Moment has put together some well known Fujifilm X shooters and organized a 4.5 hours live workshop on August 19.
The workshop is usually $149, but there is currently a huge discount on it.
To read who will lead the workshop and what subject will be covered, check out the dedicated article at Moment.
It’s a rare thing…
it’s a rare thing that the entire FujiRumors community agrees on a certain matter.
But Fujifilm succeeded in this miracle!
How?
By categorically refusing to open their lens protocols to third party lens manufacturers.
And still in 2019 top Fujifilm managers insisted that there is no need to have Sigma, Tamron & Co on the X mount side of life.
I love you Fuji, but this was just the biggest error the management ever took, proven by the fact that’s it’s also the one decision the entire FR community disagreed with.
Well, Fujifilm finally fixed this error in 2020, by saying they open X mount to third parties.
Late, but better late than never.
And guess what is happening? Third party manufacturers are finally joining the X mount, attracted by the Fujifilm market share and facilitated by the open lens protocols (a deal breaker for Sigma for a long time).
So let’s see what is happening.
Cosina launched the Voigtländer Nokton 35mmF1.2 X, no autofocus, but with electronic contacts to provide Exif data and focus check.
Tokina launched a couple of X mount lenses.
Sigma is hinting to have lenses for X mount coming in 2021.
And the probably biggest news so far: Tamron will be launching the Tamron 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3 for Fujifilm X in 2021.
And since we have Tamron officially on board now, I thought we could give a revival to our original Tamron X mount lenses wishlist, which we published back in 2020 here.
You can still vote the survey, but so far you top 10 Tamron wishes are:
And given the increasing X mount autofocus offering, we launched the dedicated third party X autofocus lenses group here.
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A littel while ago, 7Artisans announced the new 7artisans 55mm F1.4 II and 7Artisans 60mm F2.8 II (a refresh of their very popular 7Artisans 55mmF1.4 and 7Artisans 60mm F2.8)
The 7Artisans 55mm f/1.4 was ins stock already since a while at AmazonUS here, BHphoto here and AmazonUK here.
Now also the 7Artisans 60mm F2.8 II is in stock at BHphoto here as well as at AmazonUS here and AmazonUK here.
Skylum now released the latest update for the Luminar AI software.
Until August 3th there is also a special offer for the Luminar X Membership, which is 50% off.
Skylum products can be purchased with an extra $10 discount by using coupon code “FUJI“.
Portrait Bokeh AI
The long-awaited Portrait BokehAI feature will help Luminar Creatives achieve dreamy and spectacular portraits. Using artificial intelligence, this tool quickly analyzes the depth of an image, and creates a beautiful background blur in seconds, adding a realistic and dreamy 3D bokeh effect to your portraits.Bokeh Al creates a beautiful background blur in seconds, adding a realistic and dreamy 3D bokeh effect to your portraits. You can use it to automatically emulate the stunning background haziness of a high-quality lens at maximum aperture; easily add volume, airiness, and depth to your photos; hide imperfections in an unfocused background; and let the subject in your photos stand out
Textures with visual preview
The improved Textures tool gives you incredible new possibilities. In the Local Masking tab, click on +Add and select Textures. Now you can visually browse Textures in the dropdown list and instantly have an idea of what your final result can look like (just like in SkyAI and Augmented SkyAI).
Shifting Horizon Control in SkyAI
In Update 4, you can enjoy significant improvements to the SkyAI tool.There’s now a new slider that correctly adjusts the position of the sky. You can replace the sky and set the desired position of your horizon line thanks to the Shifting HorizonControl slider in the Sky Orientation section. Instead of Vertical Position, Horizontal Position, and Horizon Blending sliders, now there is just one smart control that saves time and is more efficient in getting your replaced Sky Texture exactly where you want it.
Get Luminar AI here.
[NOTE: at the event every participant was either vaccinated or had been tested negative in the 48 hours before (the tests are free and fast to make where I live). Most of the guests (me included) were fully vaccinated]
Did you notice it?
For the first time in years, last Saturday I haven’t published something on FujiRumors for an entire day.
And the reason is simple: I was at the wedding of a very close friend (I also served as his best man).
I also was in charge of taking pictures. Not all of them. They had a professional photographer shooting with a Canon DSLR. But the photographer left at dinner, so that’s mostly when I took over.
Now, my buddy told me he does not want to see me stressed running around taking pictures all the time, and that I should enjoy the party. And I promised him he will see me holding more often a glass of good wine rather than a camera. And that’s what I did.
But, despite a bit of pressure to get the job done right, I also enjoyed to take images a lot. In fact I felt honored that I could contribute a little bit to capturing such precious memories for his life.
And now…
brutally honest…
Let’s talk about what went great and what not so with my Fuji X gear during the wedding.
But first…
Any wedding photographer out there reading FujiRumors?
Well, if so, then oh boy, you have all my deepest respect for your job!
I mean, I am a teacher and blogger. And in both cases, if I mess up a lesson or an article, I can fix it later on with another and better lesson or article.
But now that I photographed a wedding for the first time, even though the part in the church and the reception at the restaurant was covered by the official photographer, I did feel quite some pressure knowing that this is a 1 time only moment. I don’t get a second chance to get it right. And having a job where you expose yourself to such a pressure, well, I guess you must have nerves of steel for that.
So if wedding photography is your job, you have my deepest respect. I probably would not have the nerves and strength to do what you do, and I am grateful that there are guys like you out there taking over this job.
The official wedding photographer used a Canon DSLR. Interestingly the glass he used was all from Sigma.
As for me, all I took with was the X-T4, X-E3, XF23/1.4 and XF56/1.2. I also had the XF35/1.4, but at the end for the outside shots I mostly used the XF56/1.2 and inside the restaurant I needed to go with the wider 23/1.4. So the 35/1.4 remained in the camera bag.
And quite frankly, the setup I used was perfect for what I did. Maybe sometimes the XF 18mmF1.4 or the XF16mmF1.4 would have been handy, but shame on me, I don’t own those lenses.
As I said previously, I knew I don’t have to interfere with the official photographer, so whenever he was taking images of the guests, I did enjoy talking with friends and drinking good wine. But in those occasions, where he was away with the bridal couple taking some portraits, I sometimes grabbed the camera and took some snapshots.
So how did it go? Let’s talk about it!
My Fujifilm X gear performed fantastic, except for one thing, where it performed OK but not great. You’ll read about it below.
The probably biggest advantage I had over the official photographer, was that most of the guest were basically also my friends or people I know quite well. And as some of you already predicted in my original article, this allowed me to get close to them with my camera gear without intimidating them.
Look for example at the image below, where a good friend of my childhood, that I haven’t seen in years as he moved to another part of Italy and opened a restaurant there, spotted me taking pictures. He gave me such a genuine smile as he was happy to see me again. I took this image while he was approaching me with his wife.
And there are a couple of images like this, where the guests just wholeheartedly smile into the camera or just keep doing their stuff spontanously while I take some images.
Last but not least, the official photographer probably did not even notice that I am also taking images. I acted stealthy like a ninja as I did not want to interfere with his work and irritate him by standing in his way (you can see an image of me down below).
As for the gear itself…
I came back home with lots of lovely images. Especially the newer processor and faster sensor in the Fujifilm X-T4 performed admirably even in low light, but also the Fujifilm X-E3 was a solid performer throughout the whole event.
Just one thing I wish Fujifilm would improve, and you can read it down below.
Sieh dir diesen Beitrag auf Instagram an
