FUJIFILM GFX 50S - The Medium Format Market Gets Interesting

Photokina News

It’s Day 1 of Photokina 2016, and Fuji has already staked its claim on being the biggest newsmaker of the show by delivering a full medium format mirrorless camera system.   Fuji is not new to medium format.  The company made some of the best and most unique medium format film cameras, ranging from the zoom-integral 645ZA to the “Texas Leica” 6x9 series of rangefinders.  Now, two decades later, the innovative manufacturer has returned to the rare-air of the medium format market with the “GFX” series.
At first glance, the big news here is the scale of Fuji’s commitment to the platform.  This is no single-camera flash in the pan.  The GFX was announced with !SIX! (count’em, six) lenses, an interchangeable finder, and a reference to the GFX 50s being the “first” camera in line.

Unsurprisingly, the camera is based on the ubiquitous 44x33mm 50MP chip (presumably same superb Sony sensor featured in the Hasselblad, Phase and Pentax MF cameras).  More interestingly, however, t...