CineD and Gerald Undone recently published a video where they talk about how they make their lab tests.
It’s a one hour video I invite you to look in its entirety.
What I will highlight are 6 minutes towards the end of the video where they talk about the excellent test results of the Fujifilm X-H2S (starts minute 48:35).
They talk about how different and pleasing noise actually looks on the Fujifilm X-H2S (not the first to say this and actually that’s a peculiarity of X-Trans sensors, I mean the more film-like grain at high ISO and the less color noise).
So it seems that when Fujifilm advertises the X-H2S as having 14+ stops of video dynamic range, they are totally honest about it. In CineD tests, it beats even the full frame Sony A1.
But even more importantly, if you want to get rid of noise, for some “secret language” reason (as Gerald would call it), it seems that at least noise reduction applied in post is able to clean up noise with an ease he has never seen before.
Also, CineD mentions a strategic advantage Fujifilm has over Sony and Canon. Which one? You’ll find the answer in the short summary down below.
Maybe you have noticed that lately we tried to highlight also reviews from smaller youtube channels, along with the usual big ones.
Now, I won’t enter the discussion on why it seems that at least some of the big channels have a conflictual relationship with the Fujifilm managment, leading them to either ignore Fujifilm cameras (some never reported about the launch of the X-H2S) or to review Fuji gear… how can I say that… to review it not with the same care as they do with other brands.
But that’s not the article, where we want to talk about it.
What you need to know now is: we will keep covering the reviews of huge channels (in case they cover Fujfiilm, but highlight when they make errors like here and here), but also highlight smaller channels every now and then.
Small channels might not have the best studios, lights and audio, but they are often run by truely passionate photographers, who probably shoot more pictures with their gear out on the field than many of the huge channels combined. So their opinion, at least in my eyes, has just the same value the one of massive youtube channel.
So today we talk about TC, who owns the Sony A7IV and lots of lenses, but after his comparison with the Fujifilm X-H2S, he decided to sold off his entire Sony full frame kit. If you want to know why, you can find the video below as well as a summary.
Why are You Scared of PSAM? ;)
Before we go ahead, just a little consideration of myself. Why are you scared of PSAM?
Look, TC switched back to Fujifilm among the others because it has a PSAM dial and he loves it. So now we have a former Sony shooter coming back to the Fujifilm camp thanks to the Fujifilm X-H2S.
And isn’t that what we want? And what Fuji needs? More people shooting with their gear?
What damage does it do to us retro lovers?
Fujifilm has basically already said that there will be a Fujifilm X-T5, X-E5, X-T40, X-Pro4, X100V successor… and all of them with the retro feel we all love. That’s plenty of options that will continue to exist for us.
And now let’s see what motivated TC to sell all his Sony gear to switch to Fujifilm.
But here is one important thing that should not pass unnoticed: the official list of supported Fujifilm cameras.
So I think it is worth to highlight them in its own article. Accroding to Tamron, the new Tamron 17-70mm f/2.8 will work fine with the following Fujifilm cameras (see below):
The latest Top Gun movie used a range of Fujinon cine lenses to capture acrobatic as well as low flying jets.
Claudio Miranda, ASC, the award-winning cinematographer behind “Top Gun: Maverick“, shares behind the scenes footage, stories from the set, and all the ins and outs of selecting and working with the gear used to create this history-making film.
This is not green screen nonsense. The whole point of the movie was “how much can we capture?” Top Gun is a movie about getting it in-camera. […] Some of the cameras were rigged in really impossible places. And all these things needed different kind of lens qualities.
I made a list of what can fit and have great range and still be IMAX-worthy.
Top Gun was more about long lenses, so we used the Premier 75-400mm T2.8-3.8 all over the place. […]
During the middle of the movie we actually had a chance to get a hold of the Premista 28-100mm T2.9. It was amazing. I wish we could have kept it but unfortunately it was only one in the world at the time. We loved the full frame aspect of it, it was sharp, it was straight, it was like you went to the wide end of the lens and there was no bowing, there was no barreling. One of the only full frame zooms I know that’s acutally decent enough to shoot with.
[…]
What I do love about the Fuji zooms, all of them, from the Premista to the Premiers, there is no oddball barrel distortion when you’re zooming, or there is no vignetting, there is no softening towards the edges, it’s all straight. .We just like how the Fujinon lens maintains its field of view througout the zoom range. If you get a flare in the zoom, it does not fog the lens. It’s a beautiful zoom, the coatings are great.
Now, both color filter arrays have their strengths and weaknesses. We have written about it more in detail here. In short we could sum it up like this:
Bayer Array: better for more features and less power hungry and less heat generation and less battery drain
X-Trans Array: better for image quality (sharper*, less color noise at high ISO**, more film-like grain etc)
What I would like to hear from you today is what you’d prefer. Hence, down below is a survey.
Ringo Chiu won the Pulitzer prize 2021 as part of the awarded photography staff of Associated Press for a collection of photographs from multiple U.S. cities that cohesively captured the country’s response to the death of George Floyd.
Now NBC News just published a video about Ringo Chiu. In the interview, Ringo Chiu’s first sentence is “I just love photography” and then he goes on telling his story that brought him from China to USA and finally to win the Pulitzer prize.
So what has this to do with Fujifilm?
Well, photography lover Ringo, who grabbed one of the most prestigious awards for photojournalism on the planet, also shoots Fujifilm, as we can see multiple times during the video.
So let’s celebrate yet another Fujifilm X shooters who achieved great results thanks to his passion and talent for photography.
And yet, I am pretty sure that somewhere in a basement or fancy loft, a youtuber is already preparing a video with catchy headline declaring that the Fujifilm X system is no good for any professional use ;).
You can see the video above and check out Ringo Chiu’s work at his instagram here and website here. For the Pulitzer price photo series about the Black Live Matters coverage see this link.
distracted a French presidential candidate during his interview (story here)
One of the most recent entires in the awards list is the one of Fujifilm X shooter Magdalena Wasiczek, who won the International Garden Photographer of the Year Award (IGPOTY).
Magdalena has created this stunning, shimmering play on light, as she elevates this humble butterfly to the heavens. The magic of this capture is literally in the very air, with raindrops and macro lens used to great effect.
With this calibre of capture, it is easy to see why this will be her third overall IGPOTY win, and I offer her my congratulations for achieving this most amazing distinction.”
Congratz to Magdalena! You can check out all the details and see the image in full size at igpoty here.
But wait, there is more!
Also John Pettigrew made it among the finalists in the wildlife in the garden category with an image taken with X-T30 and XF55-200 (image below).
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.
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