Anyone who follows the automotive industry will know there has been something of a horsepower arms race going on between the manufacturers of a new breed of 'hyper hatchbacks'.
The Audi RS3, for example, packs nearly 400bhp, which is utterly bonkers, but it won't be long before Mercedes-Benz goes one step further just to prove a point.
Hasselblad is essentially the hyper hatchback of the camera world, shoe-horning a ridiculous amount of megapixels into a medium-format camera that isn't much larger than the DSLR you and I are used to taking on our travels.
But the difference here is that Hasselblad really has no major competition, yet it has decided to outdo itself with the latest H6D-400c MS body, which boasts an effective resolution of 400MP via its innovative six-shot image capture technology.
High-precision movement
According to its maker, the Multi-Shot capture setting requires the sensor and its mount to be moved at a high-precision of one or half a pixel at a time via a piezo unit.
When in this mode, a total of six images are captured, with the first four seeing the sensor move one pixel at a time to achieve real color data.
This cycle then returns the sensor to its starting point. A further two exposures are made, moving the sensor by half a pixel horizontally and then half a pixel vertically.
Confused much? Fret not, because all you need to know is that the H6D-400c then merges the six captures to create a single 400MP image, delivered to your PC or Mac (which must be tethered during shooting) as a 2.4GB 16-bit TIFF.
Professional photographers looking for this unrivaled image quality will have to stump up $47,995 / £36,250 (about AU$60,000) – excluding taxes – for the H6D-400c, which is due to start shipping in March.
