Tuesday 30 August 2016

Entry level mirrorless medium format camera

Early summer, i put down my mirrorless medium format wishlist. Reading about the rumoured lenses on fujirumors made me realize a MMF done right could have so much potential. Here is how Fujifilm could make an affordable entry level that would still be attractive in low end medium format price ranges. (Edited the text after fixing some seriously flawed arithmetics)


The only certain known about the hopefully upcoming fuji MMF is the sensor. It will be the Sony 44x33 or not at all in the close future, whether modified to xtrans or not. This gives us a 4x3 aspect ratio which is quite close to optimal for fitting a lot of sensor area in an image circle so the lenses will not have to be too big. Its also gives the images the same proportions as the classic 6x45 film format, making it very suitable for waist level shooting.


Even an entry level MMF camera wouldn't come cheap so it would have to come with something very appealing, much like the x100 attracted a lot of attention and buyers without being the best performer at its going price. It would also have to strip away a lot of the extra stuff we would expect from an expensive Fujifilm camera.

One obvious thing we can expect to lose on an entry level camera is both the EVF and optical viewfinders. Other things that may have to go are big buffers, extra jacks for headphones and mics, dual sd-slots, weather sealing and so on. So would anyone buy a £2000-3000 x-m1 with those things missing?

I wouldn’t and i guess you wouldn't either. But what if i offered you this, but with the sony 44x33 instead of 127 (40x40mm) film?

A rather small (and thus cheap) screen as a wlf with a foldable cover and there you are, a small and retro MMF camera in TLR style but with only one lens, interchangeable or not. Maybe the screen could even flip back so that we can use it like a regular non-evf mirrorless camera when we want to look stupid instead of super trendy.

1 comment:

  1. interesting thought, i have used a fuji 6x9 cm camera, and got great pics, large blow up capability on poster size black and white photos, keep us informed. Cheers from Ralph Thomas in Vancouver Canada

    ReplyDelete