[metadat]

What is a "digital back"?

Edit: Wow! Thanks for all your replies! This sounds intriguing, but only tangentially related to scanning.

Now if you could turn a film camera into a high-quality scanner.. wouldn't that be something :)

I'm in the ignorant camp where I've been satisfied with Epson consumer grade scanners because I had no idea what I was missing.

Cheers.

[Tomte]

https://www.hasselblad.com/de-de/h-system/h6d-100c-digital-b...

You love the feel of your camera, its optics, and you don't want to throw away 20000 dollars? Pay a few thousand more and it's now a digital camera, everything else stays the same.

[shagie]

The large format approach is often a scanner - which works fairly well with a landscape. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Digital_scan_back

It takes a bit of rethinking since the shutter speed should be thought of as exposure speed since it is the speed at which the scanner moves - not the duration the shutter is open.

[buildbot]

Replaces a film magazine with a digital sensor

Has been made since the late 80s in various forms.

Phase One is the “premier” brand, with hasselblad closely following, then you have the defunct brands such as imacon, leaf, megavision (maybe around still), Sinar (around, part of Leica), Fuji made one, Rollei also made some. Dicomed made an actual 60mmx60mm one for a full frame 6x6 camera, still unique to this day.

[chihuahua]

I think in some film cameras, you can replace the part of the camera where film is exposed with a digital image sensor. Then you can use the same camera, but instead of exposing chemical-based film, you're recording digital images.

[lostlogin]

> I've been satisfied with Epson consumer grade scanners because I had no idea what I was missing.

Every time I meet someone who is expert in something I enjoy I have learned to tread carefully. It can often ruin perceptions - sure, it leads to a better result but it’s often very pricey.

Coffee, computers, networking, storage, backups, automation, tools, etc etc.

My life is a lot better and things a lot more reliable for the help I’ve had, but I’m poorer.

[jsmith99]

Others have already explained, but many medium format camera systems were made to be modular long before the advent of digital. The viewfinder, lens, or the bit at the back which holds the film could all be hot swapped if you wanted to switch to eg a waist level finder or different film.