People ask me what makes my mind up about a product to feature here in the column - seeing as I am tasked with banging out a piece a day all week. Of course there are the promotional briefs from major manufacturers and the announcements of product launch days. These are all necessary to satisfy the urge for novelty on the part of the clients and the urge for money on the part of the management. I understand both urges, and am sympathetic. I go to all the launches I can manage as there is bound to be something to see and hopefully something to eat and drink. That satisfies my urges.
But as far as the goods that just sit on the shelf without any especial occasion attached to them, it is really a case of sudden inspiration. As it is a photo safari into the wild warehouse, I suppose you could say the choice is just a whim away...
Camera Electronic has an advantage for those of us with a passion for the littler and simpler things of life. CE has a pipeline to some amazing bargains in equipment that has served other people in the past - either clients or other traders. In short - we get interesting secondhand and even more interesting ex-demo gear.
This rarely calls to the photographers who hang off every word on new-camera internet sites. The folks who want the latest of everything as soon as it is announced in New York and visibly itch when you tell them that it takes a week to arrive to the other side of the planet. They are in even a worse state when you tell them that the manufacturer actually has not released the real thing and the rumour site they frequent was showing them a mock-up. They are
not the people who buy ex-demo cameras.
Likewise the ex-demo rarely goes to the fashionable. They are concerned with status and position and this is reflected in their possessions. Bless them, they are prepared to buy the styled and the shiny, and are frequently in a financial position to do so without sweating or stammering.
The real customers for the ex-demo are the real customers who are going to go out there and actually use the gear...for real:
a. First-time buyers who need a good solid camera and lens for the basic photos of life. If they get a good one, like the Canon 700D or one of the
Olympus micro 4/3 OM-D series and add a basic zoom lens they stand a darned good chance of coming back with the pictures they really want.
b. Students. They have not got as much money as the front-end-of-the-jet set but they still have
some and we are delighted to be able to take it from them. But we need to give them a real learning tool that they can actually complete their assignments with. One that will take the lenses that they need.
A sobering thought: the dear old days of the dear old Pentax 1000K are dear old dead. Likewise all the economic little film cameras we learned on. People can still pick up the remains at the camera markets, but in most cases they would be well advised to put them right down again. The future of photography for nearly everybody will be better served by them getting a dear little digital demo camera and using it to death.
c. Hard-bitten pro photographers who sail the wild seas of wedding and event photography with fabulously sophisticated full-format rigs fronted with enormous lenses. They might have ( Hah, almost certainly have...) paid a stiff price for those new bodies and that new pro glass, but they are still susceptible to the fickle finger of fate. No-one should sail those seas without a lifeboat - if the lifeboat is a small frame camera that takes the pro lenses as a matter of course, then it can be quickly swung out of the camera bag and attached with sleight of hand and the guests need never know that the Big Pro Body has carked it. The files may not be quite the same, but the shooter will have something with which to talk themselves out of trouble.
d. The experimenters. A combination of Salvador Dali and Isaac Newton to a man or woman, the experimenters are never short of the desire to cut the red wire, cross the plasma streams, or adapt an old lens that smells like cheesy socks onto their digital camera. For them, an economical ex-demo body is an ideal platform that does not sacrifice the integrity of their main camera system. They can clap on any number of adapters and shoot anything that they can find in the bargain bin at Cash Converters. No judgement there, as I have three adapters in my equipment cabinet myself, and the main illustrative images for this column are taken with an adapted lens.
e. The canny. People who have the desire to take pictures, but look long and hard at the new camera prices - some because their circumstances require it of them, and some because that is just
them to the core. Flinty-eyed is a difficult adjective to work into normal conversation but it definitely applies to some people. They can get more bang for their buck, if you can actually get it out of their hand, with the ex-demo camera than they can with nearly anything else. Here again I do not condemn - I am retired and have had to stop buying platinum bracelets for blonde showgirls because of economics. Perhaps I will need to buy ex-demo bracelets...
All this said. I see we have a good big hefty shelf of ex-demo Canon 700D cameras sitting up in the warehouse. If you find that you fit into any of the five categories, come on down and ask a staff member to show you the wares.
