– The photographyblog X20 review is now online. Defintily passed the test. It gained five out of five stars, again! (also pocket-lint assigned five stars here, calling the camera “the new champion of the high-end compact cameras”)  But now read the photographyblog review here.

“We ran into some issues in bright sunlight when shooting in aperture and shutter priority modes, where the top shutter-speed limit of 1/1000th second at f/2 or f/2.8 often caused under-exposure. Unlike the X100S, the new X20 still doesn’t feature a built-in Neutral Density filter (something that we complained about with the X10), so you’ll have to stop-down the aperture and sacrifice some depth-of-field to avoid blowing out the highlights. […] Fujifilm have cleverly made the focusing ring more sensitive to how you use it – turn it slowly and the focusing distance changes slowly, but turn it more quickly and the camera quickly moves through the distance scale. It now takes less than 2 full turns and a couple of seconds to jump from the closest focus distance to infinity, a big improvement on the X10. […] Shutter lag is virtually non-existent on this camera, so once you have set the focus, you’ll never miss the moment because the camera can’t fire the shutter quickly enough. […] The Fujifilm X20 is a much faster version of the original X10, with a few handling tweaks that make it even more intuitive to use. […] The Fujifilm X20 produces images of outstanding quality […] an excellent performance for a camera with such a small sensor.”

– The German site digitalcamera posted his review here (translated version). A bit too big for a compact camera. The image quality is more or less what you’d expect from a 2/3 sensor. With the new technologies inside the X20 (X-Trans, no low pass filter…), they had a bit higher expectations.

– Now something for our Spanish readers. dslrmagazine posted the review here (translated version).

X100S: BHphoto / Adorama / AmazonUS / AmazonDE / AmazonUK / AmazonITA / DigitalRev / your ebay / your Amazon
X20:  BHphoto (black – silver) / Adorama (black – silver) / AmazonUS (black – silver) / AmazonUK (black – silver) / AmazonDE / AmazonITA / DigitalRev / your ebay / your Amazon

VSCO Film 01

Vsco Film 01 now with custom camera profiles for Fuji! check it out here.

X100S
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PROS: Excellent resolution and detail in photos – Low noise up to ISO3200 and above – Excellent colour reproduction – Unique – optical hybrid electronic viewfinder – Aperture / Shutter controls – Excellent build quality – Silent shutter sound – Bright f/2.0 lens. CONS: Quite high price – Fixed focal length – RAW not available with “Advanced Filters”. Read the whole ephotozine review here. They “highly recommend” this camera.

“Using the Fujifilm X100S for Street Photography” at thephoblographer here. The full review has still to come.  “The cold can really destroy battery life, but the X100s has held up extremely well and I have been able to have it on for a remarkable 14 hours or so until it finally died. No, I’m not joking. I dimmed the screen though, so keep that in mind. Plus the camera was turned off at certain points. This battery life rivals Canon’s.“

DPreview added 3 pages of studio shots with the X100S. Click here to get lost in comparison. Page 5: ISO JPEG’s, page 6: HIGH-ISO JPEG’s, page 7: RAW. Compare, but be careful, don’t get addicted ;). About the X100S RAW’s DPreview says:

“Processed through Adobe Camera Raw 7.4, raw files from the X100S look great at low-to-medium ISO settings, with the exception (as with the JPEGs) of some obvious artifacts in areas of extremely fine horizontal and vertical detail, and a slight lack of definition in the very low-contrast feathers at lower-right compared to more conventional sensors. In general though, organic textures are rendered nicely, and overall detail reproduction is very good. Compared to the best of its competitors, the X100S does well, but moiré is a factor in areas of very fine detail, and it is possible that Adobe Camera Raw is not yet quite making the most out of its sensor (we will update our conversions if and when Adobe tweaks its plugin).”

X20
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Techradar posted his X20 review (click here). From the conclusions:

“With the X20, Fuji continues its dominance in the corner of the market reserved for high-end compact cameras with superb image quality that exude retro cool. The fact is, no other manufacturer manages to mix those two qualities together quite so well as Fuji, and for that, the company should be applauded. As a premium compact, the Fuji X20 is a delight to use and will be surely appreciated by those looking for a great backup model for their DSLR or CSC. If you already own a Fuji X10, there’s not quite enough here to warrant an upgrade just yet, though there are obvious advantages to this over the previous version of the camera.”

image courtesy: techradar

FR-reader Hinrich send me this video (vimeo), made with the X20. He wrote: “Short late afternoon walk with my friends new Fujifilm X20 around my barrio. Old man hand-held, no stab. no editing. The camera looks beautiful and fits ergonomic perfect into my hand. But I think the quality of my Sony RX100 photo and video files are better. Thank you”

X-E1
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Cameralabs highly recommends the X-E1. Read why in their comprehenisve review here. An extract: “The X-E1 is a great follow up model to Fujifilm’s X-Pro 1 providing most of what the more expensive flagship model offers at a significantly lower price point. For purists, an optical viewfinder on a rangefinder style camera will be a must-have feature and the X-Pro 1’s hybrid viewfinder is a technological wonder. But if you can live without an optical viewfinder, the X-E1’s EVF is one of the best around and is arguably better suited to an interchangeable lens camera.”

image courtesy: cameralabs

PS. In the meantime FR-reader Frank is anxiously awaiting his X100S. Everything is ready, as you can see in the next image…

image courtesy: chromasoft

Fuji X-photographers finally have more software options to process their X-Trans RAW files. That’s great. Now the question is, which one is the best option for your needs?

Sandy (chromasoft) compared ACR7.4/LR 4.4 RC, Silkypix, C1 and AccuRaw (you may know that AccuRaw is Sandy’s product). As other reviews already pointed out, he says that Adobe considerably improved its products. On his site you can see comparison images with the old version of Adobe Camera Raw. Here just a some PROS and CONS of ACR7.4/LR 4.4 RC:

“Compared to the previous generation, the new Adobe algorithm has much less obvious chroma smearing, so it certainly is much improved. Taking a closer look, where previously the smearing was really bright and intrusive, in the new version the smearing is a lot less bright. However, there’s actually more smeared pixels – in effect, the smearing now has a wider radius. In addition, the image is noticeably softer than the previous version.”

And what about Capture One, Silkypix and AccuRaw? Read the whole comparison here!

From the conclusions:

“Firstly, Adobe’s products, even in the new LR 4.4RC/ACR7.4 form, still don’t stack up. Although much improved over the previous generation, they still have excessive chroma smearing relative to image resolution.  If you were to select a raw processor purely on the basis of getting the maximum out of your X-Trans based camera, Lightroom wouldn’t be it. […] with the new raw developers, the difference between a conventional sensor and a X-Trans sensor is small enough to get lost in differences in lens performance, etc. There are now enough good raw developers that most users will be able to find one that works for them.

At the end of the post you can read also his thoughts about the X-Trans technology. While many praise the new Fuji-sensor (technology of the year according to imaging resource), here is Sandy’s point of view:

“It’s ten months since I first blogged about the X-Trans processor, and so far it’s delivered nothing to justify the “greater resolution than conventional sensors” hype. Finally, the really big losers are the many camera “reviewers” out there that uncritically repeated Fuji’s claims about the X-Trans sensor’s greater resolution. To their credit, some reviewers did raise warning flags – Sean Reid and Thom Hogan to mention two, but they were the exceptions. So next time you read a camera review, here’s a suggestion – take look at what they wrote about the X-Pro when it was introduced, and judge accordingly.”

In response to chromasofts article, read the one at soundimageplus here.

“Well there may be be some reviews out there like that and I’ll take the writer at his word, but I certainly haven’t seen any. I’ve talked about how good I think the X-Trans image quality is, seen as a whole package including ISO performance, clean results etc., but I’m not sure resolution is part of this.”