I’m writing this article in the early part of March. And after this, I’m going to go sit in my living room and play Pokemon Fire Red on my Nintendo Switch. It was recently released and it’s been quite fun if not a challenging learning curve because it’s the first time that I chose a water pokemon as my starter. This is what camera manufacturers haven’t done — with the exception of Leica. But more of the manufacturers should.
I’m talking about the idea of reissues and storing components.
Everyone wants those retro compact cameras — so why can’t the brands build them? I don’t believe any of the excuses these days in a world where they all use the same components. Or why can’t they at least do it for lenses?
Let me come up with a few examples:
- A Canon 5D Mk IV in a special color variant but with perhaps an updated sensor
- A Nikon Df with the internals of the D6
- A Sony APS-C camera with a sensor and color render like the NEX 7
Don’t tell me that I can do all of this in post-production. If that’s the case, then I don’t even need to spend money with a brand ever again. On top of that, I don’t want to do something in post-production. One of the reasons why I left Adobe is because they learn what you do and then probably feed that to their AI learning algorithms. And if they do that, then they’ll eventually replace you as a photographer. So instead, I work to do everything in-camera as much as I can.
I don’t believe anyone that says that the retro-camera market doesn’t exist in 2026. Millennials really brought it back with film. And if it’s even a small part of the market, we have to consider pricing. The prices on cameras often skyrocket insanely. Manufacturers can undercut that by making new variants. But they’re not.
With that said, manufacturers don’t understand that the appeal of these devices isn’t that they’re old. The appeal is that they deliver images and image quality that people want right now because of the sterility delivered in photographs otherwise. Everything that comes out of a phone is highly processed and requires AI of some sort. And everyone is sick of that. Manufacturers can deliver those products, but they’re playing themselves.
At a certain point, I believe that consumers are just going to turn their back on camera manufacturers since they’re all just treating influencers nicely and paying them in dollars or by being seen.
I hope that the Chinese manufacturers end up flipping the industry on its head because it needed it to happen a very long time ago. The Japanese aren’t making artisan products anymore — especially because they’re not even made in Japan or they’re all multi-billion dollar companies that make products for commercial sales.
When Leica re-released the M6, they did so not to make a ton of money. But moreso to keep a spirit alive.