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Phase One Breaks the 100MP Barrier With Their New XF Phase One Camera System

Posted on: 01-3-2016 Posted in: Photography

Phase One has done it and broken the 100mb mark with their new XF camera system.

Today, Phase One upped the ante by announcing their latest XF system. The Phase One XF 100 MP system provides medium format quality with 100 megapixel images (the photography Jedi just felt a great disturbance in the force as if millions of retouchers cried out in terror). The XF 100 is powered by a CMOS sensor instead of the traditional CCD sensor. What’s the difference? The technology for the CCD sensors has been around longer and the conversion from light to pixels is done in the chip. These take a special manufacturing process that makes them more expensive to produce than the CMOS sensor which is produced like a traditional microchip.

The advantage of the CCD sensors, at least in the past, was they were able to reproduce the light information without distortion (think: high quality without noise) where the CMOS sensors struggled with this ability. The CMOS technology is newer but is now all but caught up with the CCD sensors. The CMOS chips have the advantage of being less reliant on power so batteries last longer as well. Judging by the photos taken by the Phase One XF 100 MP, the CMOS chips have caught up with the CCD quality with the added benefits of no lens crop factors or focus screen masks.

With this new release, the XF 100 is the first CMOS sensor to provide 16-bit color processing right out of the chip. In situations where 16-bit color isn’t necessary, 14-bit color is available via a simple setting in the camera. Phase One’s Capture One PRO will be able to handle the 16-bit color seamlessly (you can download a demo of Capture One PRO here). In addition, the XF 100 offers 15 stops of dynamic range. Clean ISOs range from 50 to 12800 and exposures up to 60 minutes are available.

100MP Full Frame Medium Format CMOS Perfection

“We’ve always strived to offer our customers the ultimate photographic flexibility. We were the first to offer Full Frame Medium Format CCD systems and now we’re proud to be the first to offer a Full Frame Medium Format CMOS solution. The Phase One XF 100MP Camera System offers the same great advantages of full frame usability with the added benefits of CMOS. No lens crop factors, no focus screen masks, just uncompromised image quality from edge to edge.”

“The XF 100MP captures the intricate detail of my creations with such astonishing precision, it surpasses every expectation I ever dreamt possible.” – Alexia Sinclair

Click the images below to experience the depth of 100MP

Medium format cameras are well-known tools for capturing stunning landscape images as well. Here are some samples from Peter Eastway and Tim Kemple that showcase the power of the Phase One XF 100. Keep in mind that these are JPGs for the web so it doesn’t take a long time to load the page. If you’re not yet convinced and you’d like to see high resolution TIFFs, Phase One provides them here.

The live view screen has been improved as well. At 30 fps, the screen image is extremely smooth. Checking focus is as easy as double-tapping on the screen. In addition, capturing images can be done tethered via WiFi, USB, and now HDMI.