Phase One announces "go anywhere" XC digital medium format camera

Phase One has just announced the XC, a new, highly compact, travel friendly, medium format stills camera with an eye-watering price.

Unlike medium format cameras of the past, the XC has been designed to be highly portable and easy to transport around. The camera has been designed around the Phase One IQ4 150MP image sensor range with respectably large dimensions of 53.4mm x 40mm, 16-bit colour depth, and over 15-stops of dynamic range. Both the colour and achromatic (B&W to you and me) versions of the sensor feature a resolution of 14204 x 10652 active pixels with a micron pixel size of 3.76 x 3.76. The colour sensor features an ISO range of 50 - 25600, while the achromatic version goes from ISO 200 - 102400.

Fixed lens

The XC, unlike its stablemates, the XF and XT, features a fixed Rodenstock HR Digaron-S 23mm f/5.6 lens. Now, this might seem like a limitation at first, giving what is an extremely wide angle of view. However, it does depend on how the images will be used. The sensors output 151MP images, and so there's plenty of scope for cropping in without any iota of quality or perceptive resolution loss, final use depending.

What we can say is that the example images given on Phase One's site look impressive. Even viewing on a laptop screen, it's clear that you're not looking at images that were produced with even a full-frame mirrorless camera. There's a certain quality that transcends mere screen resolution.

The price? Oh, let's not let ourselves be concerned with such trivial things <cough> $62,490. However, it is available now if that's the sort of funding you currently have rattling around in your bank account.