5 Years of GFX Fujifilm Nordic 2hr Special With Full Summary: The System, The Future, Tilt Shift, and More

• 2 years ago

Fujifilm Nordic posted a 2-hour long special to celebrate the 5th anniversary of GFX and it is interesting to hear how GFX impacted their photography. There is some vague talk about the GFX system during Søren Solkær’s segment where he is using the GFX in place of a full-frame camera and the Fujifilm rep makes a somewhat generic statement about how sensor technology is improving in APS-C and Full Frame and that those improvements will naturally come to GFX. This is an obvious statement and everything including Global Shutter will end up in GFX, but all that depends on the sensor manufacturer being able to and choosing to make the sensor.

You can make pretty accurate predictions about what is coming by looking at the sensors on the market. For instance, Sony used to keep BSI technology to themselves, but now many companies have access, etc… point being we should not read into what is being said about sensors because Sony or someone else needs to make the sensor first and what they are willing to produce might not be your technology of choice. Beyond that tilt-shift was brought up and that it should be coming within a year.

Below is a pretty deep summary of anything that might have been of interest in the 2 hours video above. The video is worth watching on a slow day, but I do not think it was overly informative. The photographers spoke freely and one even brought up that every now and again he has to pop his battery out to reset his camera, but beyond that GFX has been a great experience.

Pål Laukli From Norway

• First Fujifilm Camera was X20 and after 20 min his wife grabbed it and never gave it back so he had to buy another one.
• Fujifilm “fanboy” because they actually feel like a camera
• The first time was a revelation and now others are trying to copy it
• Used to work with medium format backs
• GFX is a game-changer
• Goes between GFX and X-T4
• Only uses Fujinon lenses
• Admits he is a mega fanboy
• Has been in photography for 28 years and the GFX100 is the greatest camera ever
• Most shots just work out of the camera
• It is just so easy to hand over for post-production
• GFX is so easy to do you can just hand it to your mother
• X-T4 is faster and great for sports while GFX has crazy color depth and details
• It’s amazing how fast the GFX is
• GFX is a total package, but when combined with X-T4 there is no reason for more cameras
• The worst issue with GFX is sometimes you need to power cycle with pulling the battery out, but beyond that never had an issue getting the shot he wanted in the warm or cold
• Has been shooting JPG to decrease production time with natural lighting and am very happy with the results
• GFX is instinctive you can just shoot when you see stuff which is nice to do with a medium format camera
• The selling point isn’t resolution etc it is the versatile compact trustworthy package
• He had a very expensive camera system before that he tried to sell and no one wanted it
• The GFX isn’t expansive if you are using it as a tool for work and you can treat it like a tool without worrying

Flemming Bo Jensen

• Photographer since 1998 and Fujifilm Ambassador since 2013
• Learned photography through travel
• Still does a lot of assisting just to do and learn interesting stuff
•  X-T3 is his favorite camera and it is fast
• GFX is really fast too and not much slower than the X-T4
• X-T3 with a prime can get great shots one-handed hanging it over a fence which can be done with a GFX, but it is a little heavy for that.
• You can get really get close by cropping GFX
• Great for shooting a crowd with a band in front of them because you can shoot wide without making the shot shift wider
• Fujifilm used to make great cameras for wide shots like the TX1
• The GFX be used as a panoramic camera because the sensor is really big
• The square format of the camera lets you do pano crops that look great with lots of megapixels left
• People don’t get pushed far away shooting wide like this
• GFX is a lot bigger than full-frame and even larger than APS-C
• X-T3 makes him feel fast but it may not be faster
• Shooting is all about getting the emotion of the picture because it is hard to reduce the scene into a 2d photo
• Social media and Instagram suck for photography so you should have a website
• If he could only pick between X-T3 and GFX100 then X-T3 would be the way to go

Jessica Wikström

• Started with GFX in 2017 and back then was shooting Canon
• Shot GFX for about a month and fell in love
• It was instant love
• Been a photographer for 15 years
• Became a Fujifilm photographer in 2019
• She likes to shoot stationary in a studio
• Medium format was big and heavy until GFX
• Thought she wouldn’t like medium format until she got her first GFX50S shot home and she fell in love with the results
• She hates editing and finds it boring
• Switched from Leica to GFX in 2018
• The feelings and colors of the GFX is what shes been looking for all these years
• Loves the colors
• Never worries about being able to recover an underexposed photo
• The Sharpness is great and you cant talk about GFX without talking sharpness
• insane amount of detail and easy to crop
• You can almost feel the images that come out of the GFX
• The speed is also very impressive and you can shoot kids with it
• Always knowns she will get the shot
• GFX gets you to slow down and think about what you are doing in a positive way
• You don’t have to check the back of the camera because you know the speed, focus, and lighting are all there
• You don’t have to be technical to us GFX
• She prefers flash to constant light

Søren Solkær

• A non-ambassador Fujifilm is working with
• There are a lot of great photographers out there and Fujifilm found him from someone at a camera store showing them his work
• Been working in professional photography since the mid-’90s
• Started with analog photography and got into digital in 2002
• Started with GFX about a year ago
• The post-production guy he works with had a talk with him that there was a new camera in town and he didn’t want to switch because he liked the cameras he used, but the new cameras files were way beyond what he was working with
• Having a huge file is an advantage to scaling files
• The post-production guy was right there are many reasons GFX is beyond the competition
• He started with the GFX100
• There was some getting used to it, but he likes it
• He always works fully manual to be in full control and it took him a while to nail it but now he gets 100% of the shots he wants
• Sometimes the file size isn’t needed and he shoots full frame
• He’s able to focus on hawks and falcon without an issue with GFX
• There are two things he could dream of which is pushing the limit of high shutter speed with high ISO and the other is shooting faster
• Fujifilm responded to him that GFX is going in the same direction as other camera technologies at this time
• Fujifilm our fast system now is X and technical is GFX, but both will get faster and faster processors and better sensors.
• Fujifilm this camera is super full frame and it should as capable as possible and the representative believes we will go in that direction.
• The quality and the image reminds him of shooting Hasselblad’s back in the day
• GFX has given him the joy of photography back
• Love the combination of classical design and modern technology

Summary and Q&A

• GFX50 was a more popular choice than GFX100 and it seems it is due to the look
• Tilt-shift coming within a year
• Beyond that, it was a quick summary of what was talked about

Fujifilm GFX100S:

B&H Photo / Amazon / Moment / Adorama

Fujifilm GFX100:

B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

Fujifilm GFX50SII:

B&H Photo / Amazon  / Moment / Adorama

Fujifilm GFX50R:

B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

Fujifilm GFX 50S:

B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

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