The 51million-pixel Pentax 645Z has a CMOS sensor which measures 43.8×32.8mm (168% the size of a 35mm frame), so it can record a huge amount of detail. It’s also capable of showing a Live View image and recording Full HD video.
The Pentax 645Z replaces the 645D, and this new Pentax camera offers a number of other upgrades, such as a maximum sensitivity of ISO 204,800 and a tilting 3.2in, 1,037,00-dot LCD screen.
Our head of testing recently put this Pentax 645D replacement through its paces; find out what she thought in her Pentax 645Z review video.
Hi I’m Angela Nicholson, head of the photography testing team and today I’m going to take a look at the Pentax 645Z.
As you can see, the 645Z is a beast of a camera, that’s because it has a sensor that measures 43.8×32.8mm, that’s 1.68x the size of a 35mm frame. Pentax has used a Sony CMOS chip and there’s an effective pixel count of 51 million.
As you might imagine, this enables the camera to resolve and phenomenal amount of detail.
Pentax has coupled the sensor with its PRIME 3 image processing engine that’s also seen in the Pentax K-3 APS-C format SLR and the 645Z behaves rather like an overgrown K-series camera.
There’s a maximum continuous shooting rate of 3 frames per second for up to 10 raw images (or 30 highest quality JPEGs), which could be very useful when shooting fashion. There’s also a maximum sensitivity setting of ISO 204,800 – other medium format cameras only go up to ISO 6,400.
Even more unusually for a medium format camera, this 3.2-inch 1.04-million-dot tilting screen can display a Live View image, which is especially useful in a studio. The information display also rotates for easier viewing when shooting upright images – although the tilting mechanism is no help then.
Another unusual feature for this type of camera is that full-HD movies can be recorded and there are two SD/SDHC/SDXC card ports, one of which is compatible with Flu cards to allow wireless shutter release and image transfer and via a smartphone.
There’s also Pentax’s 27-point SAFOX 11 phase detection autofocus system and it’s pretty fast unless subjects are close or light levels are low. However, the points are clustered around the centre of the image frame so the focus and recompose technique is often required for off-centre subjects.
As with other Pentax SLRs, the 645Z’s metering system performs pretty well, but it tends to underexpose when faced with large bright areas, so you need to keep an eye on the histogram if you’re shooting landscapes and the like.
Thanks to seals around all its controls and joints, the 645Z is dust and weatherproof, so I don’t need to worry about the threatening skies today with this weatherproof 55mm lens mounted.
As you can see, there are plenty of direct controls scattered across the camera body and it’s great to see a switch to active mirror lock-up mode.
Also, as the user interface is similar to that of Pentax K-series cameras, even those who have never used a medium format camera before will soon feel comfortable using it. It has to be said, however, that the menu looks very dated.
Though it’s big and fairly heavy, the chunky, comfortable grips mean you don’t have to restrict yourself to shooting with the camera on a tripod.
However, it can be a bit of a stretch to reach some of the controls, adjusting the white balance for example could be tricky for anyone with small hands. It would also be nice if a few more of the buttons could be customised to access the photographer’s preferred options, but it doesn’t usually take long to find the features that you want.
As I mentioned earlier, the 645Z is capable of resolving a huge amount of detail. Its images also generally have natural colours and exposures are good though you need to keep an eye out for underexposure. Thanks in part to the large pixels, noise is controlled very well, but I’d avoid using the very highest setting because of slight desaturation and a granular texture.
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