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付費內容，轉自金融時報
https://www.ft.com/content/a147378f-ea88-43dc-b36d-c1348883db39

For decades Canon and Nikon have had the duopoly of professional sports photography. But just as changing technology can affect an athlete’s competitiveness, the development of mirrorless cameras has broken their dominance of the professional market.

People watching the Games may not have realized it, but alongside the debut of skateboarding and climbing, at Tokyo 2020, Sony’s mirrorless cameras successfully debuted on the track.

The prominence of Sony’s Alpha mirrorless cameras in the Games, and the rave reviews from the photographers who use them, mark a turning point in the professional market, which has remained true to single-lens DSLR cameras, even when consumers have opted for smaller and lighter devices.

During the Rio Olympics in 2016, the battle was mainly divided between Canon and Nikon DSLR cameras. While official figures have yet to be released, estimates for Tokyo 2020 range from 10 to 30 percent for Sony’s mirrorless cameras, with a significant chunk likely taken from Nikon, according to photographers working at Olympic venues interviewed by the Financial Times.

“During the Rio Olympics, everyone used DSLR, but I was surprised to see so many photographers using Sony mirrorless cameras this time,” said freelance photographer Yusuke Nakanishi.

For the Tokyo Games, Nakanishi has switched to using Canon’s mirrorless camera: “I prepared to be able to switch from these Olympics because I felt DSLRs will fade in the future.”

Last year, global shipments of mirrorless cameras surpassed those of DSLRs for the first time.

Global shipments of digital cameras have fallen 93 percent over the past decade, according to the Association for Camera and Imaging Products.

Despite declining digital camera sales brought on by the popularity of smartphone cameras, Sony took a risk with its decision to develop a range of more expensive mirrorless cameras, echoing the strategy it used to reverse its consumer electronics business losses.

Its gamble since 2010 has paid off with its share of the global mirrorless camera market reaching 35 percent last year, at Canon’s level and more than four times Nikon’s share, according to Techno Systems Research.

“Sony is the absolute leader right now in mirrorless,” said Ichiro Michikoshi, analyst at market research group BCN. “Canon and Nikon were late because they had their DSLR line, which created a risk of cannibalization, so the gap is now even bigger against Sony.”

As a high-profile symbol of its ambition to break the Canon-Nikon duopoly, Sony has earned a prime position in the massive Olympic Media Center, where its branded service center rivals that of Canon, a Tokyo 2020 Gold Level sponsor. .

Sony’s presence in the professional market has been on the rise since the launch of its Alpha 9 mirrorless camera in 2017.

Last year, the US news agency Associated Press surprised the industry when it announced that all of its photographers and videographers would switch to the Sony Alpha system.

AP photographer Eric Gay uses a Sony mirrorless camera at the women’s basketball event. AP says camera technology is superior to DSLR models ©️ Charlie Neibergall / AP
“We switched to Canon after the Olympics in Athens [in 2004] Because Nikon was not prepared with the technology we were hoping to get, this is pretty much what happened this time. Canon was not ready with the professional grade camera, ”said Denis Paquin, AP’s deputy director of photography, who is in charge of the Olympic photography operation.

In addition to simplifying the workflow for AP photo editors, Paquin says the benefits of mirrorless cameras, which don’t have a mirror in the viewfinder that need to be opened, get out of the way of the sensor each time the shutter is fired. , include speed and quality of focus. of the images. Without the familiar sound of DSLRs, mirrorless cameras are also much quieter, making them less intrusive at events like golf and tennis.

“What it has done without a mirror is that it has made us invisible again. That is where we have always wanted to be: observers without changing history and what was in front of us, ”said Paquin.

Two photographers, one Czech and one British, who have attended the Games for many decades, predict that by the time the Olympics are held in Paris in 2024, most professionals will be using mirrorless cameras.

For some photographers, however, switching to a new system is expensive, while changing long-established habits is not easy.

Canon and Nikon have been renting mirrorless cameras that have yet to be officially released to the pros at the Tokyo Games, but their main push has been with their flagship DSLR cameras.

“There are risks of suddenly switching from something you’ve been using for so many years. So I decided to wait until Canon developed their professional mirrorless camera, ”Nakanishi said.