Land of the rising sun to the rescue.

Expanding my range of Hasselblad lenses in order to incorporate the medium format gear into my prestige workflow is a near impossibility as they are so damned expensive. I’ve been on the lookout for used versions of the 21mm XCD lens for ages, and I might have found a solution - international Ebay.

The Japanese market is rammed with used versions of medium format stuff, and I found a 21mm lens priced at just under £1200 rather than the £3200 listed on various UK retail sites. The selling price is only one of the considerations however. Import duty of about £50 and vat of £246 would also be payable. Shipping is shown as free. As a VAT registered business I’d claim that back in my quarterly return, so it would come in at £1250 - well under half of the new, retail value in the UK.

I’ll get my January tax payments out of the way first, and consider it after doing a plan for 2026.I’m still paying off the expenditure of the camera itself, so don’t want to land myself with business debt that is uneccessary. If I can add medium format capture to my range of offerings it’ll give me the opportunity to ramp things up in the coming year.