In the camera industry, "toy" or "tool" has become the only two ways out.

Nearly 13 years ago, in the summer of 2012, Sony, which was still full of "faith" at that time, launched a camera that had a profound impact on the future, the Cyber-shot DSC - RX100.

Yes, it is the famous first - generation "Black Card". To this day, we still clearly remember that we once recommended this "compact camera" with a minimalist design but extremely high cost - performance to a friend who was still in college at that time, and he was also extremely satisfied with this camera. He even communicated with us about his usage experience many years later.

However, precisely because of this, when we saw on the evening of July 15, 2025, that Sony almost "quietly" released the RX1R Ⅲ priced at 33,999 yuan, and even the matching lens hood was sold separately for 1,199 yuan, we immediately felt that it was really necessary to talk about it.

As is well - known, the RX1R Ⅲ belongs to Sony's "Black Card" family, along with the previously mentioned RX100 series and the RX10 series, which focuses on long - focal - length shooting. However, by tracing the history, it is not difficult to find that for a long time, compared with the RX10 series, which is positioned as a "lightweight long - focal - length camera for home use", or the RX1 series, which is positioned as a "full - frame fixed - focal - length compact camera", the RX100 series, a 1 - inch zoom compact camera that emphasizes portability and all - around performance, was the key in terms of shipment volume.

However, the current situation is that the RX100 series, which was originally positioned as "high - end for home use, lightweight and all - around", has not launched a new product for nearly 6 years. On the other hand, the more niche RX1 has undergone a replacement after nearly 10 years.

What does this mean? If we take a look at Sony's current (non - interchangeable - lens) official website, we will find that the ZV series, which focuses on VLOG, beauty features, and video shooting, has replaced the "Black Card" family and is placed in the most prominent position. Meanwhile, there are still a large number of old - fashioned models of the traditional RX100 and RX10 "Black Card" cameras listed on the official website. However, when you click on them, it will show "Notify me when in stock" or "Pre - order now", which obviously indicates that there is no inventory, and there is even doubt about whether they are still in production.

In other words, we can think that Sony's focus in the camera field has long since shifted from the "home - use, all - around" segment. Instead, the ZV series, the A7 and A9 families (including variants like the FX3), which precisely target "productivity", and the two special product lines of the RX1 and A1, which are clearly more like "toys", are the segmented directions that they are really promoting now and that the market can widely accept.

Of course, in fact, this is not just a problem for Sony. In fact, for almost all existing first - and second - tier camera manufacturers, the "home - use market" no longer exists. After all, as we all know, the price of the current flagship imaging mobile phones of various brands is at most in the range of 5,000 to 7,000 yuan. If you don't "chase the latest models" and buy older models, you can even get one for three or four thousand yuan.

In contrast, the traditional compact cameras with 1 - inch "large sensors" were initially priced at only two or three thousand yuan, but later became more and more expensive. Even in 2019, the official price of the Sony RX100 Ⅶ at that time was already over 8,000 yuan. We don't know whether the hardware improvement of the "large - sensor compact cameras for home use" really brought such high cost pressure, or whether the relevant manufacturers saw that this type of product was selling well and simply wanted to make more money.

However, from the perspective of consumers, this is simply an ironic story of "in the past, people bought large - sensor compact cameras because they couldn't afford DSLRs", and "now, people can't even afford compact cameras because they don't have enough money".

So, does this mean that the current camera industry has really been "crushed" by mobile phones, especially high - end imaging models? Not necessarily.

On the one hand, the physical size of smartphones is limited. With the current material science - related technology, a 1 - inch main - camera CMOS is already the limit for smartphone imaging design. For the other "secondary cameras", the size has to be compromised, and the actual effect still cannot compare with the large photosensitive area of high - end cameras, which usually start with a full - frame sensor and have a constant aperture across the entire focal - length range.

Moreover, in order to ensure the weight, quality control, and optical image - stabilization effect, smartphones have made many compromises in the material of optical lenses. Even the current top - of - the - line flagship imaging models can at most use 1 - 2 glass lenses, and the rest are plastic lenses with relatively low light transmittance. Smartphones would never dare to imagine the lens - group designs in cameras that often have ten groups and a dozen or twenty glass lenses.

On the other hand, for the daily use scenarios of ordinary users, the imaging ability of high - end mobile phones is already strong enough. Coupled with the support of current AI technology and the platform advantages of mobile phones themselves, "shooting and getting instant results" and "sharing immediately after shooting" have become the usage habits of most people. However, precisely because of the characteristics of high - end imaging mobile phones that overly emphasize "ease of use" and are accessible to everyone, they do lack a sense of ceremony and scarcity in the experience.

In this way, for the current camera industry, there are naturally only two feasible "ways to survive".

Firstly, it is to focus on pure high - quality imaging and "productivity" attributes. This naturally includes the super - flagship DSLRs and mirrorless cameras of various first - tier brands, as well as those rarer and more expensive professional "video cameras" and "large - sensor studio cameras". In addition to these, the "lightweight video cameras" represented by the Sony ZV series and the Canon PowerShot V1 series, which are relatively affordable in price and focus on high - quality VLOG and simple video - shooting capabilities, can actually be regarded as an attempt by traditional camera manufacturers to compete with mobile phones for some consumers.

As for the other way, it is even simpler. That is to simply turn cameras into "toys" for the wealthy. Use scarce materials to make the camera bodies, design the shapes to the extreme with creative designs, and add some stories that sound "much better" than those of mobile phones. Even if such cameras may not be very convenient to use in practice, or may even have little practical value, as long as they are scarce and unique enough, they can have a share in the market as a unique existence outside of mass - consumer products.

Moreover, the most important thing is that although we all know that "productivity devices" usually have a naturally high price, the price must also be set in combination with the "capabilities" of the device itself. For example, no matter how "professional" a flagship full - frame mirrorless camera is, its target consumer group will not accept a price higher than that of professional movie cameras or medium - format cameras.

The Fujifilm X - Half has neither good image quality nor practicality, but it is fun and not cheap.

However, pure "toys" are different. Their prices can be set without considering the actual use value at all, but only based on "scarcity". For this reason, this part of camera products may actually provide higher profitability for relevant enterprises. Although the prosperity of this type of product is bound to make relevant brands more distant from mass consumers, in today's market environment, perhaps camera manufacturers have no other choice.

[The pictures in this article are from the Internet.] 

This article is from the WeChat official account "3eLife" (ID: IT - 3eLife), written by 3eLife Editor, and is published by 36Kr with authorization.