The Phocus for Mac Record: 2026 Bug and Fix Timeline

If you bought a Hasselblad camera between March 30 and June 3 of 2026 and downloaded Phocus for Mac, the software you got did not show you accurate color and could not export your images at full resolution. That version, 4.1.2, stayed the current download for 65 days.

I have covered each of these problems in its own post as it happened. What has been missing is one dated record of the whole period: what broke, when it was reported, what Hasselblad said, and when fixes shipped, or didn't. Readers keep writing to ask which version is safe and what to trust. This is the reference page for those questions, and it gets updated as the record moves.

A note on support: This page represents my personal exploration and testing, not official technical support or guidance from Hasselblad. If you need assistance with your Hasselblad equipment, please contact Hasselblad directly: customersupport@hasselblad.com for global support, support.us@hasselblad.com for the Americas, or visit hasselblad.com/support for regional options.

Key finding: Phocus 4.1.2 shipped March 30, 2026 with broken color and capped exports and stayed the current download for 65 days. Phocus 4.2 (June 3) fixed both but alters 3FR RAW files on import, closed as won't-fix July 14. In August, pixel measurement showed the Import dialog's preset has never been applied in any tested version, so default imports and exports do not carry HNCS.

The timeline, dated

Every entry below links to the full write-up or names the Hasselblad support case, so you can check the record yourself.

March 30. Phocus 4.1.2 ships. The release notes list HDR export, tethering, and card fixes. My release notes post covered it the same week.

April 9. Owners on Reddit notice that default color rendering looks flat and wrong. I confirm it the same morning: the default preview no longer applies the correct HNCS gamut. Every image opens looking desaturated until you manually intervene. I report it to Hasselblad that day (Case #9991365) and publish the regression report.

April 13. I publish a binary diff investigation comparing 4.1.1 and 4.1.2 to pin down what changed inside the application.

April 15. Hasselblad support confirms in writing that an engineer has reproduced the color defect. A fix is promised for a future release, with no date.

May 20. A reader report leads me to a second defect: JPEG, TIFF, and HEIF exports are silently capped below full resolution regardless of your export settings. A 100 megapixel file exports at roughly 37 megapixels. I report it (Case #10109745) and publish the export bug write-up.

May 22. Hasselblad confirms the export cap as a known issue, with a fix planned for the next update.

June 3. Phocus 4.2 ships and fixes both defects. I verified both fixes hands-on the next day. From first report to fix: 55 days for the color defect. For the entire 65 days in between, 4.1.2 remained the only version offered on Hasselblad's download page, with no public notice about either problem.

June 27. A reader cannot open his Phocus-imported 3FR files in DxO PureRaw. Working with him, I compare his imported files against the card originals byte by byte. They don't match. Phocus 4.2 rewrites the camera Model tag on import and adds a private metadata tag; Phocus 4.1.1 left the file untouched, an exact copy. The Phocus manual says otherwise: "3F files remain unaffected" and "the original file always remains." The 4.2 release notes say nothing about the change. DxO PureRaw 5 and 6.3.1 refuse to open the altered files. Reported as Case #10227174. The full write-up, published July 11, has the byte-level comparison and the workarounds.

June 30 to July 10. Hasselblad engineering first calls the rewrite intentional, for Adobe compatibility. When I show that Adobe opens unmodified 3FR files without issues (which Hasselblad then confirmed in writing), the explanation changes: the rewrite is to align the 3FR with the FFF format. On July 10 it changes again: import "creates a new file, not a modification of the original file." Three explanations in ten days. My questions from July 8 went unanswered twice, so on July 10 I asked a third time, now for a rollback of the import change (the durable fix belongs in camera firmware, not in import) and, if it stays, for the change to be documented in the release notes and the manual.

July 9. I send Hasselblad advance notice of this timeline, with an invitation to comment. The outcome of that invitation is recorded at the end of this post.

July 14. Hasselblad closes the discussion: "This is the final response from our engineers." The closing reply restates that import is not a direct copy of the card file, says the Model rewrite exists to align 3FR imports with the FFF path, and suggests copying files off the card manually if you want them untouched. Neither question from July 8 gets an answer: no firmware-side fix, no release-notes or manual correction. The rewrite stands in Phocus 4.2, now formally a won't-fix.

July 15. Phocus 4.2.1 ships with eleven words of release notes. What those words do not say turns out to matter twice below.

August 1. I discover that 4.2.1 silently fixed the color label bug (Case #9686749), 231 days after I reported it. No release note, no notice to the reporter. The write-up has the verification. A welcome fix; an unannounced one.

August 7. A reader report sends me back to the Import dialog's Adjustment preset (Case #9940198), which Hasselblad had declared fixed in 4.2 and which I had verified myself in June. My verification was wrong. Pixel measurement on 16-bit TIFF exports shows the import preset is never applied to the render, in 4.2.0, 4.2.1, and (measured the next morning) 4.1.2. The 4.2 "fix" changed sidecar bookkeeping, not the image. The corrected post carries the retraction and the numbers.

August 8. To find out what the un-applied preset costs, I run the same 3FR through Phocus Mobile 2, which offers no preset choices. Its output matches the desktop's manually applied Standard preset within 0.21% RMSE and sits 10.2% from what desktop imports produce by default. The measurement post spells out the consequence: in its default state, Phocus for Mac does not deliver HNCS, on screen or in exports, until you apply Standard by hand. Which rendering Hasselblad considers canonical is a question I have put to them; this page updates when they answer.

What did those 65 days mean for new owners?

Hasselblad markets the X2D II with "Brilliance at Every Moment" and "Crafted Details From Capture to Edit." The camera earns those words. The color science earns them. I bought mine because of both.

But for 65 days, every new owner's first experience of that promise ran through software that displayed the wrong color by default and exported files at a fraction of the sensor's resolution. A photographer who did not know to go looking for third-party coverage had no way to learn that the flat rendering on their screen was a bug rather than what their new camera produced.

That is the part of this record that goes beyond any single defect. Every piece of software ships with bugs. Hasselblad's response to these two was to leave 4.1.2 as the only download for 65 days without a word about either one.

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What Hasselblad fixed, and what stays open

The record cuts both ways, and the fair version includes the fixes.

Fixed in 4.2: the default color rendering and the export resolution cap. Credit where due: support escalated both reports, an engineer reproduced the color defect within six days, and both fixes shipped in the next release.

Both open items below are tracked, with current status, on the live Known Issues page.

Still unfixed as of publication:

The 3FR rewrite on import (Case #10227174). Undocumented, contradicts the manual, and breaks DxO PureRaw. Hasselblad closed the report as won't fix on July 14; the rewrite stays. If you keep your card originals, you are unaffected in Phocus and Lightroom; the details are in the timeline entry above.
The Import dialog's Adjustment preset is never applied (Case #9940198). Declared fixed in 4.2; pixel measurement in August shows the fix was bookkeeping-only and no tested version (4.1.2 through 4.2.1) has ever applied it. Until you apply a preset by hand after import, what you see and what you export is not the HNCS rendering.
In-camera star ratings still do not survive import for RAW files (Case #10078056). Hasselblad acknowledged it as a known issue in May, with no commitment to a fix. Still broken in 4.2.1, retested August 3.
Phocus freezes on slow network volumes (Case #9935255): synchronous file I/O on the main thread inside a file-system event callback. Engineering confirmed and queued it in April 2026; nothing has shipped through 4.2.1.

What should you do if you are affected?

If you are still on 4.1.2: update to 4.2. Both major defects are fixed there.

If you exported JPEGs, TIFFs, or HEIFs from 4.1.2: check their pixel dimensions. Anything capped below your sensor's resolution is worth re-exporting from 4.2.

If you use DxO PureRaw: feed it files copied directly from your card, not files that went through Phocus 4.2's import. If the card original is gone, the fix is a one-line metadata repair; write me through the contact form and I will send it.

If you rate images in camera: keep doing it in Phocus instead for now. The in-camera ratings do not come across for 3FR files.

Whatever version you run: apply an HNCS preset (Standard, unless you prefer another) from the Adjustments dropdown after every import, before editing. The import dialog's preset selection does not do it for you, and exports made without it do not carry HNCS.

Hasselblad's response

I offered Hasselblad the opportunity to comment on this timeline on July 9, and asked who owns the post-purchase software experience. As of publication, I have received no response.

Where this record goes from here

This page will be updated as the open items move. If the 3FR rewrite is fixed or documented, that goes in the timeline. If the ratings fix ships, same. Since August, every Phocus release also gets pixel-level regression testing here against my archive of past versions before this page calls anything fixed; a toolbar label or a release note no longer counts as verification.

What would make a page like this unnecessary is simple, and none of it is exotic: pull a release when a serious defect is confirmed, or post a notice; write release notes that disclose what changed; keep the official documentation current. Those are small habits for a company whose hardware deserves them.

The Phocus for Mac Record: March to August 2026, Dated