So do they look more affordable now?
I understood the prices correctly all along, but I made typos in my message since I hade already kind of converted to Swedish currency in my mind.
When economy is a factor one compares with alternate solutions which cost similarly.
To make high res landscape photo today there's these alternatives
- 35mm DSLR pano head stitching - cheapest
- 36 megapixel Nikon D800 DSLR - likely exceeding more expensive entry level MFDB
- Medium format digital, on SLR camera
- Medium format digital, on tech camera
- 6x9, 6x12 rollfilm
- 4x5", 5x7" or 8x10" on film plus drum scanning ($50 - $150 per shot including scan service), ~100 megapixel for 4x5, 300 for 8x10
- 4x5" scanback
- 4x5" stitching using large pixel MFDB
With a 4x5" camera I get the flexibility to work with both 4x5" sheet film and 6x9 and 6x12 rollfilm plus some digital solution in the same system. And I get to work with a view camera, which makes photography experience so much nicer, this is a hobby for me afterall (with some artistic goal making large prints and selling a few etc, but no way near financing the costs), so I want it to be pleasing to shoot. Result is important, but also the process. I've done a lot of pano head work, and it works and gives great results but it is not as pleasing from a photographic experience aspect since you don't really do all the compositional work at site, you just gather data so you have enough and stitch&crop back home.