Announcement days are exteremely busy and so much content is spilled out all at once.
In fact there is so much out there, that most just watch the videos of the biggest channels and skip out on others.
This means that is easy to miss out on something.
And quite frankly, smaller channels can sometimes kick out better content and coverage than well known and established ones.
Well, today I’d highlight one review that I am not sure how many of you have seen. It comes from tb- photography, who runs an 11K subscribers channel.
It’s all worth a watch, but for the purporse of this article I’d like to focus your attention on the part that shows subject and animal tracking at work (min. 11:16 to 12:16)
For being pre-production, I believe the Fujifilm X-H2S did an astonishing job, especially with Pre-AF turned on.
And again: it’s pre-production, so it can only get better from here on.
Go see by yourself. The video below will start at 11:16 for 1 minute of new AF tracking glory ;).
So far we know (and it has been well documented) that the Fujifilm X-H2S has a vastly improved dynamic range performance in video over the the previous generation sensor, with 14+ stops compared to the previous 12 stops).
But so far we don’t have any word about the dynamic range or ISO performance for stills. And that makes sense, as it is pre-production and we better wait for the final thing before we make any judgments.
With this disclaimer printed clearly on top of the article, I’d like to share a video overview of the X-H2s plus new lenses shared by Ringfoto.
It’s in German, so let me translate the part I’d like you to hear.
Martin at Ringfoto shows samples he took with the Fujinon XF150-600mmF5.6-8 of his cute dogs running around. He talks very positively about the autofocus.
Then he addresses the concern that f/8 at 600mm (900 equiv.) might be perceived as too slow by some, as you will have to shoot at higher ISO. But here is what he says:
Opposite to other X-Trans cameras, the X-H2S has four analogue-to-digital converters [admin note: X-T4 & Co have two A-D-C]
Thanks to the new sensor and new technology inside the camera and the four analogue-to-digital converters, my feeling with this pre-production X-H2S at this point is that ISO performance on X-H2S is 1.5 stops better than on the X-T4, which would be sensational.
I want to be careful for now, but it looks very promising.
So what is Ringfoto talking about when they mention the analog-to-digital converter (ADC)?
We know the Fujifilm X-T3 and X-T4 (and all other ISOless or ISO invariant Fuji cameras) have two analogue-to-digital converters. On the X-T3 it works like this: every image recorded under ISO 640 “travels” through one ADC, and every image above ISO 640 goes through another ADC. This helps to improve noise performance.
This can have the paradoxical effect that an image taken in camera at ISO500 can be more noisy than an image taken in camera at ISO800 or even ISO1200, because after ISO640 the other ADC kicks in to improve performance, as you can see at the photonstophotos technical chart here.
What’s important for us to know in this article, is that those analog-to-digital converters are a good thing when it comes to noise performance.
And now that we know thanks to Martin that the Fujifilm X-H2S has four AD-converters as opposed to two ADC in the previous X-Trans cameras, then this could indeed explain what Martin observed: a sensational improvement in ISO performance.
Now, to my knowledge Fujifilm has not made any public statement about the increased number of ADC or about the improved ISO performance in stills.
All we could observe until now is that in video the noise performance is shockingly good, as documented also by Gerald Undone and we reported here.
My final word?
Well, there is no final world.
I will wait for final production samples to be tested side by side with other Fujifilm cameras. And this is what also Martin at Ringfoto said, that he wants to validate (or not) his impression with a final production camera.
And once he did that, I will do my job, report and translate his findings for you.
Fujifilm engineers are constantly and restlessly fine tuning, adjusting, tweaking, correcting, improving the firmware until almost the last day before it will ship to customers in mid-July.
This means: whoever tested the camera in the last few weeks, was actually playing around with a potentially buggy camera, and indeed some reviewers notices some bugs here and there (and reported them to Fujifilm).
But this also means, we can’t really make any conclusions about this camera in regards to IBIS, autofocus, image quality and what not.
The fact that it is just pre-production was highlighted also by Taylor Jackson in his Fujifilm X-H2S coverage, and yet, he seems to be impressed already by its autofocus, so much so that he says it is noticeably better than on his Canon EOS R6 and very likely on par with his Nikon Z9.
So why do I share this review in a dedicated article?
Well, because so far it is the only review I have found where a guy actually tests the X-H2S side by side with other cameras, meaning under the same conditions, same light, same subject, same everything. And we can actually see the different cameras tracking stuff side by side.
So what are his findings? Let’s find out in the summary and videos down below
The Fujifilm X-H2S picked up subjects at significantly further distances than his Canon EOS R6
he was not expecting it, but autofocus is fast, sticky and confident
you can see the eye AF picking up the eye even through dark sunglasses
a quick test with a person running towards the camera at 40fps – all images were in focus
Canon R6 vs Fujifilm X-H2S
he is impressed by how far eye and in general human detection works on the X-H2S
at far distances the Canon goes around focusing on various stuff. Fujifilm sticks on the person
Fujifilm camera more accurate autofocus than Canon R6
then he went to Island to photograph Puffins, and the camera detects their face
he shows 2 people very very far away on an endless beach, and the X-H2S picks up their faces (which is really just a few pixels on the screen)
Canon R6 vs Fujifilm X-H2 Indoors AF tracking
in short: the X-H2S wins
He also shared a Fujifilm X-H2s wedding photography Behind the Scenes video, which I will also share down below.
In the wedding video he compares it to the Nikon Z9 (which he has used really a lot) for indoors wedding photography. Here are his findings:
the Fujifilm X-H2S gets very very close if not on par with the Nikon Z9
it’s crazy to say it’s on par considering the Fujifilm camera is half the price of the Nikon Z9
Reasons to get it for wedding: physical size of Fuji kits, costs a lot less than other stacked sensor cameras, great color sciences (but this one is subjective)
he will compare it to the Canon R3 in a later video (and FujiRumors will report about it)
But again, it’s pre-production. So don’t take anything here as the final verdict.
