Well, for Jordan, myself, and I'm sure many others,
The big haunting question is: Will the Mamiya ZD DMFB work on a view camera (or even better, a camera body such as the Cambo Wide DS) for more flexible architectural/landscape shooting and stitching ability?
My gut feeling is NO...but I hope someone will prove me wrong on this issue.
I base this on the fact that there has been nothing infowise on a shutter release feature that I can find mentioned in any literature on the current ZD model promoting this ability.
I do see history repeating itself here, since the original Kodak DSC Pro Back did not have this feature either, but fortunately it was upgraded one year later with the "Plus" model's "external shutter release port", which then allowed those DMFB's use with a view camera.
Curiously, when the final slimmer and lighter Kodak 645 DSC Pro Back models were later introduced only for the Hasselblad H1, Contax, and Mamiya AF camera bodies, the "port" was missing again.
I feel this new ZD Back is just a long overdue upgrade of the last Kodak 645 DMFB Mamiya version, and the ZD model finally fills the gaping hole Kodak left behind.
This is a well positioned price for a new model specific 14/12 bit DMFB in comparision with the rest of the industry's 16/14 bit offerings.
And this wonderful price point for the ZD back (Lower than I think all of us expected) also follows an historically similar price point pattern with the older 645 Kodak DMFB's as well. Those Backs too, as you may recall, were offered at much lower price points compared to the rest of the MFDB competition of that time period.
I agree with Nick that the price points of competing product lines will probably see little movement since Phase, Leaf, and Hasselblad offer much better feature sets compared to the ZD back in its present form.
But wow, those 22 megapixels, with that 36mm x 48mm image size, for those who own Mamiya AFD's, for only $6999, is still verrrry nice! And with the new 28mm lens, oh boy!!!
And the "external shutter release" feature? Well, we will just have to wait and see.
Indeed, as RicAgu remarked, we live in interesting times............
Joe Bossuyt