Top 10 Digital Cameras on Flickr

zokiii writes "This list represents the top camera makes and models used to create photos uploaded to Flickr. The list is generated automatically by periodically sampling the EXIF data from the stream of recent uploads." This is actually an incredibly simple idea, but a really useful one when considering a new camera to buy. Score three points for scrapers.

Comments

Stats

[BWJones]

Beautiful use of statistics and just the sort of thing that the Flickr board of directors can take to their marketing meetings. Companies eat this stuff up as it is a real world reflection of specific markets using their products.

Interestingly, these statistics show that most of these cameras are solidly in the middle "pro-sumer" market and demonstrates that both Canon and Nikon did good when they went after a market that was primed to explode much like the 35mm market did in the late 70s and early 80s. Technology in both cases made it possible to build high quality cameras at affordable prices.

Of course this means good things for the consumer, but watch out for a new megapixel war much like what we saw with computers and the Mhz war. Of course just like the Mhz war, the MP war is going to be mostly hype as I've seen some damn fine images from 6 or 8 MP cameras that were far above the quality produced by some higher MP count cameras. The secret is going to be the size and quality of the individual imagers on the CCD, the quality of the image management chips (I tend to prefer Canon's DIGIC) and the quality of the lens.

Re:Stats

[capt.Hij]

Beautiful use of statistics and just the sort of thing...

They do not say if they are reporting the number of cameras by user or if they go by the number of pictures. For example, if they go by picture they are telling us who uploads the most pictures, if they go by user they are telling us how many cameras are used. They do not discuss the methodology.. They also do not provide numbers nor graphs. It is an awful way to communicate statistics.

Re:Stats

[Uncle Rummy]

Actually, they do discuss this, though indirectly. They apparently are counting the number of pictures uploaded:

Further, you will notice that the D-SLRs dominate the list. Perhaps this is due to the sheer volume that photo enthusiasts (amateur photographers and professionals) upload on their sites, which sometimes serve as their portfolios. They're likely the ones to have Pro accounts, too, which gives them unlimited upload capability. Casual users, on the other hand, might not be uploading so frequently, and would probably have free, limited accounts.

Small error

[KokorHekkus]

Canon EOS 350D DIGITAL and Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL are the same camera AFAIK, just differnent names for different markets. It's called 350D in Europe, Digital Rebel in the US... rest of the world I don't know.

Guess it says something about the demography of the posters though.

Fairly high end cameras

[binaryDigit]

Most of the cameras are all relatively high end stuff:

1. Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL XT
2. NIKON D50
3. Canon EOS 350D DIGITAL
4. Canon EOS 20D
5. NIKON D70
6. NIKON D70s
7. Canon PowerShot S2 IS
8. Canon EOS 30D
9. Sony CYBERSHOT
10. Canon EOS DIGITAL REBEL

Don't know if this is really useful for the "average" consumer, but does give an interesting view of who posts on Flickr. It would be interesting to compare this with other sites like pbase and see how the camera distribution changes as the demographics of the users (and the intended audience of the site) changes.

but a really useful one when considering a new cam

[Silver Sloth]

Well, err...
It tells you what other people are using. By this logic I should be driving a Ford Mondeo (and using Windows on my PC!)

or see FlagrantDisregards top 100 models / makes

[joejoejoejoe]

http://flagrantdisregard.com/flickr/topcameras.php

John has this for flickr too, and shows the top 100 makes and models. I think he uses the Flickr-API, ie not a scrapper. He says on the page "The lists are generated automatically by periodically sampling the EXIF data from the stream of recent uploads." and I think he hits that stream via the API...

Useful list? I think not.

[wfberg]

It's just a list of which cameras produced the most pictures uploaded to flickr. The article itself points out that it's likely skewed because enthusiasts that spring for expensive cameras are also more likely to spring for premium flickr accounts where they can upload an unlimited number of photos.

So what does this list tell us?
The people who spend a lot of money on their 'prosumer' cameras take a lot of pictures. Well, they would have to, otherwise they just wasted that money on their prosumer camera. And they're also more likely to spring for a premium flickr account. Well, they would have to, what with all the crappy pictures they have to take to legitimize buying an expensive camera.
Even looking at the individual users pictures tells you nothing about the quality of their camera. They might just be really good photographers, or they just throw out 9 out of 10 shots because the camera sucks.

These statistics are pretty much useless to anyone. They're only useful to flickr itself; they can now dream up new ways of advertising, like show ads for camera accesories based on EXIF info.

Now, if they had a list of camera models by number of users, that would be more interesting (probably more accurate portrayal of marketshare than the manufacturers themselves give off). Or of models that are used to post the fewest pictures before the users photos suddenly change to another brand (in other words; quickly abandoned crappy models). Models that are used most for dark scenes with/without flash. That sort of thing.

Re:I expect better from /.

[rtaylor187]

Relax... This particular information is only about which cameras are being used to take pictures posted on Flickr. It has nothing to do with pro photographers, non-pro photographers, "best" cameras or or "best" photos. Please adjust your expectations.