If you thought Hasselblad only designed medium-format cameras for professionals, you are mistaken. At a standing room only press conference at photokina in Germany today, the company announced it had formed a partnership with Sony and would begin producing an “ultimate luxury” mirrorless, interchangeable lens camera called Lunar.

The Italian-designed camera will ship in the first quarter of 2013 and sell for 5000 Euros, or approximately US $6527. (An image of the Hasselblad Lunar taken at the press conference is shown at the right.)

But Hasselblad doesn’t intend to stop with just a mirrorless, interchangeable lens camera. More cameras in other segments will follow.

In addition to the Lunar model, Hasselblad will launch a full frame digital SLR in the next year and a digital compact camera, a line of tripods and luxury accessories in the years that follow, said Larry Hansen, Hasselblad’s Chairman and CEO.

“As I said before, for Hasselblad this is ‘the new dawn,’” Hansen said. “The plan is to move very quickly. Our plan is to show cameras and launch cameras in every sector of the market.”

Read more of this story and see more photos of the new Hasselblad Lunar here.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, September 18th, 2012 at 10:17 am ET by Dan Havlik and is filed under photokina, Products.