The review is riddled with problems.
To start with, Marc starts as an owner of the one system, and so at a subconscious level the Phase will to him have an advantage, and he will be able to get more out of it. At a conscious level one can discount such factors, but muscle memory, for example, will always favour the camera he owns.
In the studio, he chose a lighting scenario which wipes out one huge advantage of the Hasselblad: the high sync speed of all lenses.
The metering I cannot comment on, but it sounds highly unlikely to me that the Hasselblad meters that badly for everyone out there. I don't know what was wrong in the setup he tested. It should perhaps be mentioned here that when people actually buy a system, they may go through extensive hoop jumping to get a good copy of everything, like the 3 lenses that some buy, only to keep the best and send the other 2 back. When you test such a system against an off-the-shelf competitor, there is an inherent imbalance. Joseph Holmes had one Phase back which was 170 microns off! Imagine the test results if that was what Marc had used.
He cautions that one should not confuse resolution with sharpness, and then he shows a newspaper and confuses resolution with sharpness! If he wants to test resolution, he should use a resolution test target. Adding a little sharpening and contrast to the Hasselblad image would vastly improve its appearance compared to the Phase shot, but I don't see the Phase out-resolving the Hasselblad in this shot. Finally, using a normal lens very close up is more likely to show up differences in the lens. He should use a macro lens close up or a normal lens at normal distances. In the later MS vs. P65+ comparison he observes how blotchy the Phase suddenly renders the dots in the print, but fails to make a comparison to the first image where the Hasselblad was blotchy, and he also fails to condemn the Phase for the blotchiness in the same way he condemned the H3DII-50MS for blotchiness.
I think that what he is dealing with is designing tests where the interaction of the subject at the pixel-level is skewing the results. On fredmiranda.com there was one guy who tested a Canon 5D against a Leica M8 for resolution, and his test was done in such a way that the Canon could just barely resolve some text at a distance, but the Leica, having 10MP vs. 12.7MP, failed spectacularly on this target. This kind of test is only relevant at that exact distance. A little further, and both would fail to render the text. A little closer and both would render the text. The same might be happening here. A little larger, and neither would have blotches. A little smaller, and both might have blotches (like would certainly have been the case if he had shot the Hasselblad in single-shot mode in the second test). In the first test, he found the exact distance where the Hasselblad's slight deficiency in pixels led to blotchiness but where the Phase was still okay, condemned the Hasselblad and stopped using it in single-shot mode. Horrible reporting. He really needs to try all modes all the way and not remove one mode from the equation for a poor result on one test.
His Velvia++ comments are also suspect, and he fails to document it. The one example he shows (the lawn and trees), the colours start fairly close, and some parts look better on the Hasselblad shot, others on the Phase shot. He then goes on to trounce the Hasselblad...
His comment on the dynamic range of current 35mm DSLRs being 7 stops is truly bizarre. I am not sure if any pro-level DSLR has ever had that little dynamic range, but the current kings of DR are the P65+ and the D3x. He really needs to back off there or back up his statement. The statement about 12-14bits vs. 16 bits is also blinkered, given that the 16 bits of MF is often theory only, let down by the ADC. See comments by the author of one RAW package on LL.
He also fails to mention what a fantastic deal it is for the H4D-50MS to be several thousand cheaper than a P65+ single-shot.
Marc Dubovoy is perhaps well respected, but ultimately, I think he falls into the same old trap: he exaggerates small differences in the results, and fails to account for some pretty significant differences in the starting point. On top of this, he seems to misinterpret some test results, leading to wrong conclusions.
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Ultimately we all want to own the best that we can afford, but it should not be forgotten that any of these systems, whether from Hasselblad, Phase, Sinar or Leaf, can be used to get fantastic results. The difference between 22MP and 60MP is sometimes important, but more often, it makes little difference, single-shot or multi-shot. Only in specific, limited scenarios do these differences start to become important. We should also not forget that for every person who likes the handling of a camera, there is someone else who cannot stand it.
To be honest, these cameras/backs are almost all so good that comparison testing makes little sense to report on. We really need to test individually, for our own needs, for our own preferences. Marc's review does a huge disservice to Hasselblad and their loyal customers, and I don't say that as a Hasselblad fan, as most people around here are fully aware.
