Phase One IQ180: 80 megapixels of lavish color - by aby benedict

Phase One's IQ180 sensor mounted to the 645DF camera body and Schneider-Kreuznach's 120mm tilt-shift lens.

When describing Phase One's IQ180-based camera system, there are plenty of superlatives you could pick.

High resolution is one choice: the sensor captures 80-megapixel photos measuring 10,328 by 7,760 pixels.

Expensive is another obvious candidate: the IQ180 image sensor costs $43,990. Adding in the 645DF camera body and Schneider-Kreuznach's 80mm LS lens bumps the price to $47,990.

But the one that intrigued me the most was outstanding color.

Over two weeks shooting with the IQ180 and 645DF medium-format camera body, I was consistently impressed with the depth and subtlety of its images' color. As often as not it was the color, not the high resolution, that made me want to dive into the photos (having a high-gamut display helps a lot) and print posters. Skin tones look more alive and natural, and I found myself shooting to capture color much more than I usually do.

Photography pros
It probably goes without saying, but the IQ180 is for professionals. Medium-format cameras' image sensors are considerably larger even than top-end cameras of the 35mm lineage, whose "full-frame" sensors measure 24x36mm. Phase One's IQ180 is 53.7x40.4mm.

A close-up of a flower shot with the Phase One IQ180 digital back and 645DF camera body with the Phase One/Mamiya 120mm Macro f/4.0D lens. 1/250 sec at F7.1, ISO 200

Eighty megapixels is more than even most professional photographers need today. Indeed, too many pixels can cause problems: squeezing in so many makes for physically small pixel sizes and correspondingly high noise that degrades the image. But the IQ180's spacious chip permits pixels to be relatively large, which satisfies professionals' needs for high resolution without introducing too much in noise.

Which professionals? Chiefly those who work in a studio for big-budget shoots. The IQ180 is the sort of camera that's used for big, finely detailed ads of fashion models, luxury hotels, fancycars, Swiss watches, and diamond jewelry. These are premium shoots for premium clients, where it's more likely investments in expensive gear can be justified.

The high resolution is good for posters, top-quality reproductions, editing flexibility, and more. It's darned impressive, too. I've included a couple of images in this story that you can zoom into, but this iris photo below shows the uncropped frame above and, below, a 100-percent zoom of the area marked with a green rectangle.

A close-up of an iris at Claude Monet's garden in Giverny, France. The area in the green rectangle is shown at 100 percent zoom below. This was shot with Phase One's IQ180 and 120mm macro lens at 1/125 sec. at f/10 and ISO 200, with no extra noise reduction applied.And if you zoom into this portrait I posted on Microsoft's Zoom.it service (it's also in this story, a few paragraphs down), you can see reflected in the boy's eye the following: me, holding the camera and silhouetted against the window; the railing, sky, and trees outdoors; and colored paper and two plates on the table. Also worth a deep dive is this photo of the side of Claude Monet's house.

Still, a tough competitive challenge faces Phase One and its Japanese subsidiary, Mamiya, which builds medium-format lenses and camera bodies. Even as several medium-format rivals faded away in recent years, Nikon and Canon full-frame SLRs are much cheaper and steadily improving in resolution, too. Those manufacturers have a wide selection of high-quality lenses and accessories such as wireless flash controllers. Plenty of professionals cut their teeth on SLRs and stay there. And their sensors are tied to the consumer market, benefiting from rapid technology advances and manufacturing efficiencies.

So Phase One must stay a step ahead with its premium products. Here, the IQ180 is more compelling than its predecessor, the Phase One P65+ digital back I tried last year.

Usability improvements
One very big improvement is usability. The IQ180 has a touch screen that's vastly easier to use than the four-button interface of the the P65+. Quick taps on the screen let you zoom in all the way to 100 percent so you can check focus. Other taps let you more easily delete photos, give them star ratings, and change camera settings.

The screen is responsive, unlike some touch screens I've used, and when you're looking at zoomed-in images, you can flick to pan around more easily. That's a huge improvement over the unintuitive controls of the P65+.

The screen itself is much nicer to look at, too--brighter, more detailed, with colors that aren't so washed-out. The IQ180 has live view, great for close-up macro focusing while the camera is on a tripod; otherwise you can stick with the nice viewfinder.

Other refinements over the predecessor was faster autofocus (though it only works with the center point of the lens) and vastly improved automatic white balance.

Overall, the IQ180 was more alive than the P65+, farther removed from the inert film packs that digital backs replace. That made it much more useful as a tool to get the right shot when you're taking the photos.