Page  1   2    A Digital Single-lens Reflex Camera War Erupts in Japan Interchangeability of Lenses Proving Popular among Amateur Photographers Digital Single-Lens Reflex camera war; Canon EOS Kiss Digital (left) and Nikon D70 (right)    Japanese camera manufacturers are in a hot competition to become the leader in the sale of the digital single-lens reflex (SLR) camera -- digital cameras that accept interchangeable lenses. It is an internationally competitive product in which Japanese camera manufacturers can fully exert their technological expertise. The Popularity of Digital Single-Lens Reflex Cameras; Capitalizing on Reputed Japanese Technology    It is an internationally competitive product in which Japanese camera manufacturers can fully exert their technological expertise.    It all began in the autumn of 2003 when Canon Inc. launched the Canon EOS Kiss Digital (Rebel Digital in the U.S. /EOS 300D elsewhere outside of Japan). Up to then, the price of digital SLR cameras had exceeded 200,000 yen, but this new camera lowered prices to the realm of 100-thousands of yen. Nikon Corporation met this challenge by releasing the Nikon D70 at a similar price in March 2004. This was the beginning of the digital SLR war.    Digital single-lens reflex cameras, which until then had been for professionals and a small number of amateur photographers, became affordable for the ordinary user, and the market expanded in a burst. In the autumn of 2004, Konica Minolta Photo Imaging, Inc. entered the digital SLR war with its Konica Minolta alpha-7 Digital (Konica Minolta Dynax7D/Maxxum7D) equipped with anti-shake technology. Olympus Corporation counteracted by releasing a digital SLR camera priced in the low 100,000 thousands of yen range (its upper end DSLR camera is priced at more than 200,000 yen). Meanwhile, Pentax Corportion introduced a digital SLR camera that costs less than 100,000 yen.    With the fall in the sales of film cameras, great expectations for constant growth had been placed on digital cameras. However, according to statistics compiled by the Camera & Imaging Products Association, domestic shipment of digital cameras for the month of June 2004 fell 13 percent as compared with the same month of the previous year. This was the first time since the association began compiling digital camera related statistics in 1999 that there was a year-on-year decline in shipments. Japanese newspapers reported that digital cameras, which had been hailed along with flat-screen TVs and DVDs as one of the "new three sacred treasures" of Japanese households, was in the danger of dropping out of the race. Consumer electronics manufacturers, such as the Sony Corporation and Matsushita Electric Industrial Co., Ltd., poured huge volumes of compact, light digital cameras into the market. With the advance of price reduction, ownership rates surpassed 50 percent, and digital cameras became a saturated market. Concern erupted that the digital camera market would follow a downward path tread by the personal computer market in Japan.