Kudos and many thanks to BJL and others for providing some expertise here.
So despite this thread meandering long and far away from the OP’s original question and the many rants (mine included), I’ve learned some things (I think!).
- When set at 200 ISO, my back shoots the same raw data it does at 35-100. I did not know that, and I don’t know when it started doing that. For all I know it always has. In my defense I can’t remember the last time I seriously used an ISO setting above 100. More on that later…
- “Base ISO” (or I suppose any other camera ISO setting) is not some sacrilegious specification. Camera ISO setting is useful to the photographer for taking pictures, but not for comparing cameras without interpretation. Frankly I never used sensitivity graphs for making a buying decision. Some here think photographers use these ISO graphs for that purpose, which brings me to my rant.
To Edmund and Sunli:
I might agree that on a consumer level, DSLR’s are compared, and perhaps choices are actually made on which DSLR to purchase, based on specs. But I will never believe that is the case with MFD backs, especially those from Phase One.
So I, pretty emphatically, do not agree with these statements:
“ISO 35 is just marketing”
“Phase… understand that cameras are often bought on specs”
“These numbers in the specifications play a significant role for marketing.”
“Phase is getting customers based on this spec (who here apart from some experts would buy an ISO 35 fixed-ISO back)?”
Just look at one of the most important characteristics of their marketing materials. Successful marketing materials need several things and one of the most important is a call to action. After a potential buyer interacts with a brochure, website, ad, salesperson, whatever, what is it precisely you want that potential buyer to do? Do you want them to pick up the phone and call? Write a cheque? Add the product to their shopping cart? Take a test drive? What??
Go to B&H and add that IQ380 to your shopping cart – oh wait, you can’t do that can you? Why do you think that is? Do you really think it is because their dealer network is almighty powerful and won’t let them do it? Nope. If Phase thought they would sell more stuff through those retailers they would. Now think about their marketing strategy: Pricing, distribution network, product feature set, and call to action in their marketing materials. It is pretty clear that the central call to action is The Demo.
Better yet, attend a PODAS workshop, which has been a reasonably successful marketing program Phase One “sponsors.” You arrive and after the usual introductions and logistics, you are handed a camera. For the next 45 minutes or so you fumble around taking random photos and learning where and what the switches and dials do while technicians run around helping. Then you pack everything up and head out to some fantastic location and start taking photos. From that moment on the whole workshop is about the photographs; it is not about the camera. People are taking photos, processing photos, eating, drinking and discussing photos. Nobody is running around whispering, “This camera is amazing because it will do this at that ISO.”
The marketing slight of hand at PODAS is not about some spec, it is that you are in a beautiful location with great light and could take stunning photos with an iPhone or any other camera. Again, it is about the demo and about the photographs.
BTW, I would buy a fixed ISO 35 camera, and essentially did (and paid a lot for it!). I'm serious that I cannot remember when I've ever used anything higher than ISO 100, and I’ve loved every minute of it. Do I wish it had Sony-sensor dynamic range? Of course! But Sunli, I don’t think saying the IQ180 has great dynamic range is a false statement. It is certainly not as good as other cameras, but almost all cameras have great dynamic range in my opinion. I opened the freezer the other day and pawed through a bunch of film I still have in there to get at something. Only one type of film in there, and it is ISO 50. Did I used to use other film? Sure I did but not very often. So for me, buying a “fixed ISO camera” wasn’t that much different than what I had been doing all along!
I don’t sell cameras, but I strongly believe very few if any of these backs are sold because of some spec in an ad or brochure. The idea that the way Phase uses ISO settings is purely a marketing gimmick, and is therefore the only the reason they still exist (because no sane person would actually want or use their products if they new “the truth”) is 180 degrees away from everything I see in their marketing strategy. And everything I experience with the product.
Dave