[JJ_SO]

First, those were only my ideas about "cool stuff" and some of them are not really fresh and new. But still, not all of them are "impossible" and your explanations of why they didn't become real were not always "end of story". Although it's impossible to predict if any of them would bring tons of cash to the manufacturer.

 

Because there are so many parameters to control. Less buttons means less parameters means less control.

However, try the Canon DSLRs with touchscreen. They have touchscreen done "right", and you don't "need" the buttons anymore. 

The reason I didn't try it yet: I don't want to be tempted to change systems another time, but I see Canon doing innovations while Nikon is only chewing the grass of yesterday.

 

Speech recognition is an odd way to control things. Others can hear you. It is slow.

 

I don't want to do everything with voice control. And it should be possible to switch it off, but usually my mouth is close to the back of the cam, so it's not necessary to talk very loud. The camera should be able to learn my commands, i.e. "spot" for spot metering, "balance" for level indicators. But I don't want to imagine what a mess the Nikon programmers would leave in the menu...

 

Turning the camera is fast and intuitive (unless when on tripod)... Turning the sensor is yet another control button?

No, it would be a mechanical move with the advantage of keeping the camera in the same position on a tripod. A small version of a Mamiya RB/RZ 67 - but the mechanical problems or their solutions would increase the price enormously. And if one likes to turn the body , that remains possible. It would be better for tripod use, though.

 

Because cameras can't know the exact behavior of the lens motor and electronics. Cameras don't know step sizes.

Cameras put the distance to the object into metadata - so they do know something about steps… And what else than steps - very precise steps - are the Micro AF adjustments? Here I don't find your reasoning convincing. It is doable, I'm pretty certain.

 

Remote view finder is handy at times. Just like swivel LCD displays are handy at times. Having a remote trigger + live view just is a nice tool.

 

In some situations it's the only possibility to get the shot, But then, if I look carefully to the "quality" of Nikon's LiveView, I don't see the remote displays would do the job without massive improvements in LiveView - and then the questions is, why not using a mirrorless FF system for that?

 

Why would you want to remove the display?

 

Have you ever tried a CamRanger? Basically, the iPad/iPod is this "removable display" feature, just without the CamRanger device and having WLAN inbuilt. It doesn't need to have the huge range of the CamRanger, I would see it as innvation/improvement for my purposes if I could separate the display (which would have to be a touchscreen and it would need a battery or some other kind of energy source) from the sensor/lens/shutter/memory/battery combination

 

Because AF is not that controllable (every lens behaves differently). I can see how one would design a dedicated lens for a certain body for that, though, where the photographer tells the camera the step distance between shots.

If cam-manufacturers manage to make seamless panorama shots in cam and correct their (flawish) lens design in cam, focusstacking is no big deal - only trouble is, the user interface designers don't think enough "Apple".

 

Has been tried twice. Problem: one does not just need a sensor (doable), but also battery, memory, computer, controls (problematic). And nowadays, what would it add to the DSLR landscape?

Good point. It's doable with professional cams where the film-back can be changed, but the rest of the old designs may not be precise enough.

 

One or two manufacturers actually are researching into that area.

 

Question is, will it be cheaper to invest in a changeable sensor or get a body with foveon sensor and fixed lens just for landscape? I don't prefer dealing with different user-interfaces and menus, but there are not only contras... A second, independent body could save the phototrip if the main-body is malfunctioning.