Here at work we use a Nikon D3. It is several years old but we bought it new.
We shoot everything in RAW + Jpg mode. ISO 1000 and 1/4000th shutter speed. It is always oblique angle aerial photography.
The point to that is the full size sensor is amazing. Virtually zero noise or no noise. On occasion we have evening or night shoots of a football stadium. We crank the ISO up to 6,400 and the noise is very minimal to none. We make great 20x24 prints from those.
This is a small proof of one of the images done with very little image processing. The final version looks even better than this.
Full size sensors are the way to go.