Digital BW, The Print

Hi Tom

A couple of quick comments.  Firstly price is not necessarily a good of
judge of quality and value.  Secondly, yes they are designed - at the moment
- for two different purposes but watch them converge.  In the last few years
we have seen 645 photography pick up more and more of the features of 35mm
(autofocus etc) as photographers wanted to gain a broader use of the larger
film size.  In many cases I suspect that the level of convergence has been
slowed by the key limiting factor of having to wind forward larger film -
issues that don't exist with digital.  I don't think we are too far away
from someone like Mamiya producing an digital-only 645 - watch the
collaboration and bundling with the digital back guys.  Note the ISO
expansion of the digital backs, for example.  Also, the digital backs (I am
not referring to the scan backs) are also having to go portable - the new P
series from PhaseOne is a good example.  In a digital world it is far easier
for these products to converge with regard to function.  Of course there
will always be compromises made to tailor to a particular activity and
Canon's breaking of its 1x line into the 1Ds and the 1D is a very good
example.  But I really do see the 1Ds targeted as an alternative to the
lower end, 35mm sized sensor, 645 backs and that these particular digital
backs will not be able to hold their pricing.   (Many pros are recommending
a newcomer to digital purchase a 1Ds rather than an 11mp digital back as a
much more versatile first digital camera.)  That's why my question was
specific to a comparison of the likes of a 1Ds or 1D MK II versus a 35mm
sized sensor digital back.  FPS and portability features are easy to
compare.  Image quality is not.  It seems this comparison is a very murky
one - even on a single variable such as S/N.

Now a full-framed 645 portable digital back with a pixel density like the 1D
MK II (I wonder what the pixel count would be if did the extrapolation?)
would be sweet but yes will likely be a very expensive proposition....but
the challenge is being laid down by the 35mm SLR kings and not the 645 guys.

:-)

<At $20,000+ there should be a difference.  But, remember, those two systems
are desigen for different purposes.  So, this is really an apples to oranges
comparison.
> 
> Tom Baker>