Not that Time Magazine is a particularly good arbitrator of design and innovation, but it was interesting as to what they picked as their top Consumer Electronic gadgets this year. Of the 23 choices they made, three were cameras:
- GoPro Mission 1 Pro ILS
- Fujifilm Instax Mini EVO Cinema
- Nikon ZR
Three very different cameras, all distinguished by the fact that what they are didn’t really exist prior (action camera with lens mount, Super8 meets instant film, and RED-level product in a small, affordable, more handholdable box with an industry-leading LCD). So Time is obviously rewarding previous unseen innovation over product incrementation.
Time does say something that (most in) the photography community hasn’t been saying: that we’re still seeing innovation in the dedicated camera market. The problem, as I’ve noted elsewhere, is that there have been so few new camera introductions recently that what’s really happening in the forum discussions and on social media is that people are really complaining that “Company X didn’t make what I wanted this year.”
Given that many of the cameras are now on four-year update patterns, that means that in any given year the majority of camera owners are going to feel like their maker is not paying any attention to their particular needs. On the other hand, I don’t know of a four-year old camera that isn’t very capable, so it’s not that photographers are suffering from this iteration slowdown.