EOS-R - It's out. Thoughts?

To add to that, Canon started this mirrorless design years ago, LONG before there was an A73. So all the R&D, production, marketing, etc already came at a price to Canon, and they had to set a price point long ago. $2300 is the price point. Sure, it is too bad Sony came out with a $2000 budget FF that has functions beyond the EOS-R, but there is nothing Canon could do, this price of $2300 was set at least a year ago, if not longer.

It is what it is at this point, Canon can only move forward with production and hope it sells.

No production model goes like this, at least not by viable corporation anyways:

- Let's start our design and in 3 years, we will bring our product to the market
- Okay, let's figure out costs and set a budget
- So, it shows that we need to come out with a product that is $2300 to minimally break even after these years of investment and actually pull a profit
- OK - go for it
....
- Oh my, we are less than a year away from announcing this and look what our competitor did.. They came out with something that is better in many ways to what we designed, and at... gasp.... a lower price!

Then

- Ok, let's go back to the drawing board and redesign components, software etc and postpone our release for 2 years, and then price this new design $300 less than before...

OR

- Ok, even though our numbers from 2 years ago shows we need a price of $2300 to pay for this effort and make a profit, let's go in the red to compete with the other product that is superior to ours in some ways and set our release price at $1800. That will show up the competition, make the masses happy, and we hope to draw profit from our other divisions to make up the numbers in the red.


----------


No what happens is that you move forward with the original plan, try to make improvements to features/function where possible with software releases, cut production costs where possible to consider lowering the price a bit, and market the crap out of the product to build sales. You expect to hear whining about the price and features, you dig through all the noise to find the things you can improve upon, and make short term plans to make those changes if financially viable (like 2 firmware upgrades in the near future to allow silent shooting in continuous and Eye AF with continuous focusing).

Canon is doing what any respectable and stable company would do. I am sure we all hope they make this all work so that the next 1 or 2 products will be that much better and at a lower price point than the DSLR equivalents, right?

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18712593
To add to that, Canon started this mirrorless design years ago, LONG before there was an A73. So all the R&D, production, marketing, etc already came at a price to Canon, and they had to set a price point long ago. $2300 is the price point. Sure, it is too bad Sony came out with a $2000 budget FF that has functions beyond the EOS-R, but there is nothing Canon could do, this price of $2300 was set at least a year ago, if not longer.

I hope Canon isn't trying to recover all of their years of development costs in a single model. Hopefully they have roadmap of several bodies over the coming 3-5 years, and they will amortize their development costs over that. The core technologies don't have to be redeveloped for each new model, just updated and tweaked.

On the other hand, if what you say is true, then future bodies should be dirt cheap since they'll leverage technologies that are already paid for!

Mike

But offcource the lessons learned with the EOS M series doesn't translate to FF

Wilt wrote in post #18712339
Not ridiculing your statement, but retrospectively I do find it highly amusing, having covered weddings a few decades ago with a medium format film SLR which required this...

1. inserting dark slide at end of roll
2. pressing release button to remove film magazine
3. putting depleted film magazine away, pulling out a magazine with a fresh roll
4. attaching new film magazine
5. removing dark slide and advancing roll to first frame
6. repeat steps 1-5 as needed, and before all film magazines are depleted...do the following for every exposed film magazine
....pull out old roll, seal the paper seal and put roll in exposed film case, pull out new roll break the seal and load into film insert, place insert in film back.

so that 6 film magazines were sufficient to cover a wedding for 10-12 hours, resulting in 10-15 rolls of exposed film with 30 shots each...

...to then think that opening the battery door and replacing a run down battery every 300 shots could be so incredibly shot-losing an activity!

Amen Wilt

That statement you have highlighted in blue comes from someone who has never shot a wedding for a living. One of the most ridiculous things I have ever read at POTN. I have never lost a shot to a dead battery. What a lame comment. Most of us have 3-4 extra batteries and change them routinely so they DONT miss shots.

I actually had to read that 3 times to see if he was being sarcastic. OMG that comment is so far from reality. Wow

mcoren wrote in post #18712629
I hope Canon isn't trying to recover all of their years of development costs in a single model. Hopefully they have roadmap of several bodies over the coming 3-5 years, and they will amortize their development costs over that. The core technologies don't have to be redeveloped for each new model, just updated and tweaked.

On the other hand, if what you say is true, then future bodies should be dirt cheap since they'll leverage technologies that are already paid for!

Mike

I apologize, I figured the context of all of their developmental costs would be recognized as just around the EOS-R.

soeren wrote in post #18712644
But offcource the lessons learned with the EOS M series doesn't translate to FF

What lessons with EOS-M? It is actually a pretty successful line. The EOS M series is a very nice series, I really like the M3 and the M5/M6 are nice, and the M50 has been received well and does even more things well. I am sure there were many things considered in the EOS-R taken from the EOS-M designs/lessons learned.

The only thing lacking really with the M series are lenses. However Canon showed that they are ready for that right out of the gate with some stellar RF glass upon the inception of their FF mirrorless lineup.

Have you used the M line at all? It is a nice little camera series and capable of some spectacular photography.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18712649
What lessons with EOS-M? It is actually a pretty successful line. The EOS M series is a very nice series, I really like the M3 and the M5/M6 are nice, and the M50 has been received well and does even more things well. I am sure there were many things considered in the EOS-R taken from the EOS-M designs/lessons learned.

The only thing lacking really with the M series are lenses. However Canon showed that they are ready for that right out of the gate with some stellar RF glass upon the inception of their FF mirrorless lineup.

Have you used the M line at all? It is a nice little camera series and capable of some spectacular photography.

Never said it wasn't successful. I actually didnt even say they are bad cameras. Every new camera contains good, less good and bad things either from a consumer pow or seen from the production line. Offcource they'll evaluate their offerings not just Re features but also re where to save money in production etc. And I was being sarcastic on the whole development story winding up earlier.
Being somewhat defensive here? or is there a more appropriate word to use instead........ Things learned perhaps?

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18712649
What lessons with EOS-M? It is actually a pretty successful line. The EOS M series is a very nice series, I really like the M3 and the M5/M6 are nice, and the M50 has been received well and does even more things well. I am sure there were many things considered in the EOS-R taken from the EOS-M designs/lessons learned.

The only thing lacking really with the M series are lenses. However Canon showed that they are ready for that right out of the gate with some stellar RF glass upon the inception of their FF mirrorless lineup.

Have you used the M line at all? It is a nice little camera series and capable of some spectacular photography.

They had to pull out of North America for some time.

soeren wrote in post #18712656
Never said it wasn't successful. Every new camera contains good, less good and bad things either from a consumer pow or seen fromm the production line. Offcource they'll evaluate their offerings not just Re features but also re where to save money in production etc

I don't think that answered my question?

You alluded to Canon ignoring lessons learned in the EOS-M when designing the EOS-R, so I assume a) there were some major issues that Canon had to address with EOS-M, and b) you have inside knowledge that Canon introduced the same issues with the EOS-R, thus ignoring those EOS-M lessons learned. Or did I misuderstand what you were trying to say here?

soeren wrote in post #18712644
But offcource the lessons learned with the EOS M series doesn't translate to FF

I have an M3 and wasn't aware of issues I should be dealing with, so I am curious.

Charlie wrote in post #18712662
They had to pull out of North America for some time.

So there was a design issue that caused this? And if so, the EOS-R has the same issue?

I am more curious what soeren is referring to in his comment. Perhaps I misunderstood the comment, that is entirely possible given the content and structure of the text. Let's await the answer.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18705477
I guess I had never seen that in the past. Good to know. I always thought that with AFMA, when I would even use Canon glass, like 2 different 24-70 or 100-400, it only ever saw one model, and not separate values by each lens.

Isn't this why the camera can see, or we can enter, the lens serial number? I remember the example was if you have access to multiple duplicate lenses you can AFMA each one and the camera can tell which lens is attached.

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18712663
I don't think that answered my question?

You alluded to Canon ignoring lessons learned in the EOS-M when designing the EOS-R, so I assume a) there were some major issues that Canon had to address with EOS-M, and b) you have inside knowledge that Canon introduced the same issues with the EOS-R, thus ignoring those EOS-M lessons learned. Or did I misuderstand what you were trying to say here?

I have an M3 and wasn't aware of issues I should be dealing with, so I am curious.

No I was sarcastic. During development of the M line obviously canon collected knowhow and experience. An Earlier post suggested the R development stood on its own and was to be payed by R customers only. My point is that the knowledge gained with the M series offcource also benefits the EOS R

chuckmiller wrote in post #18712668
Isn't this why the camera can see, or we can enter, the lens serial number? I remember the example was if you have access to multiple duplicate lenses you can AFMA each one and the camera can tell which lens is attached.

It seems that this lens serialization recognition is pretty new and only on a few models. I wasn't aware Canon made that change, as I only have one of each of my lenses. I know they made a change to allow AFMA at the ends of a zoom, and that AFMA recognized a lens vs a lens plus TC. Somebody already confirmed this behavior earlier on the 5D4 and a couple other bodies. Good to know though!

soeren wrote in post #18712670
No I was sarcastic. During development of the M line obviously canon collected knowhow and experience. An Earlier post suggested the R development stood on its own and was to be payed by R customers only. My point is that the knowledge gained with the M series offcource also benefits the EOS R

Ah okay, thank you for the clarification, I did indeed misunderstand the comment, I apologize for that and thus why I asked for clarification.

However in regard to the 2nd comment, indeed the EOS-R development stands on its own (in regards to project management, costs, marketing and deployment), and the sales of EOS-R and RF lenses go into paying for that. Canon isn't taking a loss in this development and hopes that DSLR sales pays for it, or EOS-M sales pay for it. A vast majority of projects don't work that way in the corporate space.

Yes, I agree, there indeed is some EOS-M "DNA" (whether software, hardware, or design considerations) incorporated into the EOS-R design. All that means is that the EOS-R developmental costs were potentially reduced by recycling or re-engineering items from other mirrorless projects, but the EOS-R and RF lenses are still a project "bucket" all unto themselves.

So what is the latest "in the consumer's hands" date for the EOS-R? I haven't been following that. Hopefully very soon so that FM and POTN members can report back their findings!

TeamSpeed wrote in post #18712674
Ah okay, thank you for the clarification, I did indeed misunderstand the comment, I apologize for that and thus why I asked for clarification.

However in regard to the 2nd comment, indeed the EOS-R development stands on its own (in regards to project management, costs, marketing and deployment), and the sales of EOS-R and RF lenses go into paying for that. Canon isn't taking a loss in this development and hopes that DSLR sales pays for it, or EOS-M sales pay for it. A vast majority of projects don't work that way in the corporate space.

Yes, I agree, there indeed is some EOS-M "DNA" (whether software, hardware, or design considerations) incorporated into the EOS-R design. All that means is that the EOS-R developmental costs were potentially reduced by recycling or re-engineering items from other mirrorless projects, but the EOS-R and RF lenses are still a project "bucket" all unto themselves.

So what is the latest "in the consumer's hands" date for the EOS-R? I haven't been following that. Hopefully very soon so that FM and POTN members can report back their findings!

No need to apologize.
You are right in regards to development of the EOS r though what I mean is they are not starting from scratch. They have made mistakes during M development, learned from them and know some of the pitfalls to avoid in the R construction