Like many photographers I have looked at medium format cameras as a possible next step up in that search for, well just more. More resolution without making the pixel size smaller, more color depth, more dynamic range possible…mostly just more. This also has meant in the past more weight, more money but less choice.
The more money aspect is still true but to a much lesser degree than in the past. The GFX100 II is coming in at around 7500 USD with lenses mostly in the 2000 USD range making it likely only about 30-40% more expensive for a camera and 3 lens kit than what I would currently carry. That is not bad compared to when most medium format cameras were starting anywhere from 15 to 50 thousand a few years ago. If you are purely a landscape photographer you can get into this system now for less than 10000 quite easily.
The more weight has been mitigated in many of the latest medium format cameras themselves but the lenses of course have to deal with the physics of optical elements and that is difficult to make smaller and lighter but still cover a bigger image circle. For many landscape photographers that is not a big issue as wide angle up to short telephoto lenses are available and are only slightly larger than their 35mm counterparts. That is not an issue for me as it seems Fuji have a pretty good assortment of lenses that will cover what I would shoot for landscape. The bigger question for me is could I start to use a system like this for some of my nature photography. I’m not expecting it to replace what I use for bird photography but for many of the animals I shoot I can get away with 200-300mm equivalent focal lengths and now that Fuji can focus relatively quickly and shoot a few frames per second we seem to be on par with camera systems I shot with a few years ago like my Canon 5DS. That is a system I managed to use for wildlife photography for a good number of years and even though the newer mirrorless systems have made that feel like ancient technology I was still able to get what I considered great shots.
It would be interesting to see if I could do as well or better now with something like the GFX 100 II. There are a number of situations that I think would work well, shooting black bear during the salmon run, or elk and Big horned sheep during the fall rutt. These are scenes in which I often want to capture nature in action with more of the environment they are in. These shots would be for larger prints in which the animals are often a much smaller portion of the scene but I want to have a great amount of detail still in both the subject and the surroundings. The challenge of course with this is still related to the physics of optics as the larger format also tends to mean a shallower depth of field which can be nice for separation but not so much when you want the whole scene in focus (or at least multiple animals interacting).
So camera wise it would seem that we are in a good position. The new 100 II has image stabilization, reasonably quick continuous autofocus, it can shoot up to 8 frames per second. These are all things that are on par or better than my old Canon 5DS and then we have 100 megapixels and 16 bit color depth. The next question is about the lenses.
So this is what I can see is currently available or coming for GFX line.
20-35 f/4
23 f/4
30 f/3.5
30 f/5.6 TS
32-64 f/4
35-70 f/4.5-5.6
45-100 f/4 OIS
45 f/2.8
50 f/3.5
55 f/1.7
63 f/2.8
80 f/1.7
100-200 f/5.6 OIS
110 f/2
110 f/5.6 TS
120 f/4 OIS Macro
250 f/4 OIS
500 f/5.6 (coming next year???)
So this gives us a pretty good range of lenses from 35mm equivalent 16mm out to currently about 200mm and possibly 400mm by next year. For landscape I would be very happy with a 20-35, 100-200 and one of the 32-64/35-70/45-100 to give me close to what I usually carry around now. For nature photography the 100-200, 250 and future 500 sounds like a great setup (along with the teleconverter) to allow for most scenarios for shooting black bears, Bighorn sheep, elk and deer. Not enough for birds or for sea life around Vancouver Island that it is difficult or not appropriate to get that close. Without the 500mm a setup like this would come in at between 17 and 19000 USD. Not a small amount of money but I have certainly spent more than that on my current systems.
So, now that we know that we have a camera and at least one lens combination that could work for limited animal/bird photography (and a fantastic system for landscape) does this make sense for someone like me? Currently I would say that about a quarter of the time I spend outdoors is doing landscape photography and 3/4 is nature. Of that time I would say that still most of it I need a long telephoto lens at a minimum of 400mm and usually longer. I would guess that about 25 % of the time that I would be able to use shorter telephoto lenses so that the current options for medium format would work.
So then it comes down to what is important to me since if I had money to buy all the gear I want I would certainly have this as one of my setups. Sadly, I’m not (as Daffy Duck would say) rich, rich, I’m independently wealthy. So choices will continue to need to be made. I would like to take this from a thought experiment and try out the Fujifilm at least to see if the results come close to my expectations. That being said, I also wish to be able to afford something like the Sony A1 so that I could shoot very high frame rates silently for what is likely a much higher percentage of the subjects I like to shoot. With those two cameras being in the same price range purchasing one of them may be within possibility in the next couple of years but both is very unlikely so I’m going to need to see what my priorities are….or continue to wait and see how technology like this might come down to that second tier in the camera world.
We shall see what the future brings as currently I have been keeping both Sony and Canon camera systems around with much the same lens lineup. This doesn’t make sense long term if I was going to have two separate systems it would make sense that they overlap somewhat but there should be a good reason to use one over the other. Currently the only reason is that I have a big white lens on the Canon side that I am unwilling to replace as the cost of those have gone up significantly in the last few years. So until that changes I won’t likely sell off what I have in the way of Canon gear.
It’s good to have so many interesting choices out there now and things are continuing to get better so I’ll see if I can try out some of these options and wait for the right opportunity.