[joemiller]

The prices have come down a long way.

One thing you need to keep in mind is that most used medium and large format equipment was probably used by a professional and may have been used hard. While it was built for professional use, the "soft" parts such as foam on medium format and the bellows on large and some medium format can give problems.

I would guess you could get into a Mamiya 645 system at a fairly low cost and there is a lot of used equipment out there. The 645 can be hand held, but the 6x7 Mamiya RB and RZ are better left in the studio. My favorite is the Pentax 67 which is a clunky, quirky camera that was intended for field use. People seem to love them or hate them.

With any medium format system there are things you should look for and things you should avoid such as Pentax 6x7 without mirror lock up. I'd do some research on a system before spending much. Since the lenses are meant for professional use most of them are pretty good. There's some some that are not great (e.g., the fisheye for the Pentax 67) but there are few, if any, "consumer" or kit lenses like you get with DSLRs.

If you are a "tripod person" and like to go into a "contemplative mode" when photographing, then you might want to give it some serious thought.

BTW, the cheapest was to get into medium format might be a TLR. There's some good used ones out there.