One of the bullets promoting v8.5 was the inclusion of HDR capability. I've been playing with HDR workflows, since I think HDR is the next development area for video capture and editing. Premiere Pro/LUmetri already has the beginnings of a workflow and processing capability in CC2016, that works quite well with Open EXR or JPEG2000/MXF files. It's in development.
How does one bring HDR files into MC? Is it via DNxHR444? Even if DNxHR444 has HDR capability, the scopes in MC 8.5.1 are woefully inadequate to show anything over 100 nits.
I know no one can speculate in these forums. I just hope Avid is keeping up with the direction; and, that these initial claims od HDR capability are laying the groundwork for the future.....OpenEXR plugins? I should note that selecting a REC2020 color space within MC 8.5 is rather useless unless one has an HDR monitor.