Our friend Gary Friedmann just released his Sony A77 guide! You can purchase it here: http://www.friedmanarchives.com/alpha77/index.htm. He is quite popular within the Alpha community and his books are always appreciated. It has 576 pages! Sample pages and table of content can be read here: http://www.friedmanarchives.com/alpha77/book_page_samples.htm. It’s a must have books for all current and future A77 camera owner. I will buy the NEX-7 guide as soon as he finishes it! For US readers: A77 body only is now available at Amazon (Click here) and so the A77+16-50 (Click here).

More A77 books:
“Profibuch Sony SLT alpha 65 & alpha 77” at Amazon Germany (Click here)
“Sony Alpha SLT-A65/A77 For Dummies” at Amazon US (Click here) and Amazon UK (Click here).
“David Busch’s Sony Alpha SLT-A77 Guide to Digital Photography” at Amazon US (Click here) and Amazon UK (Click here).

It’s not a surprise that Sony just reported a bad financial quarter result. At least in the camera division it’s easy to figure out the Thai Flood as main result for the bad results. Nevertheless the company as a whole had to report huge losses (85,7 Mrd. Yen or 855 Mio. €) and CEO Stringer had to give up his post (Source: CNET). You can downlaod the full financial report here: http://www.sony.net/SonyInfo/IR/financial/fr/index.html.

While we are still waiting to see the new A35 and A55 successors Ricoh-Pentax (now they are the same company) announced two new cameras with Sony sensor inside. The A12 module (here at MR) and the ugliest camera I have ever seen…the K-01 (here at MR). I have to say our Sony designers are much better :)

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Many are waiting the new 2.0 firmware update for their A77 camera. When asked about this Paul Genge answered on Sony UK facbook site that “we have had many other problems with making the actual cameras to resolve first, but hopefully we will have some further positive news to bring you in due course. No timescale can be hinted at though.”

meanwhile the kit version is still in Stock at Amazon USA (Click here). And the camera sells so well that it made into the top twenty of the Amazon Ranking (Click here to see the full list).

More A77 search links: [shopcountry 8461].

Japan is the only market of the world offering super detailed info about camera sales. And this week BCNranking made a nice overview of the percentage sales in 2011. As you can see from the screenshot on top Sony is doing well in the compact camera market where it jumped on the second place with 15,1%. it was on position 4th in 2010. It’s not going well in the DSLR market but this has probably to do with the Thai flood consequences that made the A65 and A77 not available in reasonable numbers within 2011. Compared to 2010 Sony also lost 5% market share in the mirrorless market probably for the same reasons.

I think 2012 numbers will be more important because it will really show what’s the strength of the company in a “normal” year (a year without Tsunamis and Floods I hope!).

There is no such nice detailed market report in European and American countries. So I have to rely on the very general and “unscientific” Amazon rankings to see if a camera is popular or not. I give you here the links to check the current most sold cameras:

Amazon US:
DSLR ranking (Click here): No Sony camera in top 20 :(
Mirrorless ranking (Click here): NEX-5n rules!
Compact ranking (Click here): Canon dominates.
Lens ranking (Click here): No Sony in sight.

Amazon Germany:
DSLR ranking (Click here): No SLT camera in top 20 :(
Mirrorless ranking (Click here): Again the NEX-5n on top!
Compact ranking (Click here): The HX100V is doing pretty well.

Amazon UK:
DSLR ranking (Click here): Again no Sony on top.
Mirrorless ranking (Click here): Sony NEX-5n on position two.
Compact ranking (Click here): Cnaon-Nikon domination.
Lens ranking (Click here): It’s a Canon world.

Amazon France:
DSLR ranking (Click here): Canon as usual…
Mirrorless ranking (Click here): NEX-5n and NEX-7 domination!
Compact ranking (Click here): Again Canon…

Rokinon/Samyang posted the first image of the 8mm fisheye E-mount lens on facebook. Below you find images of the lens and image samples taken with the lens. The Rokinon will be available in March.

Reminder: In USA the company uses the “Rokinon” name (here on Amazon), in Europe they are branded as “Samyang” ([shoplink 11234 ebay]here on eBay[/shoplink]), in UK you can find them with the name “Wallimex” (here on Amazon UK).

Sony Japan (Click here) presented the next-generation Back-Illuminated CMOS Image Sensor (See graph on top): “as the pixel section and circuit section are formed as independent chips, a manufacturing process can be adopted, enabling the pixel section to be specialized for higher image quality while the circuit section can be specialized for higher functionality, thus simultaneously achieving higher image quality, superior functionality and a more compact size. In addition, faster signal processing and lower power consumption can also be achieved through the use of leading process for the chip containing the circuits.”

The well informed Japanese website Nikkei (Click here) said that Sony will acquire 20-30% of Olympus shares. While Sony’s mail goal is to have a control over Olympus highly profitable medical business this may will influence the camera division too. Only time will tell!

P.S.: A swedish source told me that there will be around 100 units of the Nex-7 body in Stock on the 4th of February (Check Sonystore Sweden). More pre order options: [shopcountry 8454]