Only several weeks after X-T2 announcement, Fujifilm unveiled the mirrorless medium format camera, Fujifilm GFX, at Photokina 2016 in Cologne, Germany, yesterday (9/19).

 

Senior Vice President Fujifilm Corporation, Toru Takahashi, officialy announced Fujifilm GFX in front of hundreds of worldwide press, photographers and invitees. Quoting “The world just does not fit conveniently into the format of a full frame camera,” Takahashi seemed to answer many questions of Fujifilm consistency on APS-C mirrorless, instead of full frame.

 

Tag-lined “Joy of Photography,” the new Fujifilm’s format is planned to be released early 2017. It is going head-to-head with Hasselblad's mirrorless medium format camera which was previously announced.

 

General Manager Sales and Marketing Fujifilm Toshihisa IIda explained more details of this 51.4-MP camera. Sized as big as 43.8 x 32.9 mm, the medium format CMOS sensor is 1.7x bigger than 35mm full frame sensor. It brings 8256 x 6192 effective pixel, which every single pixel is built as a micro-lens on top of a base of optimized silicon-process.

 

Mirrorless-consistent

 

Iida also explained Fujifilm consistency on mirrorless in medium format camera production. “Mirrorless makes sure we keep the size of camera and lenses small,” Iida said and added, “It also gets the picture rid of shake, which is normally happens in camera with mirror.”

 

Iida claimed that larger pixel in GFX’s sensor boosted up 50% response comparing with the response of 35mm full frame sensor in similar resolution. Fujifilm GFX is also known to give more options of picture size ratio: 4:3, 3:2, 16:9, 65:24, 5:4, and 1:1 square format.

 

 

GF Lenses

 

History proves that Fujifilm is also best of glass manufacturing for lenses. Packaged as GF lenses, a series of G-mount lenses, these are the lenses in the line up: prime standard lens GF 63mm F2.8WR, zoom standard GF 32-64mm F4 R LM WR, and prime macro GF 120mm F4 Macro.

 

Also lined up as GF lenses are: wide GF 45mm F2.8R WR, ultra-wide GF 23mm F4 R LM WR, and fast aperture mid-telephoto GF 110mm F2 R LM WR. The focal length and maximum aperture combinations meet the needs of professional photographers.

 

Iida also announced Fujifilm GFX’s newly designed focal plane shutter bringing shutter speed as high as 1/4000 second.

 

Viewfinder Features

 

Last but not least, Iida demonstrated the finders options of Fujifilm GFX. Basically it is equipped with same swivel LCD type as in X-T2. By using this feature, photographers easily shoot in waist-level.

 

There is an additional External EVF, which looks like a prism-finder-shape of SLR in film era. This additional feature makes photographer shoot comfortably in eye-level.

 

Both vertical and horizontal shooting style are accommodated in ergonimic design by Fujifilm engineers with a vertical battery grip.

 

To meet the professional photographers’ need, Fujifilm equips GFX with tether shooting capability. It is said that the tether shooting feature will be compatible with various RAW conversion application software.

 

 

More coverage on GFX and Fujifilm will be reported later today on the first day of Photokina 2016.