The original Mamiya RZ67 medium-format was introduced back in 1982 and has since gone through a series of upgrades each designed in response to user needs and evolving imaging technologies. The 4th and latest generation upgrade is the Mamiya RZ33, which is the first fully integrated RZ-based, cable-free digital imaging system.
The heart of the new camera is a 33-megapixel, 48 x 36mm, 16 bits/channel CCD, which is mounted on a revolving back, which enables you to switch from portrait to landscape mode without having to reposition the camera. If you currently own an RZ system, you’ll be pleased to know the RZ33 makes full use of all existing RZ lenses, prism finders, waist-level finders, and other RZ imaging accessories.
Because the RZ33’s imaging sensor is smaller than the camera’s native 6x7 design you have to consider a 1.48x magnification factor when choosing lenses. As an example Mamiya’s 50mm/4.5 ULD wide-angle lens has an effective field-of-view of a less-wide 74mm lens, a 150mm portrait lens has the effective field-of-view of a 222mm lens, etc.)
The RZ33 records 16bits/channel RAW files that open up to 190MB, 16 bit TIFF files that display little if any artifacting and/or moiré patterns. This capablilty makes it an attractive tool for shooting beauty and fashion, jewelry, textiles, or any other subject matter that requires sharp, clean detailing. IOS levels can be set from a native 50 through 800, and frames can be captured at a rate of 1.1 frames per second.
Images are captured onto CF cards (the faster, the better), and the resulting images can be viewed and edited using the camera’s 2.4 x 2.7 inch (6 x 7cm) LCD touch screen, which is also used for selecting camera and menu settings. For processing your image files, the RZ33 comes with both Capture One DB and Leaf Capture, which are two of the finest image processing programs available today.
As with earlier generation RZ optics, you have a full range of shutter speeds from 8 to 1/400-second (and ‘T’ for time exposures up to 32 seconds) with full flash sync at all speeds, which makes the camera equally ideal for studio and location shooting alike. Another RZ feature pro shooters take advantage of is the close focusing abilities of the RZ-system with all RZ optics. And yes, the RZ33 also accepts Mamiya RZ 120/220 film backs for those who still swing both ways.