5D Classic Admirers Assemble (7)

5D4ME wrote in post #18789688
Man there's some dirty price fixing going on in the camera market. The 85mm 1.8 I bought a week ago for $300 is now suddenly $370 everywhere, even though its been $300 for years now. Kinda like how every time someone makes a youtube video about the 5D classic, the prices jump almost instantly. I remember earlier last year prices for the 5D jumped to nearly $700 for a while. Massive price gouging. Amazon still hasn't shipped it (even though I ordered it over a week ago), but I talked to them to see if there was payment issues or anything and they said it's all fine, but said if I want to try to get it quicker, then I should cancel and re-order. I was like heck no! It's like they're trying to trick people into paying more. Glad I got in before the jump in price. EF mount may not be entirely dead yet, but it's basically about to be a dead mount system considering Canon's new RF mount. Prices for EF should be dropping like rocks or at least not rising, especially considering all the people both Nikon and Canon lost to Sony. Watch, I bet you that the 50mm 1.8 will rise from $125 to like $200 in the next month.

Canon refurbished site, had the 85/1.8 for $239 in December, with the 50mm STM at $89. Not sure how you are figuring on "price gouging". And I certainly wouldn't pay $370 for the 85mm f/1.8 (even though it's a pretty terrific lens and bargain, and that's still lower than the MSRP of $419, so again, no price gouging). Just wait, more sales will come about.

Also, the 5D has been selling used for well under $500 for quite some time now. You cannot buy it new, or even refurbished through Canon. If you paid $700 for your 5D in the past year, well you know the old saying.. "a fool and his money, are soon parted".

Nah I paid $270 for my 5D, and bought my 85mm new for $300. But I would have bought the 5D a long time ago if it wasn't for the price gouging. The middle of last year, like 4 popular youtubers made videos about the 5D and the price skyrocketed over night across the board. As for the lens, the price jumped from $300 to $375 in less than a week, after being $300 forever. My guess is someone on youtube made a video about the lens, then their automated algorithms saw it and jacked the price up, happens all the time someone makes a youtube video about a camera product. Don't read too much into MSRP, the MSRP price has been the same forever, and it hasn't been close to MSRP for years.

5D4ME wrote in post #18789715
Nah I paid $270 for my 5D, and bought my 85mm new for $300. But I would have bought the 5D a long time ago if it wasn't for the price gouging. The middle of last year, like 4 popular youtubers made videos about the 5D and the price skyrocketed over night across the board. As for the lens, the price jumped from $300 to $375 in less than a week, after being $300 forever. My guess is someone on youtube made a video about the lens, then their automated algorithms saw it and jacked the price up, happens all the time someone makes a youtube video about a camera product. Don't read too much into MSRP, the MSRP price has been the same forever, and it hasn't been close to MSRP for years.

It's called Supply and Demand. Prices always flunctuate, just as sale prices do. That's hardly the definition of "price gouging" though. if that were the case, that anything that ever goes off of sale, would be constituted as price gouging. Furthermore, the 5D is no longer in production. If prices skyrocket on an item no longer being produced, that's not price gouging. That's Supply and Demand.

Sorry if you feel that Canon or others are slighting you somehow, but "price gouging" this is not. And as far as the MSRP goes, feel fortunate that Canon has been generally selling for under that. They certainly don't have to.

It's clear there's automated pricing schemes going on. There's probably a dozen different sellers on Amazon selling the 85 1.8 new. The prices for all of them changed overnight, and it wasn't a special sale going on or anything, because again, they've been $300 regularly for well over 4 years now. If it was merely supply and demand, not every seller would be at the same price, because some sellers sell more than others, and have more supply than others, and live in completely different regions. It's more like "increase price when there's demand, regardless of supply"....which is definitely not the principle behind how actual supply and demand is supposed to affect prices. I'm sure the price will settle down once the algorithms see the sales plummet at the new price though, but that might take months. Doesn't affect me obviously, but it's just something I've observed on the pricing of things. I still consider it price gouging, it's just automated price gouging.

I don't think supply and demand really applies to an old camera such as the 5D either. There's always 5D's floating around, never a shortage of them being sold, and while the demand might increase here and there, and the supply obviously isn't increasing, the utility of the product isn't increasing when compared to newer products, and most of the 5D's in circulation are probably at least on their 2nd, 3rd & 4th owners by now, and sold mostly by private owners, meaning there is no supply and demand to affect their pricing because the supply from sellers is typically only ever "1" to begin with. It's not like camera shops selling them are ordering up used 5D's to have supply, they're just getting whatever falls into their lap when someone comes in to get rid of one. It's not like "sorry we're trying to get more, but it'll take time to order some up so the prices gotta go up!". It's simply too old and outdated of a product for supply and demand to really be applicable in any meaningful sense. Which is what makes it price gouging. If someone makes a youtube video praising the 5D, and 100 or 1000 people go off and buy one, that may be an increase in demand....but it has very little to do with supply affecting price at this stage, and more to do with "increase price when there's demand, regardless of supply", because at the same time 2,000 5D's could be offloaded onto the market for sale, adding more supply than the current demand, and the price would still rise if someone created a Youtube video praising it.

All I can say is if people ever see a youtuber advertising an older product they might be interested in, make sure to look up the recent trend of pricing to make sure the price isn't artificially jacked up.

Not seeing much heinousness in the 1 year pricing history. I think I'd give my blood pressure a break.

That actually proves my point. There's always a few sellers who sell for ridiculous prices, which skews the average higher than the actual typical base price. If you look at the highest price, it was at its highest at $439....over 10 years ago. 3rd party was $705 in 2010. I doubt anyone paid that for the product.

If you take the highest price and the "lowest" price (which is actually the typical price) and average those two together, 299 + 439 / 2 = $369. Which is "coincidentally" the price it is now, and the "average" price on that chart. Think about that for a moment REAL hard.

And let's keep in mind, just because people are selling at the highest price, doesn't mean people are buying at that price. So what does it all mean? Artificial manipulation of pricing, having nothing to do with supply and demand.

Let's say you're buying a used car from me that usually sells for $2000, but some wacko is selling one for $4000 but no ones buying. Then I tell you "Well, people are selling for $4000, let's meet in the middle". So now I'm asking $3000 for a $2000 car, with the price having absolutely nothing to do with actual supply and demand, nor nothing to do with the price that people are actually willing to pay.

Right now, you'll still find 5D classic's on ebay in the $700-$3400 range, and not necessarily mint condition either, even though mint wouldn't even be worth that. The difference is, Amazon essentially averages in ridiculous sellers who are hoping to get lucky with some dumb buyer, and Amazon uses their ridiculous prices to artificially jack up the base prices.

5D4ME wrote in post #18790102
That actually proves my point. There's always a few sellers who sell for ridiculous prices, which skews the average higher than the actual typical base price. If you look at the highest price, it was at its highest at $439....over 10 years ago. 3rd party was $705 in 2010. I doubt anyone paid that for the product.

If you take the highest price and the "lowest" price (which is actually the typical price) and average those two together, 299 + 439 / 2 = $369. Which is "coincidentally" the price it is now. And let's keep in mind, just because people are selling at the highest price, doesn't mean people are buying at that price. So what does it all mean? Artificial manipulation of pricing, having nothing to do with supply and demand.

Let's say you're buying a used car from me that usually sells for $2000, but some wacko is selling one for $4000 but no ones buying. Then I tell you "Well, people are selling for $4000, let's meet in the middle". So now I'm asking $3000 for a $2000 car, with the price having absolutely nothing to do with actual supply and demand, nor nothing to do with the price that people are actually willing to pay.

Right now, you'll still find 5D classic's on ebay for over $3,400, or $2,000, $1,200, etc.

If you think that that proves your point, there's no rationalizing with you. Toodles.

Low light shooting with the 5D, is actually pretty good! This shot was taken at ISO 800, and at 0.3 seconds exposure (using the 28mm f/1.8 lens, shot at f/1.8).

What is your threshold for ISO usage on the 5D?

Simple logic shows that it clearly proves my point, you're just not interpreting the data properly.

5D4ME wrote in post #18790102
That actually proves my point. There's always a few sellers who sell for ridiculous prices, which skews the average higher than the actual typical base price. If you look at the highest price, it was at its highest at $439....over 10 years ago. 3rd party was $705 in 2010. I doubt anyone paid that for the product.

If you take the highest price and the "lowest" price (which is actually the typical price) and average those two together, 299 + 439 / 2 = $369. Which is "coincidentally" the price it is now, and the "average" price on that chart. Think about that for a moment REAL hard.

And let's keep in mind, just because people are selling at the highest price, doesn't mean people are buying at that price. So what does it all mean? Artificial manipulation of pricing, having nothing to do with supply and demand.

Let's say you're buying a used car from me that usually sells for $2000, but some wacko is selling one for $4000 but no ones buying. Then I tell you "Well, people are selling for $4000, let's meet in the middle". So now I'm asking $3000 for a $2000 car, with the price having absolutely nothing to do with actual supply and demand, nor nothing to do with the price that people are actually willing to pay.

Right now, you'll still find 5D classic's on ebay in the $700-$3400 range, and not necessarily mint condition either, even though mint wouldn't even be worth that. The difference is, Amazon essentially averages in ridiculous sellers who are hoping to get lucky with some dumb buyer, and Amazon uses their ridiculous prices to artificially jack up the base prices.

Looking at eBay, using the "5D Classic" in the search bar, almost all the listings are under $500. Not a single one at the prices you mentioned. Furthermore, eBay puts a "trending" price on their listings, showing the trend price at $369. Just like anything you buy, you have to do your homework and look. If you feel its too much, don't buy it. Simple as that. And with out of production items, Supply and Demand is a very real thing, especially given that the 5D cannot be repaired by Canon anymore.. meaning, you will find less and less working models, thus Demand increases.

Honestly, you sound like you feel you have been a bit slighted, which is the driving force behind your rather... "interesting" arguments.. if you pay more than you should, simply because you must have it, then the bad is on you. Most folks are satisfied with what they have bought from Canon and their authorized resellers. If you aren't, please look elsewhere.

For low light on any camera I do image stacking to reduce noise whenever possible. I would have shot at that ISO for maybe 0.2 second exposure to save the highlights a bit, took 10 shots, then stacked them all in post to reduce noise/increase detail. (a little tricky with the clouds though if they move too much, but can still turn out good)

My threshold for ISO usage is generally only base ISO. I would have personally chose 100 ISO and just exposed for 0.6 seconds, take 5-10 shots, then stack them in post.

Set the listing order to "highest price". Then you'll see.

5D4ME wrote in post #18790129
Set the listing order to "highest price". Then you'll see.

This is set to highest price. Still don't see the outrageous prices you mentioned.

Wrong, buddy...

I'm still not understanding the reason of your post.. first off, these are not "authorized" resellers.. so they can sell it for whatever they want. If someone is foolish enough to pay those exorbitant prices, then the seller did pretty great, IMHO.

Secondly, with the 5D out of production, the Supply and Demand argument exists.. even if these are not mint units. Do your homework. Don't pay for something you don't want. Your logic is severely skewed here, and people that aren't authorized resellers have been doing this forever and a day. Ever hear of scalpers for concert/event tickets? Ever hear of car dealerships buying a used car from someone, and marking it up 500% to resell?

Geez, get over whatever you feel you got slighted on. Most folks here, including myself, are happy with our authorized Canon reseller purchases. But this argument of yours.. wow, just wow!