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Thom Hogan just wrote a new article on his website predicting the future camera market, the article is here:
http://bythom.com/design2010.htm

what do you think?

I think Mirrorless will become the biggest thing for the size and image quality. Cell phones... don't think they'll ever produce image quality the same as a proper camera, or will they?

I don't quite get it.
Does that mean dSLRs will sell less and get cheaper?

In Japan, we have alot of cellphones that have more than 8mp! The image quality isn't that bad either! Take a look at the Sony Xperia.

I think most people who buy D40, D60 would switch over to mirror less as it is much smaller and more compact. These users would probably hardly edit their photos or really use their SLR to the max.

I would have to say, I agree with his thoughts.

yes i agree with his thoughts as well. Actually this is exactly what i have been thinking the future will be like.

The gap in picture quality between a cellphone camera and compact digital camera is getting smaller every month. While the compact camera still can produce better quality picture and has more features but for most people , a good quality cellphone camera is good enough for them and the advantage is that you'll have the (cellphone) camera with you all the time. So the cellphone camera market will absorb most of the compact camera market eventually

and for the DSLR market, like what CTM said, a lot of people who bought a D40/60 today would have bought a mirrorless instead as they just want a camera that can take good quality picture but not too big. The mirrorless has the size advantage

This is what i just saw today on another website, the most recent Japanese camera sales figures



Order Manufacturer Series model Sales Share (%)
1 Canon Canon T2i 12.5
2 Canon Canon T1i 11.6
3 Nikon D90 11.4
4 Nikon D5000 10.1
5 Panasonic LUMIX GF1 7.8
6 Nikon D3000 7.1
7 Olympus OLYMPUS E-PL1 6.9
8 HOYA PENTAX Kx 6.5
9 Canon EOS 7D 4.4
10 Canon Canon Xsi 3.4


The Micro Four Thirds has been able to expand the japanese DSLR sales share and now already crossed the 20% barrier! One year ago it was only 5% market share.

And remember right now we've only seen the first/second generation of mirrorless cameras, so give it another 12-24 months, and with some of the big names (Nikon, Canon, Sony) come and join the party, the mirrorless cameras will be even better (in quality, feature, price) then todays mirrorless camera and will attract even more people to buy it.

I'm guessing within 2 years time, 50% of interchangable lens camera market will be mirrorless.

I also see the point and shoot market becoming much smaller. Another advantagewith mobile phone cameras, resizing of the images and being able to email it or put it on Twitter / Facebook without the need to download it to a PC.

I am surprised to see the D90 on that list. I would have thought the D3000 would be more popular due to price.