GFrensen: Yes, but will a "pro" do ever a job with only a Nex5...Nex5 is not designed, build and market at the "pro"
Disagree, professionals are doing jobs with only a Nex 5, speaking with 100% certainty on that score.
A professional who is aware of the Nex definitely wouldn't care how the camera is marketed, and probably wouldn't care who the camera is designed for, when deciding whether or not to use it.
And if the Nex is small, light, and works well in the field, who cares if the thing was "built for" a professional. In terms of redundant backup in the field, am far better off in total system reliability with multiple light weight camera bodies, if they're no more burden than one "pro" body. The far more likely failure scenario than spontaneous failure of a "non-pro-built" body is losing track of a camera in the field (tends to only happen when you're working without an assistant), dropping/banging it, battery failure, etc etc.
Once firmware version 3 came out, with the ability to assign custom white balance to convenient soft keys, have found the Nex 5 to be a completely professional camera.
Hmm, my "only thing missing from the Nex that has professional impact" is the lack of built-in radio remote control or (almost as good) a cable release terminal or at least a rear infrared sensor. Part of what's missing about the Nex remote is also the unavailability of all drive modes with remote. I.e. would be using a remote release for every single tripod photo if the release worked from anywhere for every drive mode.
Now my professional work almost never involves external flash control, which the Nex 5 is not well-equipped for. But have no doubt that with a bit of research and thought that (for me completely unimportant) "shortcoming" could be remedied.
And more importantly for purposes of argument, every camera is lacking some features.
I.e. my view cameras are not hand-holdable, my medium format cameras don't have a histogram display, my Nex doesn't have a larger sensor or weather sealing, big deal. Because none of them have every conceivable professional feature for every conceivable gig, doesn't make every every one of them "unprofessional".
GFrensen: My point was that there is nothing about the rumored NEX 7 to make it more professional (in the modern definination that Canon, etc use)
Disagree here, a better sensor (which is surely on the boards for a "Nex 7") is always way more professional than a worse sensor.
[Nex 7 not more professional...] than the NEX 5 except that it may have an EVF.
Hope Nex 7 doesn't have an EVF if it makes the camera more than 30 grams heavier, or makes it more fragile or expensive or bigger. Have completely adjusted to using a 30-gram clip-on plastic magnifier on the Nex viewfinder, it is superb.
Gfrensen: I think the main thing that makes the camera a "pro" camera is NOT weathersealing, it is NOT functionality, it is SERVICE. You have to have a professional service scheme for professionals. As long as you don't have that, many "Pro"photographers will not buy your camera.
Maybe many "pro" photographers still think about servicing their digital bodies, but in the Nex era my concern about servicing has dropped to zero. I care as much about servicing my cheap Nex body as I care about servicing my smartphone. It is a throwaway expense of doing business if it fails, and that failure will be a welcome excuse to replace it with the latest version. Really, have never in my life serviced a cellphone or piece of photo equipment, it's always been destroyed, lost, stolen, sold, traded, or obsolete and moved to backup or discard status before it's merited servicing.
Gfrensen: I don't think Sony will provide in this way, so no Sony camera is realy a "pro" camera, although many pro's will use it.
Am offering the contrasting opinion that once cameras are cheap/disposable and small enough to pack along extra bodies in a professional kit, it is now obsolete and irrelevant to describe a camera as "professional". Just as there is no need for me to describe or decide if my cellphones or pencils are "professional". Even though I may use and depend on those objects on some given job.
Put another way, there's still such a thing from my point of view as a "professional" camera outfit . For example no matter what the technology, a professional kit has all the things one might reasonably need on a particular job, with backups . E.g. by my definition any truly professional kit is carried in at least 2 separate bags. But in the Nex era there is no longer a need for any particular object in that kit to have been designed for professionals, if the Nex feature set is adequate.
And will finally note that the Nex has so few moving parts that it has proven completely resistant to ill effects from several 5-foot falls to ceramic floors. Meaning that there's little difference between the ruggedness that professionals need and the ruggedness that ordinary consumer products also benefit from.
Designing a fragile, failure-prone "consumer" Nex or cellphone could be as problematic in terms of returns, and cost Sony as much or more bad publicity, as designing a fragile, failure-prone "professional" DSLR would be for Nikon or Canon.
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