I hope that the latest medium format backs will establish a clear advantage in image quality attributable to superior dynamic range, and thus put improved dynamic range at the top of many customer and camera designer wish lists for improvements in DSLRs, ahead of yet more pixels, or clean ISO 3200 images, or catching up with the 10fps rate of the fastest 35mm film SLR.
I'm not sure if I'm going to get into trouble again with Michael, but I'll risk it (and desist at the first warning
).
Putting aside issues such as CMOS versus CCD, pixel size versus pixel pitch and differences in aspect ratio between the P25 sensor and the 1Ds sensor, essentially, for a given field of view the P25 employs
two 9 micron pixels to do the job of
one 1Ds pixel.
No smaller format can compete with that advantage. Whatever tricks can be devised to reduce noise in the smaller format and increase dynamic range, the same or similar tricks (or different but effectively the same) can be used to reduce noise and increase dynamic range in the larger format.
