Photo news: Dull CES and Gettystock
There was hardly anything new at CES this year, but more about Nikon's moon camera. The news of the week is the merger of two picture agencies.
"Only" 4th place in the photo competition, but here again as a lead story: The picture "GI - Shadow" by JensLe.
(Image: JensLe)
Getty buys Shutterstock – Is this good news at the start of the new year? After all, one of the largest photo agencies, primarily focused on current affairs reporting, is taking over a typical provider of stock photos, where many smaller creatives are also active. It will be interesting to see how many of them will bow to the terms and conditions of the large new owner. Getty's greater reach could be an advantage, but that remains to be seen.
A quasi-monopolist for stock photos
Other industry observers point out that the size of the new Getty's stock market valuation alone will create a giant that accounts for 75 percent of the market for stock photos. At least that's the calculation of Jaron Schneider from Petapixel, who is also calling for regulators to ban the merger. Our colleague Daniel AJ Sokolov has analyzed why it came to this in the first place: Of course, it's all about the money, or more precisely, the two companies' stock market prices, which have been falling for a long time.
Videos by heise
Regardless of the outcome, the market for stock photos is something to worry about anyway, as non-copyrightable AI images are only a threat. The business model of living from real, self-created stocks is not only threatened by this. Schneider also fears that Getty could reduce the shareholdings of photographers. And if not: with an assumed 75 percent market power, they can virtually dictate them for the entire industry. Also for Shutterstock subscribers, by the way.
Nikon's moon camera takes shape
Let's move on to a more pleasant, and in any case unattainable, photo motif: the moon. Reachable is to be understood here in the literal sense because the subject is not the moon as seen from the earth, but the other way around. And this is for the first manned moon mission since 1972. We are talking about HULC, the "Handheld Universal Lunar Camera", which we reported on at the beginning of 2023. This is a modified Nikon Z9, which also includes a heating blanket. Nikon has now shown exactly what this looks like at CES.
And that was one of the few newsworthy photo innovations from Las Vegas. This trend was already apparent a year ago, and with the death of photo fairs in Germany too, it is likely to stay that way. Manufacturers are relying increasingly on precisely controllable and much cheaper in-house events or purely online events. This is a shame, especially when it comes to cameras because you want to get your hands on them before you order them for a few thousand euros.
New, old cameras from Panasonic
There are at least two cameras that are new in one small aspect, even if they were already announced in December but have not yet been featured here: Panasonic's Lumix G97 and Lumix TZ99. They largely correspond to the previous models, but now have a USB-C port because this has been mandatory in the EU since the beginning of 2025. The compact "Travelzoom" TZ99 will be released at the end of February for 549 euros, the MFT camera Lumix G97 for 749 euros, in a kit with 12 - 60mm lens for 949 euros.
Because our column took a short winter break, it is now being published as the second issue in the second week of the year instead of the first. Confusing? No, because we count them stubbornly by calendar week. And because there is a lack of remarkable long reads on the weekend, this time there is a long click with photos, namely the winners of our "Urban Architecture" photo competition. Even if you've perhaps photographed your own or another person's city many times before: The winning photos show that there is always something new to discover.
(nie)
