Glass Bodies a variant-level encyclopedia of vintage lenses and cameras by iwillpat

Hasselblad 2000FC

Hasselblad · Hasselblad V mount · 56×56mm nominal on 120; 6×4.5 via the A16/A16S magazines, 220 via the A24, 70mm via the Magazine 70 · 1977

Also known as: Hasselblad 2000FC · Hasselblad 2000 FC · Hasselblad 2000-FC · Hasselblad 2000fc · 2000FC · 2000 FC

Variants & identification

Variant Mount Years Serial ranges Production
2000FC, chrome Hasselblad V 1977–1982 Two-letter year code + a third letter F in 1977 (Hasselblad Historical), then two letters + digits: RV… = 1981 on a body shown by the Photo of the Life blog
Numeric part reported as 500000–501368, then 1510000–1514838 (a collector's Facebook page, John Hasselblads — single source, not seen in any reference work consulted); Japanese Wikipedia's product list has the sequence starting at 500001 		No factory figure published. About 6,200 bodies for 1977–1981 is claimed by a collector's Facebook page (John Hasselblads) and appears nowhere else consulted
2000FC, black Hasselblad V 1980–1982 Same letter-coded sequence as chrome; no separate black block is published No split between finishes is published
  1. Variant years for the black body begin at its first documented appearance (the 1 January 1980 U.S. dealer list), not at a launch that no consulted source dates.
  2. The production figure of about 6,200 rests on a single collector's page and should be read as unconfirmed.
How to tell them apart (expand)
  • Shutter-speed ring on the body, around the bayonet, with a red C position and L lock — no 500-series body has one
  • Mirror-program disc (0 / 1 / 2) in the crank hub and a pre-release latch beside it
  • Titanium curtains that stay across the gate with the magazine off: on a 2000FC/M, FCW or 2003FCW they retract as the magazine comes away
  • Model plate reads 2000FC; the FC/M, FCW and 2003FCW are each labelled as such
  • Battery cassette for one 6 V PX-28 (4LR44); a body that winds and fires without a battery is not a 2000FC
  • F lenses have no shutter-speed ring and no Synchro-Compur lever, and the F designation is not engraved on them (instruction book p. 7)

2000FC, chrome:

  • Satin chrome trim, leatherette shell; '2000FC' on the plate beside the shutter-speed ring
  • Shutter-speed ring on the body around the lens bayonet — B, 1 s to 1/2000, a red C position that hands exposure to a C lens's leaf shutter, and an L lock (instruction book, fig. 1 and p. 16)
  • Mirror-program disc (0 / 1 / 2) recessed in the hub of the folding crank, turned with a coin; pre-release latch beside it
  • Battery cassette for a 6 V PX-28 in the body — no 500-series body has one
  • Bare titanium curtains visible through the rear opening whenever the magazine is off; they do not retract — the 2000FC/M's do (Hasselblad Historical; Wikipedia)

2000FC, black:

  • Black-anodised trim, black crank and hood; product number 10332 (body) or 10324 (kit) on the box
  • Otherwise identical to the chrome body — same non-retracting curtains and mirror-program disc

Serial-range notes

Two letters before the digits
Body and magazine serials carry the year in the first two letters via VHPICTURES (V=1 H=2 P=3 I=4 C=5 T=6 U=7 R=8 E=9 S=0): UU = 77, UR = 78, UE = 79, RS = 80, RV = 81, RH = 82 (Hasselblad Historical, Q.G. de Bakker).
Three letters, 1977 (…F)
In 1977 an F was appended to the code on 2000FC cameras as a product-type letter, as C was on the 500C/M; the year is still the first two letters (Hasselblad Historical).
Zeiss lens date codes
F lenses carry no shutter but the same red-ink Zeiss date stamp inside the rear mount as C lenses: pre-1980 digits YY(Y)MM with year = code + 1957; from 1980 two reversed year digits and a month letter (A = January).
Body and magazine dates rarely match
Kits were assembled from stock, so a 1978 body with a 1983 A12 is normal and not evidence of a swap.

Specifications

Format
56×56mm nominal on 120; 6×4.5 via the A16/A16S magazines, 220 via the A24, 70mm via the Magazine 70 · 12 on 120 (A12); 16 at 6×4.5 (A16); 24 on 220 (A24) exposures
Finder
waist-level, interchangeable (prism and meter-prism finders available)
Shutter
electronically timed focal-plane shutter with corrugated titanium-foil curtains — 13/1000 mm thick per the instruction book, 0.014 mm per Japanese Wikipedia; 6 V PX-28 battery, about 20,000 exposures per cell · B, 1 s–1/2000 on the body ring with F or C lenses; with the ring locked at C the curtains act only as a blind and a C lens's Synchro-Compur gives B, 1 s–1/500 · flash sync X at 1/90 s and slower through the body terminal (red x on the speed ring between 60 and 125; faster settings block the contact); all speeds to 1/500 through the leaf shutter of a C lens · no self-timer
Film advance
folding crank — one full turn advances the film, cocks the shutter and resets the mirror; the crank hub carries the mirror-program disc, which is also depressed to make intentional double exposures
Back
interchangeable magazines — A12, A16, A16S, A24, Magazine 70 and the Polaroid Magazine 100; the Polaroid Magazine 80 must not be fitted, because its projecting glass plate destroys the shutter curtains (instruction book pp. 10 and 23)
Meter
none in body; CdS meter prism finder, or the selenium exposure-meter knob
Motor drive
Not compatible — No winder coupling — that arrived with the 2000FCW in 1984 (Hasselblad Historical). The instruction book says new accessories would connect through the battery compartment; the ADCU for C lenses is listed for the 2000FC on the 1980 dealer list
Country
Sweden
Original price
US$2,085.00 body only, US$3,570.00 with 80mm Planar F f/2.8 and A12 (chrome); black body US$2,100.00, kit US$3,600.00 — Victor Hasselblad Inc. suggested retail, dealer list effective 1 January 1980. No launch-year price has been found (today $7,940)
Accessories
Meter prism finder (CdS, centre-weighted, 25–1600 ASA), prism finders NC-2, HC-3/70 and HC-4, magnifying hood, sports and frame viewfinders · Magazines A12, A16, A16S, A24, Magazine 70 and Polaroid Magazine 100 — not the Polaroid Magazine 80 · Extension tubes 16 and 32 (introduced for the 2000FC) and 55; the 10 and 21 do not clear the body's shutter-speed ring · Automatic Diaphragm Control Unit (ADCU) with the 80/100/150/250 C lenses · Quick-coupling tripod plate, pistol grip, platform gunstock, flash-gun bracket (all listed for the 2000FC on the 1980 dealer list) · Series 70 filters (Y, G, O) and bayonet-70 lens shades for the 110mm f/2 and 150mm f/2.8 F lenses

Screen changeable by the user, as on the 500C/M — catches slid to the side, screen dropped into a cupped hand (instruction book p. 20). The CdS meter prism finder (centre-weighted, 25–1600 ASA) and the 500-series prisms fit

Where sources disagree

Last
  • 1982 — Hasselblad Historical's model table, English and German Wikipedia; the 2000FC/M follows in 1982
  • 1981 — camera-wiki.org and Emulsive, which start the 2000FC/M in 1981
  • 1983 — Japanese Wikipedia's product list, as an alternative date for the FC/M (citing Classic Camera Senka No. 4)

Better supported: 1982

A one-year disagreement about the FC/M handover; none of the sources gives a month.

First
  • 1977 — Hasselblad Historical, Wikipedia (en, de), camera-wiki; March 1977 per Japanese Wikipedia citing Hasselblad no Subete
  • 1976 — Japanese Wikipedia's alternative, citing Classic Camera Senka No. 4

Better supported: 1977

1976 is most plausibly a showing (Photokina was held in September 1976), but no consulted source says so.

Type (curtain thickness)
  • 13/1000 mm — the 2000FC instruction book, p. 21
  • 0.014 mm — Japanese Wikipedia's product list

Better supported: 13/1000 mm

The factory figure is preferred; the difference may be rounding or a later curtain specification.

Production
  • About 6,200 for 1977–1981 — a collector's Facebook page (John Hasselblads), with serial blocks 500000–501368 and 1510000–1514838
  • No figure — Hasselblad Historical, Wikipedia, camera-wiki; Nordin's compendia were not consulted directly

The serial blocks are consistent with a 1984 2000FC/M numbered RI1519722 (VH Pictures), which is the only cross-check available.

What reviewers say

History

The 2000FC put a shutter back into a Hasselblad body for the first time since the 1000F went out of production in 1957. Hasselblad Historical’s model table gives the whole model in one line — “Shortest shutterspeed 1/2000 s” — and dates it 1977–1982; the German Wikipedia article says the same thing the other way round, that with the 2000 FC a Hasselblad with a focal-plane shutter came back on the market in 1977. The name is explained by the camera’s own instruction book: 2000 for the top speed, F for the focal-plane shutter, C for the Synchro-Compur leaf shutter in the lenses made for the 500C, 500C/M, 500EL and 500EL/M since 1957 — because the point of the design was to take both. An F lens has no shutter and exposes only through the body; a C lens can expose through either, the body’s speed ring locked at its red C position so that the curtains serve only as a blind and the leaf shutter keeps flash at every speed to 1/500. With F lenses the body syncs at 1/90 s and slower, marked by a red x on the ring between 60 and 125.

What Hasselblad was trying to do is stated most plainly by English Wikipedia: the 2000 series had been intended to carry full exposure automation, and the 2000FC was rushed out without it, partly because of a rethink about whether the automation should be electronic or electro-mechanical. Victor Hasselblad had sold the company to Säfveån AB in 1976; the 2000FC was the last new camera of his lifetime, and he died in 1978. Twenty years of shutter development still ended with corrugated metal foil for the curtains, now titanium in place of the 1600F’s stainless steel — 13/1000 mm thick according to the instruction book, 0.014 mm according to Japanese Wikipedia’s product list — timed electronically from a 6 V PX-28 that the book says is good for about 20,000 exposures. The mirror was new too. A coin-slotted disc in the crank hub selects program 2 (instant return, F lenses only), 1 (mirror stays up until the film is wound, as on every 500) or 0 (locked up, required for lenses whose barrel enters the body); with a C lens the finder always blacks out until the next wind, whichever program is set.

The lenses the body was built for are listed by Hasselblad Historical as six: Distagon 50mm f/2.8 FLE, Planar 80mm f/2.8, Planar 110mm f/2, Sonnar 150mm f/2.8, Tele-Tessar 250mm f/4 and Tele-Tessar 350mm f/4 IF, with Schneider’s Variogon 140–280mm also sold shutterless as an F. Not all were there at once: Victor Hasselblad Inc.’s dealer list effective 1 January 1980 carries only the 50, 80, 110, 150 and the Variogon under “F Lenses w/o Shutter for 2000FC”, the 110mm f/2 T* at a suggested $2,175.00 and the 80mm f/2.8 at $1,050.00. The same list prices the chrome body at $2,085.00 and the kit with 80mm Planar F and A12 at $3,570.00, more than double the 500C/M’s $990.00 and $2,460.00; a black body and kit are listed at $2,100.00 and $3,600.00. That list is also the earliest document consulted here to show a black 2000FC, which is why the black variant’s first year is given as 1980 rather than 1977 — nothing found says when it was introduced.

The 2000FC’s reputation rests on those curtains. The instruction book warns three times that the Polaroid Magazine 80’s projecting glass plate “will destroy the shutter curtains”, and that the curtains must be protected whenever no magazine is fitted. Wikipedia records that the foil proved as easy to damage with a finger as the 1600F’s had been, and that every later 2000-series body retracts the curtains as soon as the magazine comes off — the one change Hasselblad Historical credits to the 2000FC/M of 1982. Karen Nakamura’s account of the series says the FCW is the model Hasselblad would still repair, and the Photo of the Life blog scrapped a 1981 chrome 2000FC after a slow-speed shutter fault because the repair would cost more than the camera. Bodies that work are praised for exactly what the book promised — the quick-return finder, the 1/2000, and the 110mm f/2.

Dating a 2000FC follows the rest of the system. The first two letters of the serial encode the year through VHPICTURES (UU = 1977, RV = 1981), and Q.G. de Bakker records that in 1977 an F was appended to 2000FC codes as a product letter, as C was to the 500C/M’s. Japanese Wikipedia has the numbering start at 500001; a collector’s Facebook page, reached only through a search extract, gives blocks of 500000–501368 and 1510000–1514838 and “about 6200” cameras for 1977–1981 — a figure consistent with a 1984 FC/M numbered RI1519722 but corroborated nowhere else. The end date is 1982 in Hasselblad Historical and both Wikipedias, 1981 in camera-wiki and Emulsive, and Japanese Wikipedia’s 1976 alternative for the launch is best read as a showing. What remains open: who designed the shutter and the mirror mechanism; when the black body appeared; whether the production figure is Nordin’s; and whether the 1976 date refers to Photokina, which no consulted source says.

Expand Collapse

This history is AI-written, from the sources listed at the foot of the page. Where the record is silent it says so rather than filling the gap — but no human wrote these sentences.

Photographs

Hasselblad 2000FC
Hasselblad 2000FC/M with the Planar 80mm f/2.8 T* — Lutz Schramm from Potsdam, Germany, via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY 2.0)

More sample photos elsewhere

These photographers keep all rights to their work — enjoy it at the source.

Live listings

Asking price, USD: a median of $1,700 across 6 fixed-price listings on 2026-09-11 (middle half $40–$1,700). Tracked since 2026-09-06, 2 days: unchanged from $1,700.

By day
DateMedianMiddle halfListings
2026-09-11$1,700$40–$1,7006
2026-09-06$1,700$40–$1,7006

Asking prices from the listings scanned, not sales; junk-flagged rows and auction lots excluded; other currencies are not converted.

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Listings updated 2026-09-11. Links go to the shop or marketplace that carries the item.

Related: Hasselblad 1000F · Hasselblad 1600F · Hasselblad 2000FC/M · Hasselblad 2000FCW · Hasselblad 2003FCW · Hasselblad 500C/M

Lenses for this body: Distagon 40mm f/4 · Distagon 50mm f/2.8 · Distagon 50mm f/4 · Distagon 60mm f/3.5 · F-Distagon 30mm f/3.5 · Mirotar 1000mm f/5.6 · Planar 100mm f/3.5 · Planar 110mm f/2 · Planar 80mm f/2.8 · S-Planar 120mm f/5.6 · S-Planar / Makro-Planar 135mm f/5.6 (bellows) · Sonnar 150mm f/2.8 · Sonnar 150mm f/4 · Sonnar 250mm f/5.6 · Sonnar Superachromat 250mm f/5.6 · Tele-Tessar 250mm f/4 · Tele-Tessar 350mm f/4 IF · Tele-Tessar 350mm f/5.6 · Tele-Tessar 500mm f/8 · Variogon 140-280mm f/5.6

Sources (20)

Every page here is assembled from public sources, and the gaps are real ones. If you own this camera, know a serial number I'm missing, or can see where I have it wrong, tell me — corrections, serials and sample photos are all worth having.