Hasselblad Looks Back... To The Future

A commemorative release packages modern digital technology in a legacy-inspired design.

IF YOU’VE EVER shot with an old Hasselblad, you can no doubt recall its inscrutable alchemy of heft, solidity and precision. The new 907X Anniversary Edition Kit, priced at €15,500, commemorates 80 years of that sensation, back to Hasselblad’s first camera, and a story that includes such heady moments in photographic history as capturing the first moon landing, the visuals of which were immortalised by two of the brand’s mediumformat film cameras.

The 907X keeps a nominal foot in the past with its boxy form and leaf shutter, but its smaller proportion defies the bulk of its forbears, hiding a massive 50-megapixel CMOS sensor within its all-metal body. The resulting 8,272-pixel x 6,200-pixel files offer surgically sharp images enhanced with Hasselblad’s proprietary HNCS colour-management technology; by controlling the dynamic range and conversion of optical images to the digital format, Hasselblad’s software is able to suffuse the picture with an analogue look. The results have an inherently natural feel, evocative and filmic.

Thanks to its leisurely autofocus speeds, though, the 907X is likely to be preferred by portraitists over action shooters – think Ansel Adams more than Walter Iooss. And yet the brand’s Phocus app for iPhone or iPad allows full camera control via Wi-Fi or a tethered USB cable, enabling remotecapture capabilities that would have seemed otherworldly to the Apollo astronauts.

Despite its latent technology, the 907X embraces a more traditional approach to digital photography, one that prioritises technique over expediency. The best part? Its CFV II 50C digital back can be paired with practically all Hasselblad V System bodies – around since 1957 – and the full range of XCD lenses, offering a retro twist for the digital age.