The fifth episode of the Fujilove podcast with Fuji Guy Billy and Jonas Rask just went online. For your convenience, here are the previous 4 episodes:
episode 1 – XF33mm development challenges and X-H1 market misunderstanding
episode 2 – autofocus motors of lenses compared and no more Kaizen love for Fujifilm X-T20
episode 3 – digital image stabilization via firmware update and GFX100 talk
episode 4 – APS-C crop factor cheating and fast GF lenses potentially coming
It’s a 1 hour podcast, and in case you are in a hurry and don’t have time yet, I cover the whole podcast below. You can listed to it all at sticher and Fujilove.
If you click the video above (which will start at 4:55), you will see it compared side by side to the IBIS on the Sony a7iii. The difference is hugely in favor of the Fujifilm X-H1. Actually it’s that bad on the Sony a7III, that one might think IBIS was disabled.
On the Sony IBIS side, things do not really get better with the smaller Sony A6600.
“in some cases tuning on IBIS on Sony A6600 almost gives as shaky results as with IBIS turned OFF“.
Don’t get me wrong, Sony is great and we are all lucky to have such a wonderful camera manufacturer on the market. They deserve all the success they have, and in some areas they lead the pack (eye-aufofocus).
But sometimes, like IBIS and weather sealing (as reported here), one could get the impression Sony wants to put those specs on paper as a selling point, but they don’t really put all the R&D necessary to make them work at their best.
Not sure if Fujifilm should do the same, meaning don’t care much about how well the IBIS on their smaller X-T prototypes currently works, and just release an X-T4 or X-T40 with IBIS as soon as possible.
At the end of the day it will show up on the specs sheets, and hence become a selling point, no matter how well or not it works.
Or maybe Fujifilm should remain obsessed by how well their stuff actually works, and just wait until their smaller IBIS unit works properly.
Fujifilm X-H1, Still Worth Buying?
So, is the Fujifilm X-H1 still worth buying?
Well, now that you can get it with vertical grip and 2 additional batteries for $999 only, there can be only 1 possible answer: I don’t know, it’s up to you! :)
But if your answer is “yes”, then you have on big problem: the Fujifilm X-H1 is back-ordered on many stores, so good luck finding one.
Sometimes I wonder, why do I stick with APS-C and plague myself into a world full of photographic shortcomings?
It’s frustrating, for example recently, when I edited an image of my wife watching a sunset.
I exposed for the highlights, and my wife turned out basically pitch black, you can’t even see her shiny yellow dress.
Now watch the image below (or link to the video) and see how impossible it was to recover her with my APS-C Fujifilm X-E3 file. I needed hours and hours of editing, but it turned out completely unusable anyway. A memory thrown away due to my underperforming APS-C camera.
But my case is just one of many that fall under the section #photosfujicanttake.
So, I will list a few more images exposing the terrible shortcomings of Fujifilm APS-C, all shared at our Fujifilm X-T User group, which is full of depressed photographers dreaming of full frame or even medium format.
Sure, some brave guys try to compensate for the immense APS-C limitations with creativity and skills, but that’s not going to work at the end. We all know true photography is all about specs, 500% magnification and 10+ stops push.
I know it’s hard to digest, but the images below show that APS-C simply can’t deliver. Luckily Apple gave us a Pro photographer iPhone 11 Max. I think I am going to try with that one.
Inevitabely, he often compared the Sony A6600 to the Fujifilm X-T3.
Now, I’ll skip the parts, where Cameralabs talks only about the Sony A6600, and highlight down below only those passages, where he mentions and compares it to the Fujifilm X-T3.