Hi All
Most of my work comes from advertising agencies in the form of travel and portrait based imagery for advertising, mostly outdoor print, billboards, brochure and some web. I have been shooting almost all on 35mm DSLR and I have been reasonably happy up until the past year. That's when I started shooting film again, first for myself then for clients through a Mamiya RZ(non D version). I have used an RZ for over 20 years on and off and I'm very happy with the operation and optics.
My question is, if you had a budget of "around" $10k what would you get? Mamiya 645 kit with a 22 or 28mp Leaf or Phase back or would you cobble together something with the RZ system? I have a RZ 50mm ULD lens that I use mostly and on 35 I'm alway shooting wide or ultra wide.
I'm just not sure which way to go. I like the idea of 1/1600 sync with the LS lenses and some of the older Mamiya fast glass stop down lenses like the 80mm 1.9 and 200mm 2.8.
Suggestions?
The major issue with the RZ will be the effective focal length when using the smaller-than-6x7 sensor.
This
Digital Transitions Visualizer tool can help you visualize what a particular lens focal length will look like with the digital back. For instance here is a screen grab using that Visualizer which shows:
[RZ with film and a 50mm lens] vs. [RZ with DM22 back and a 28mm lens]
Note of course that there is no such thing as a 28mm lens on an RZ. Which is the point; you cannot get very wide with a digital back on an RZ, even with the larger sensor backs. For portraits I think the RZ is a great digital-back option. You get an (optional) waist-level-viewfinder, interesting and very inexpensive lenses, and the option to shoot vertical without turning the camera, and native flash sync at 1/400 (not as fast as a V, H, or DF system, but still pretty good for most applications). But for landscape (for shooters who prefer a wide/sweeping field of view) it's basically a non-starter.
Based on your brief explanation of your potential uses, it sounds like you'll be better off with one of the backs that has a larger sensor (e.g. a 1.1 crop rather than 1.3 crop).
So based on your budget and needs it sounds like a DM22 fits the bill quite nicely. We have a demo DM22+DF+80LS lens kit which would be well under your budget. In fact you'd only be a bit shy of having enough budget remaining to add a Cambo Wide DS and 35XL lens (which has enough image-circle to stitch a two-frame shot to get to the same field-of-view as a 50mm with 6x7 film, and bring the image resolution to around 35mp). The DF body would be your tool-of-choice when shooting portraits (flash sync at 1/1600, autofocus, autoexposure) and the DS would be a killer tool (given your budget) for sweeping landscapes. Alternatively you could stick with just the DF body and use the extra budget for a 28mm or 35mm lens. Additional few older Mamiya lenses could be added for a few hundred dollars each (they would be limited in flash sync, the oldest generation would have to manually stopped down and focused, and the performance is a little lower than the latest/greatest lenses from Phase/Schneider, but they can help fill out your kit).
Notably that kit would come with full dealer support, which, as you wade into the waters of medium format digital for the first time, can save you a lot of headaches, hassle, and issues.
If you could stretch your budget just a tad a DM33 would also be a good option. As would for example a P25+ or P45 non-plus.