The Fujifilm GFX 50S mirrorless medium format camera has an official release date: 23 February 2017. And with a body-only price of £6,199 it's highly affordable for a medium format camera.

The GFX 50S features a huge 43.8 x 32.9mm medium format sensor - which is around 1.7x larger than a full-frame DSLR camera sensor - complete with a whopping 51.4-megapixel resolution.

Unlike many existing medium format cameras, this will offer extensive sensitivity from ISO 100 - 12,800. It doesn't follow suit with Fujifilm's X-Trans CMOS range of system cameras, however.

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Fujifilm

To cater for a sensor of this size, Fuji has also introduced a new range of lenses: GF optics, connected via the all-new G-mount. At launch there will be the GF 63mm f/2.8 (price: £1,399), GF 32-64mm f/4.0 (price: £2,199), and GF 120mm f/4.0 optically-stabilised Macro (price: £2,599). Just like the camera body each of these lenses is weather-resistant.

Other specification details reveal a 3.2-inch 2.69m-dot LCD touchscreen that's built onto a variable bracket for positioning at various angles. There's a 3.69m-dot electronic viewfinder included in the box too - although you'll need to pay £579 extra to get the vari-angle adaptor to manipulate its position.

As there's a 1.28-inch top display screen not all the settings need to display on the rear, which is great to get a good eye on what's going on in your composition.

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Fujifilm

Another revelation is just how small and lightweight the 50S is: a mere 825g with the battery included. Add the viewfinder and it's 920g - which, at sub-1kg, is lighter than many pro-spec DSLR cameras. Its small size is mirrored by its media of choice too: there are dual SD card slots (speeds up to UHS-II are supported).

The GFX 50S uses a focal plane shutter, so there's none of the fancy high-speed flash sync work that you can achieve with leaf shutter lenses. Its maximum 1/4000th sec (or 1/16,000th sec via electronic shutter) does ensure the 50S can be used for higher-speed shooting situations, however.

In terms of autofocus the 50S uses a 117-point contrast-detection AF system. We're surprised there's no phase-detection system at play here (at a sensor level), but as this is a mirrorless camera we can understand why thats the case. Adjusting the focus point can be actioned using the focus lever on the back of the camera - which is styled as you'll find in the X-Pro2 and also-announced X100F cameras - or via the touchscreen.

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Fujifilm

All sounds very pro to us. We look forward to using this mirrorless medium format. That it costs significantly less than Fuji's confident Photokina 2016 claim of "sub-$10,000" is a great thing indeed.