When Kodak looked at its product road map five years ago (when the DCS 460 was released), three years ago (when they were adapting the DCS 560 for the Nikon F5), and even two years ago when they released the DCS 660 the Kodak DCS 760 was likely seen as another iteration along its high-end, high-resolution professional series of cameras. Something happened not long after the DCS 660 reached market that significantly changed how the market would see the DCS 760: the Nikon D1 was released.
Up until the Nikon D1, Kodak had been left alone in its market segment of professional, mobile photographers. Above Kodak's already pricey cameras were dedicated immobile cameras; below them were small-sensor consumer-oriented cameras that were painfully slow to operate and had problems with low-light environments. The Nikon D1 came to market well bellow the DCS 660's price point and in a durable professional body. While the DCS 660 still held a resolution advantage over the D1 in the lighting-controlled studio, most photographers looking to upgrade from film could not afford and the Nikon D1X released this year matches the DCS 660 in image quality. It's in this modern reality that the Kodak DCS 760 is seen not as an iteration in a road map but as its response to a major disruption in the market. Observers will judge Kodak's future in the market based on how its 700-series platform is able to compete.
At $8,000; Kodak's premium over Nikon has been significantly reduced. For professional photographers, the premium may be insignificant given Kodak's reputation for outstanding support. However, support is not meaningful if the camera does not sell well, and judging from the dearth of reviews of the DCS 760 compared to the Nikon D1X, Kodak is still in for a rough road. The good news for Kodak is that the reviews that have been published have held the DCS 760 in high regard, keeping Kodak at the pinnacle of image quality. The low maximum ISO sensitivity of ISO 400 and slow 1.6 fps keep the DCS 760 in the studio (we'll see how the DCS 720x compares when let into the wild). The DCS 760 continues to support a removable IR filter or optional IR/anti-aliasing filter as it has since the DCS 400 which helps protect against the dust that Nikon's cameras experience. A draw-back to the easy-to-access filter on the DCS 760 however is incompatible with some lenses which extend further back into the body. The camera includes a list of compatible cameras in the manual, which is also available online. At launch, the DCS 760 does not support recording JPEG images directly, but Kodak indicates this should be available in a later firmware.