>
> Did you buy one? Features that sell cameras stay in the designs.
> Features that cost money and don't sell cameras disappear.
>
No, not personally because I was invested in another system, but I worked
photo retail and pushed and prodded people to buy them. It really was a good
sell feature. I was one of Canon's biggest fans for quite some time--the EOS
film series was excellent feature/price and things like this really did make
a difference. But it did take a while to dial it in.
> Specialized. As it turns out, you can't sell many cameras that drop a
> stop of the lens brightness all the time in return for lack of mirror
> slap that's only a problem in a small minority of shots. If people had
> bought them by the container load, they would still be making them.
>
I beg to differ on this one. We had dozens backordered and couldn't get them
at all. One photographer had two stolen and never could get replacements. We
begged and pleaded with Canon but I believe the problem was that the camera
was built on the same line as a more popular camera and the margin was
greater on the other camera. Canon sold every one that was made and could
have sold thousands more had they built them. What is surprising about this
is that the pellicle mirror would have been a great solution to the sensor
dust issue. But there is that little issue of autofocus... I got to use one
and also demo'd them at the store. OK, if truth be told--one of those
backordered cameras was mine. Yes, it's true--had I been able to get that
camera I would have switched from Olympus. It wouldn't have been my sole
camera, of course, but it was THE reason I wanted to switch.
C'mon! It's there, just inconvenient. :-) It is a mystery of Canon
> design. Still, I simply have it activated in the Custom setting, so it's
> just a dial twist away.
>
LOL, just had to toss that in. BTW, I'm still trying to find it on my
OM-3Ti.
> I agree, but would put it another way. Survival, let alone success, in a
> competitive market requires that most activities make a profit. All the
> things you mention above actually were innovative and cost money to
> conceive, design and produce. None of these were things that Oly,
> Pentax, Nikon, Minolta, et. al. tried. So I give Canon credit for
> continuing to try to add new ideas into camera production. So why aren't
> you beating up the other makers who didn't even try?
>
Well, while you've been on Planet Berkeley, I have beat up on the other
makes--especially Olympus. I'm NOT on their Christmas Card mailing list
after some of the things I've said. But let me name a few things that just
pop into the top of my head: Viewfinders (size/brightness), system
compatibility, system continuity, OTF metering (or mirror box metering),
OTF-TTL flash control, ergonomics, size, weight, the optical traits of the
lenses... One thing I cannot fault Olympus for, however, is system
robustness and reliability. My E-1 is the toughest and most reliable camera
I've ever seen. Period.
AG
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