Yes, Wilko, they always were too expensive (it was, so a CEO once said, because they could ask that much. I think too because they had too ask that much. Making MF cameras, and Hasselblads in particular, never was a very lucrative thing).
And affordability is a relative thing.
But this time the market is going to decide more than at any other time. The competition still is, not from other makers of digital backs, but from Canon c.s. There still is a huge price gap between the two.
Not that it is to be expected that MF digital thingies will ever be, or have to be, available at the same price level. But a bit closer they need to be still.
Marc,
"no one" or "relatively few"? Hmm...
High profit items can of course only be those that sell. No matter whether the manufacturing bits and bobs are all paid for or not.
In the "good old days", Hasselblad was serving a niche market already. Even at the best of times, only "relatively few" were buying Hasselblads. (MF never was a big part of the photography market.)
Now that things have slowed down a lot, "relatively few" of "relatively few" are still buying Hasselblads.
And "relatively few" of these "relative few" of "relatively few" are still buying V-System Hasselblads.
I think we can, without exagerating too much, equate that to "nobody".
When i wrote about "film cameras that also take digital backs (like those made by Leaf, Sinar, etc.)", i wasn't thinking about the HY6.
I was talking about the Hasselblad H-Series, which are - and should be thought of as - "digital cameras that also take film", and much more about the V-System cameras, that only are "film cameras that also take digital backs".
Digital cameras (that may also take film) are what sell, not film cameras (whether they also take digital backs or not).
So i do think it will be over for the V-System once it's 50th anniversary festivities are behind us.
And rightly so, even: the H-System is the future, if there still is one, for Hasselblad.
And Paul may be in the running for a price (if Hasselblad still awards those - they announced two winners of their large competition, but whether they also awarded the remaining two prices, plus the grand final price, we are left guessing at) with his recently overhauled, and presumably still working
1957 500 C.
They ran a competition to find the oldest one still in use when the 500 C celebrated its 25th anniversary (gee i'm getting old...), so why not again?