Seems to me that folks who're seriously concerned about maximizing DR and minimizing noise with the Sonys will figure out empirically how far they can push exposure TTR, at base ISO and when gained up, without compromising highlights. Then we'll see how they stack up against other similarly maximized cameras. This oughtta expose any firmware/data compression issues Sony may want/need to address.
As someone just standing back & watching this saga unfold, I've gotta say it's been fun so far.
-Dave-
The digital world is just fixated on shadows (see the thread of 300 charts and comparisons).
Personally to me shadows are dark and honestly cleaning noise out of a shadow is not a big deal, though I don't shoot glass smooth objects.
If anything I look for in a digital file is the transitions from shadows to midtone to highlight and the big one, holding highlights or better put, having highlights that ramp naturally and don't just burn out.
Anyway, to me it all depends on who they build these cameras for. I saw a you tube video that Sony produced in Japanese that was very pretty and they featured a film maker, a scenic art photographer and I think a commercial fashion photographer.
For the film maker, it seemed rather odd as the video samples I've seen look ok, but the video specs aren't overwhelming. The art photographer makes sense because of the 35 mpx and the fashion guy, well it was hard to tell, though they did show him tethering.
Like you I've decided to probably wait and see and I have so many platforms now it's getting obscene. I jumped into 43 for the video functions and the olympus em5 just because I had the lens set and I just like the cameras, but to go the Sony route, it would have to be a replacement for either Canon or Nikon, at least for me and I'm not sure it will replace those two makers. Probably replace my Nikons more than the Canons, but I'm probably opposite in that thought.
I'd really like to know Sony's roadmap for this series. With Panasonic it's widely known they will produce a robust 4k camera early next year. That interests me a lot if the camera shoots a pretty file.
For Olympus I don't know where they're going and maybe the em-1 is the limit for them, but I wish they track focused better, at least my em-5. If it did I'd probably buy a second em-5 body because the prices are rock bottom right now and I've grown accustom to thinking 1.8 is a normal setting.
For what it's worth I've found if you set up the olympus for no noise reduction and cut the contrast, cut the sharpness (which I believe is set to over sharp) cut the saturation and keep the iso at even numbers, high iso is much cleaner and the file is much more workable.
With Sony, it's kind of wait and see, though the camera does look very interesting.
IMO
BC