Now you could remove the Canon logo and put whatever camera name you like in it's place. Nobody would know the difference. Yes there have been for me, some aesthetic / different digital cameras, like the Olympus Pens, The Leica T and some of the Sigma DP compacts.
But any attempt to come up with something that strays from the traditional SLR body design is usually frowned upon and even mirrorless cameras seemingly have to adopt that body shape. There is also some reluctance amongst photographers to embrace the hands out in front of you method of composing and creating images like with a smartphone. In a lot of instances it does work very well and offers something different to the bring it to your eye and look through the viewfinder method of image capture.
There are now a couple of Android operating system cameras about to be released by Yonghuo and Zeiss that show some understanding of the way cameras may need to operate in the future, but both are obviously untried, untested and unproven.
I have to say I do like the industrial minimalist look, but this is perhaps early days for these kinds of camera and anyway the new developments in smartphones may mean that this is a sideshow anyway.
Now I'm happy to concede that there are many who don't agree with this. They like cameras to look like cameras. You know where you are with that SLR shape. Though I have to say that there is certainly no point in having that raised up section in the middle of the camera without an SLR mirror, but it still seems to crop up. And yes there have been some hideous cameras released.
Pentax and Hassleblad should be truly ashamed of these monstrosities.
I like cameras, I like using them and like musicians form a bond with their instruments, photographers do the same with their gear. And yes aesthetics are important to me. My cameras are more than just work tools and I like to enjoy using them. One of the reasons I don't use the Sony e mount cameras is I just dislike how they look and how they feel. And yes, this is a personal choice and somehow camera manufacturers have to try to design gear that will appeal to the maximum number of buyers, something that is far from easy. But it seems to me that customers have already chosen. Smartphones are the vast majority of peoples camera. And it isn't just because they would probably own a phone anyway. People are obviously attracted to the way smartphones take pictures. And the main reason for that has to be those huge high quality screens that give a perfect preview of how the image is going to look.
I've never understood why camera live view screens are so small. The Leica T series and the new Zeiss Android camera do have large screens, but for pretty much everything else we're stuck with a relatively small area to compose with and one that doesn't work well in sunlight. Why is this? A lot of photographers still like viewfinders, but that is actually a very restrictive way of creating images. I'm sure I'm not alone in realising the versatility that can be obtained with a smartphone camera. High angles, low angles and the ability to reach out to take a photo offer a lot more possibilities in terms of composition. And these days I use all my available options to create images. But that SLR design often doesn't make it easy to do. One reason I bought the Canon EOS R was because it has a fully rotating screen, something that I believe all 'proper' cameras should have, but don't.
As ever, I'm realistic enough to believe that what I write won't change anything and I can't see camera manufacturers racing to offer alternative designs. I could be wrong but it seems to me that they will just stick to what they know. There seems to be a natural conservatism in what camera makers offer and what serious photographers will buy and I suspect that will remain the case. Which is a shame and somewhat staid and unadventurous, but will probably remain so for the foreseeable future.
