One of the most read articles back in 2020 here on FujiRumors was the guest post titled “The X-Pan Rebirth of Fujifilm X-Pro1“, where a reader modified his X-Pro1 into an X-Pan digital camera.
And every now and then the wish of a digital Fujifilm X-Pan camera surfaces again in the Fujifilm community such as here, here and here.
Well, today we have another request for a Fujifilm X-Pan camera coming from Pavel and shared over at his youtube channel SuperSuperka (video below).
He so severely wants a digital XPan Fujifilm camera, that he made a very nice rendering on how he imagines it to be.
He called his rendered X-Pan camera the Fujifilm TX-3, of course inspired by what Jonas Rask called “the most beautiful camera ever created“, the Fujifilm TX-1. He wrote me:
Some notes about the concept. It has GFX sensor cut in half, which gives just perfect match to Xpan proportions
Logarithmic response pixels are not commonly used, but are used in technical tasks. What they can do is to not mimic film but to have native film-like look.
Arca-swiss is the bottom of the body. No additional plates needed. OVF with phase-detect autofocus.
I used 28mm which with this sensor is a bit wider FOV then original 45mm on Xpan. Like, say, 40mm on Xpan.
Quite frankly, at this point, if Fujifilm was to adventure itself in a crafting a unique niche digital camera, then I’d personally find a digital X-Pan much more appealing over let’s say a monochrome Fujifilm X camera.
What about you? Feel free to vote the survey down below.
According to rumors found and shared at Japanese websites such as AsobinetandDigicame-Info, the Voigtländer Nokton 23mmF1.2 for Fujifilm X will be announced “later this month” and ship in April.
We can be sure that the original source of this leak is Nokishita, who is all but gone ;).
This will be Cosina’s second Fujifilm X mount lens with electronic contacts after the Voigtländer Nokton 35mmF1.2 X.
But yeah, I can’t see the future. Nobody can. So Tony’s opinion is just as valid as mine. The future will tell.
Two System, Less Cameras and Lenses for APS-C due to limited R&D
Maybe I am not so much into other brands, but I don’t feel like Fujifilm is releasing less gear than other brands.
The real issue was more that so far not many third party brands released AF lenses for Fujifilm, but that has been solved in the meantime.
But in some way it is true. No GFX system could potentially mean more resources for X mount. But I think this is also why Fujifilm waited so long before offering a second sensor option. They did want to wait that their APS-C lineup is rich in lenses and once well covered, they can free up resources for other projects.
Lack of Fast Lenses
First off, let me say that there are many fast Fujinon XF lenses such as the XF200mmF2, XF8-16mmF2.8, XF50mmF1.0 as well as all the nice f/1.2 and f/1.4 primes.
But what about the f/1.8 zooms he’d wish for the X system? Well, that brings us to the next point.
High ISO
In the past, pushing your digital cameras to high ISO was something we absolutely wanted to avoid, as the performance was so bad. To avoid to go too high with ISO, we did indeed need fast glass for low light photography.
But that was the past. Today, ISO performance on digital cameras is vastly improved, which means you don’t need to try to desperately avoid high ISO with super fast and expensive glass. Nope, you can also push ISO up much higher than you ever could in the past.
What this means is that you can put smaller, lighter and more affordable lenses on your camera, as you can compensate the slower aperture with a higher ISO value.
Down below I will share a video of an extreme low light recovery I made of my wife overlooking the hills of Ronda in Andalusia, Spain (we made our honeymoon there). She basically went from almost invisible black to nicely visible in clean colors (thank you X-Trans for that high color fidelity) and in my eyes also very contained levels of noise, which make the image pleasing and usable.
But what about Bokeh? Let’s talk about it.
Bokeh
Not enough background blur? Well, this one is easy to answer. I’ll just share an image down below. And it’s not even the fastest lens Fujifilm has to offer (you can get even more radical with this one).
Autofocus (and Computational Photography)
True, Sony and Canon have better autofocus. But the point with autofocus is, that once it is near perfect, there is not much to improve anymore. Fujifilm just needs to catch up with Sony and Canon, and then the “autofocus war” will be basically over, since there will be little room for further enhancements.
Where there is much more room for improvement, is computational photography. And this is an area where smaller sensors simply are superior to bigger sensors. In fact, if done wisely, it could be even lead to a Renaissance of the M43 system (as the Panasonic GH6 shows with its terrific high res handheld mode). And certainly APS-C has a potential advantage here over full frame or medium format.
Now Cosina has published the main specs and a new product image (see above) of this lens at their website in Japanese, which I now report here on FujiRumors machine translated.
A large aperture quasi-wide-angle lens with the latest optics using one double-sided aspherical lens and two abnormal partial dispersion glass. Although it is a compact size, it has excellent resolution from the aperture opening, and large blur due to the large aperture of F1.2 can be obtained.
Just as the 35mm version, also this one has electronic contacts to transfer certain information such as EXIF data.
I love the look of this lens, and actually also of the Voigländer Nokton 35mm f/1.2 X. And although I am tempted to get one, I so far have not treated myself with one, since I’d pay for features (the electronic contacts) that do not work on my Fujifilm X-E3.
With the latest Sigma X mount releases, it’s high time for us to update the list of third party lenses with autofocus support for Fujifilm X series cameras.
We will include also the newly announced Voigtländer NOKTON 23mm F1.2 (as well as the already available Voigländer Nokton 35mm f/1.2 X), which are not autofocus lenses, but they have electronic contacts for EXIF data transfer and more.
Last year, Cosina launched the Voigtländer Nokton 35mmF1.2 X, with no autofocus, but with electronic contacts which allows for transfer of EXIF data and more (more details at the bottom of the article).
Now Cosina will also launch the Voigtländer Nokton 23mm f/1.2 APS-C lens for Nikon Z and Fujifilm X mount.
Also in this case, there will be electronic contacts but not autofocus.
It’s nice to see that Cosina understands us Fujifilm X shooters (or most of us) better than what Sigma does, and did put the effort to design the X mount version with an aperture ring. I wish the new Sigma X mount trinity would have an aperture ring too. But it’s no dealbreaker in my eyes. I shot my 27mmF2.8 without aperture ring for long and with great joy (but I replaced it now with the new XF27mmF2.8 with aperture ring).
For me, shooting Fujifilm is not only, but also about the experience. This is also the reason why I got the TTArtisan 23mm f/1.4. It’s the look and feel of it, attached to my X-E3 or X-T4, that simply makes me enjoy shooting with it every now and then.
And surely the new Voigtländer NOKTON lenses for Fujifilm X hit the same nerve, with a lovely vintage design and the bonus of electronic contacts that make it an appealing option for X shooters.
Personally, though, the Voigtländer options is not on my radar, because my Fujifilm X-E3 camera is not supported (yet). The full list of supported X series cameras can be found at the very bottom of this article.
Linguine/Spaghetti with shrimp and rocket salad (Rucola) and lemon and tomato
Time to prepare: 15/20 minutes – 2 people
Put the pasta… and let it cook while you prepare the sauce.
Sauce: Fry a bit of garlic and chili for a few minutes (low heat, don’t let the garlic turn brown). Then throw in some nice, fat shrimps (raise the heat). Let them fry 1 or 2 minutes with the garlic. Then put in a bit of decent white wine (about half a wine glass). Cook for 1/2 more minutes with rather hot flame. Then put in some tomato cut in smaller pieces (should be very mature tomato). Let it all cook for a few more minutes at medium heat (4/5minutes).
Drain the spaghetti/linguine and throw them in the sauce (keep a bit of cooking water in a glass, so if the sauce turns to dry, you can use the cooking water to make it more creamy). Then add the juice of half a lemon (for 200/250g of pasta), the skin of half a lemon and the rocket salad to taste (simply ripped in smaller pieces with your hands) and mix it all nicely.
Now you can serve the dish… and if you do so, feel free to send me the images via email at fujirumor@gmail.com. ;)
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