes as "equal compensation" for those gear purchases. Basically, everything I buy cost me twice as much as the next guy : -)

The point was that whether one strives for excellence (or not) has little consequence if you do not make your living at it. It may make us feel bad if we slack off, or take a time out, but the professional photographer has no such option without dire consequences ... therefore dearly depends on staying current as well as being "on" in a pretty consistant manner. Striving for excellence at will is different than striving for excellence with a gun to your head ... LOL.
 
G'Day Marc:

Aha, it's your wife who is striving for excellence in equivalence ... !

I understand your position and your statement here. No worries.

My own philosphy, if you like, is that as 'living a life' is our most fundamental gaol, striving for excellence, always, is of consequence.

But hey, this is way too deep for my old brain; it is 7.30am, and I need caffeine. I salute your devotion to the cause and the excellence of your endeavours, and I now withdraw as silently as the hush at nightfall in the forest.

Good light !

Cheers,

Colin
 
"I totally agree that Hasselblad has lost a whopping share of the market to DSLRs. "

But Hasselblad has always focused on the "elite" market of top-end professionals and very, very serious amateurs ... and we like it that way, right?

Not sure I would want every DSLR user out there using Hasselblad. Although I am not a professional photographer, I still get a kick out being able to produce images with that special "wow" factor. Some of the "wow" may come from years of experience and an eye for an interesting image but a whole lot of the "wow" comes from the quality of the larger capture and the quality lenses.

Just walking down a street with the 'blad in hand signals that you are a cut-above the average photographer. Occasionally that has a down-side but mainly it is positive. For ex&le, if you ask to take someone's photo, they assume you are not some amateur looking for vacation shots.

With most things that are important to me, I have always been happy to stretch my budget to purchase from companies that do not focus on the mass-market.

Long live Hasselblad.

If I was to close my eyes and dream of what this thing that Hasselblad is "up to" right now, I would selfishly dream for a reinstatement of the 200 series camera with a CFV-II back. But, it ain't going to happen ... could it?

Regards
Peter
 
"But Hasselblad has always focused on the "elite" market of top-end professionals and very, very serious amateurs ... and we like it that way, right?"

Wrong, why should it bother me if everyone used them, please spare me from any perceived exclusivity.

"Just walking down a street with the 'blad in hand signals that you are a cut-above the average photographer."

Fortunately Hasselblad cameras are not status symbols or jewellery and give no hint to the capabilities of the user.
 
But it is right that Hasselblad's market has always been a rather small one. A "niche market", as then CEO Jerry Öster once put it.

And it's also right that the digital wave has washed lots of it away, leaving a niche of a niche market.
They may be "accepting" that smaller market, i don't know. But will that be a wise thing to do?

One would think they should accept the challenge, and try to create a larger market. Or go bust.
And one might be right, don't you know. What!?
 
It seems like the best thing to do for them is keep updating products with digital friendliness in mind while lowering prices and expanding the product line with a super "consumer" digi cam (e.g. M8)

One thing is for sure, they must be so dependent in the cult/niche market that they cannot abandon it and must surely have the compatibility in mind when developing new products.
 
I guess so, but if they want to get into the consumer area currently occupied by canon EOS an the likes, they should come up with a whole new, cheaper alternative. If this is not their focus, they will have to make new products that suit the current MF photographers (who seems to live the V system etc).

But I am a newbee MF and Hasselblad, so what do I know.
 
Despite I am very fond of my V gear, I am also a person that gets seduced very often by new technology.

MF makers lost a considerable market share for these reasons:
Digital increased the blow-up capability of any given format.
Digital narrowed the gap amongst all formats.
Dback prices came to the market at inter-planetary dimension.
The high volume sales of smaller formats help to implement the latest in technology at lower costs.
In some ways, the accepted world average standard for picture quality diminished. People look at each picture less time because there are 100X fold more pictures to watch now. One other thing, many pictures now, don't get printed but just viewed in the monitor.
I swear my vinyls used to sound better than my cd's. On top on that, then came mp3. For the younger generations, mp3 sounds just fine, it is portable and that is more important than fine sound. Well, something similar happenned to photography when it became digital.

And last but not least, then came Canon five years ago with a full frame dslr with all the works at a fraction of the cost on a dback.
I bet the new 1DsMk3 is a very tempting camera for many MF shooters out there. I won't reach MF quality, but once more the gap gets smaller. Some Canonians say, the gap might even get fuzzy now. We'll see.

As for me, I am tempted but most likely I won't do it. Mainly because half the the price of the 1Ds series is just for weather sealing, high frame rate, top notch AF and built like a tank. Nice things that I don't really need myself. I'll wait for the 5D Mk2.

So, Hasselblad is not losing a potential buyer for the CFV2 back out of me (for now). But if MF manufacturers don't come with more affordable solutions soon, they will lose more market share, I believe.

Eduardo
 
People who invested in converting their Zeiss/Contax N glass to fully funtional Canon AF mounts will have the most kick DSLR kit out there. I sold my N stuff to soon. See, NEVER sell any Zeiss gear ... people will find a way to make it work no matter what.>

Marc:

Do you have the required details about the best conversion options. Also, which Cannon DLSR would you recommend for my N glass. No hurry as I love my N bodies. When shooting birds in flight along with the several others using their Cannons and lenses longer that some yachts, my Contax sounds so good compared to the noise the other shutters make. BTW I am the only one with a Contax! Oh and slide film.

Thanks:

Gilbert
 
if MF manufacturers don't come with more affordable solutions soon, they will lose more market share, I believe.

And that's an exact description of what has been happening, and why, these last years.
And an illustration, that this proces indeed hasn't ran its course yet.
 
Q.G. wrote:
And an illustration, that this proces indeed hasn't ran its course yet.

I certainly hope so.

Eduardo}
 
Gilbert, Contact D.J. Garcia over on the Contax forum. He's been using Contax glass on a Canon for a long time ... and, if I recall correctly, now has most N glass converted to AF, full auto aperture EOS mounts. Nice guy, we went shooting Zeiss together in NYC one fine spring day. Mostly C/Y manual. The one lens I'd love to get in that EOS AF mount is the Zeiss N 24-85/3.5.

(Diatribe warning ! : -@

Which Canon? Many would recommend the 5D or it's future replacement ... but I wouldn't be one of them. I personally despise all Canon bodies except the 1 series which is semi-tolerable. (despise is to weak of a word for how I feel about their W/A optics). In fact, I have zero affection for any Canon gear, and I mean NONE! if something as good came along with a bit of personality, I would kick Canon to the curb and not shed a single tear.

I still do not quite get the waxing nostalgic for the good old days of Hasselblad MF market dominance. That was then and this is now. The market is gone, and it started going bye-bye before digital hit the streets. If they had not developed the larger, near 645
sensor for digital backs, it would all be over by now ... leaving only a bunch of fuddy -duddies waxing nostalgic about the good old days :)

Let's analyze this "shrinking market" ... before a young shooter would save up and buy a Hasselblad, and in the end the undertaker would bury him with it. Now you take out a 2nd mortgage to afford the same quality of MF image making @ 10X the price ... and then upgrade it every 2 to 3 years for more than the old rig originally cost new. Digital reproduction changed how commercial images are printed, so commercial shooters had no choice ... it was publish (digitally) or perish.

The idea that we MF amateurs or semi-pros buying used gear are funding the new advancements is a fairy tale. Where do you think the MF gear traded in on the digital wallet sappers goes? Not this market I can assure you. $3,000 trade on one of these MF digital cameras and backs is a drop in the bucket once they get their mega-pixel hooks into you.

Now, why would it be good for them to bring out a really affordable MF digital solution? To do that they'd either have to lose their shirt, or lower the quality/performance to the point that it would indeed be wiser to buy a Canon.

I say jack up the quality so there is no freakin' doubt even to a blind person which is better... it already IS better, but good enough is the consumer watchword these days ... so why cater to good enough?... it's a battle you cannot win. Go after the best, and charge for it. There are 4 key manufacturers of digital backs all charging basically the same high prices. Someone is buying those backs.
 
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