spy?

do Canon and Nikon spy on each other? it makes me wonder sometimes weather Canon and Nikon are under same owner...

the camera market is dominated by these two and systems like the Olympus and Pentax get overlooked because of the dominance of the two big boys in the digital slr territory.

do you think eventually these guys may kill pantax and olympus?

Canon400 wrote in post #5109637
do you think eventually these guys may kill pantax and olympus?

Canon400,
Well seeing how I started with my first SLR being a Pentax ESII and 30 years later Pentax is still here
I would tend to think they might survive it
But in the long run who knows

Olympus is going to come and destroy us all!

if pentax and olymupus had more lenses on offer canon and nikon will suffer and prices will drop i wish this will happen in the near future, pentax and olympus booth have very good technology i would buy booth systems if they had more choice in the lens department

Canon400 wrote in post #5109740
if pentax and olymupus had more lenses on offer canon and nikon will suffer and prices will drop i wish this will happen in the near future, pentax and olympus booth have very good technology i would buy booth systems if they had more choice in the lens department

Not likely. Both Canon and Nikon have a strong start with pro and amateurs in the film heyday of the market, so lots of pre-existing lenses that easily adapt to a digital body.

Olympus, on the other hand, had lots of lenses and was pretty visionary in many regards (particularly in the shift lenses and their macro stuff) but abandoned that all when they got out of the pro SLR market and paid attention to only the ZSLR and P&S markets for a long time...their 3/4 format got them back into dSLR but with different lens mount and a format that fights a losing battle merely because of the size of the sensor...and more pixels = more noise for tiny sensors!
Pentax was more of an even-lesser-ran, even in the days of Nikon dominance and Olympus and Canon being we-try-harder also-rans in pro SLR.

Wilt wrote in post #5110033
their 3/4 format got them back into dSLR

4/3 System.

And its a crop factor of 2. Id say it only got them back into the market only in the sense that they made an SLR. Its an awful format and sensor design is inferior to larger styles.

When I was moving to dSLR, I tried really hard to warm to the 4/3 system since my OM system had been, well, simply brilliant in all respects. Sadly, I think Olympus have blundered. I guess I can faintly hope that by the time I can afford to get back to full frame (but in the digital world), Olympus may have a system in place, but I doubt it.

For many years the "big four" were Nikon, Minolta, Canon and Pentax, in that order, with Olympus and Mamiya right at their heels. Nikon pretty much held the lead throughout the film era with the F series being the best cameras produced. Where the real shakedown in the market began was with the development of auto focus technology (originally developed by Honeywell).

Nikon managed to stay in the lead but just barely with Canon coming on strong. Minolta and Pentax were pretty much out of the running. Canon made a major breakthrough that threatened Nikon's position with the introduction of the EOS-1 in 1989.

This was followed with the D30, 1D and IS lenses in rapid succession, and Canon's position was solid. It's only in the last couple of years that Nikon has managed to catch up. Pentax now holds the number three position (barely) and is developing better cameras as time progresses. They still need a full frame, though. We all know what happened to Minolta...

Olympus has managed to create a niche market with the 4/3 format, but they will never be a credible threat to Canon or Nikon unless they produce a full frame (35mm size) digital, with the lenses to go with it. Olympus was one of the pioneers of small format cameras—they produced a series of half-frame 35mm cameras in the 1960's and 70's—and seems to be continuing this way.

That was quite an interesting history lesson JW, I remember my mother used to have this old Zenith way back when. Well, it got me into photography...

surfjungle wrote in post #5120567
That was quite an interesting history lesson JW, I remember my mother used to have this old Zenith way back when. Well, it got me into photography...

huh?...Zenith...photog​raphy...what's the association of a one-time TV manufacturer with taking photos?!

Wilt wrote in post #5120617
huh?...Zenith...photog​raphy...what's the association of a one-time TV manufacturer with taking photos?!

http://en.wikipedia.or​g/wiki/Zenit_%28camera​%29 aka Zenith

surfjungle wrote in post #5122231
http://en.wikipedia.or​g/wiki/Zenit_%28camera​%29 aka Zenith

Aha, not American 'Zenith', but Russian 'Zenit'!