Quote:
Originally Posted by walter23
At some point the manufacturers will have to slow down the product cycle. Nobody will buy a $5000 DSLR if there's a newer model coming out to obsolete it at the next PMA or whatever.
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I think we're getting to a point where the innovative "jumps" are starting to slow down or flatten out (if one were looking at a graph). Megapixel differences between 8 and 10 to 12 really aren't that big of a deal now. Jumps even from 16 to 21 seem to be less impressive lately, especially with the advances in digital medium format.
DR and overall IQ improvements are good but we're starting to see improvements in post processing software and techniques to make up the difference. Noise is considerably lower than its ever been in just about all manufacturers. Even the differences between full frame and crop sensors seems to be less important today. Throw images from both on the wall at 16x20 or so and the majority of people can't tell the difference. If they don't notice, why should I shell out an extra few thousand for a full frame body?
This next generation of cameras will be it for a while, I suspect. The differences from the 10D to the 20D were significant. 20D to 30D were minimal. The 30D to 40D were definite improvements but not as significant as the 10-20 jump. Similar jumps in IQ and performance on the 1D side. The 1Ds..maybe.
The 5D is a first generation camera, though. I'm really curious what they come out with on this one. For a while I wondered if they might not simply discontinue a "budget" FF body but the Nikon D3 brings it back to the forefront. The next gen will be interesting.