Fujifilm Photography News and Rumors

Last night I took my Fujifilm GFX 50S, EF-X500, the launch line-up of lenses and carbon fiber tripod on a 10 mile walk around Downtown Miami with my friend Depot MSA to see how it handled the city late at night. The entire kit was relatively light to carry for such a long distance in a smallish bag, but switching lenses was difficult at times. From a handling perspective, difficulty switching lenses while moving was the only thing that made the walk more difficult than doing it with my Fujifilm X-T2 or Sony a7II because the lenses are very thick. While I have a bad back, the gear did not weigh on me at all, even when walking swiftly away from an eccentric homeless man that didn’t want to leave us alone. Read More »

DPReview has an article about street shooting the Fujifilm GFX 50S on the streets of Japan and here are the take aways.

• In fact, I’d go as far to say that in terms of ergonomics and comfort, I’d prefer to spend the day walking around with the GFX 50S over a Nikon D810 or Canon EOS 5D SR (with similar-sized lenses) for a few reasons. (It’s more comfortable to hold for a long time, can be used with one hand)
• Autofocus, as you might expect from a contrast detect system, is quite sluggish. Not only that, it’s also pretty loud. And when fully racking focus from minimum to infinity, the 63mm F2.8’s lens barrel extends considerably. The camera is also a tad slow to start up.
• I missed a couple decisive moments due to the combination of sluggish start up and slow autofocus.
• That said, while AF is slow, it is both accurate and precise (in good light). This is the positive of a mirrorless camera using a CDAF system.
• Using a dimly-lit bar as my scene (settings around ISO 12800, 1/60 sec at F2.8), the GFX 50S proved largely unable to focus on anything.
• Although resolution is pretty high (3.7 million dots) the viewfinder image gets noticeably ‘crunchy’ when focus is initiated, and moiré and ‘shimmering’ can be very distracting in some scenes, especially cityscapes.
• using this camera reminded me just how much I love Fujifilm colors and skintones
• There’s something really strange/enticing about being able to shoot casually with a digital medium-format camera. And despite some sluggishness in its operation, the GFX 50S was  surprisingly good for street and travel photography.

You can read the full article here, but I have to bring up a point that no one seems to be addressing. There are several ways to tweak the autofocus of the Fujifilm GFX and they do seem to matter a lot.

GFX Thoughts of The Day
Last night I shot some photos around my house with all the lights off handheld and surprisingly I was able to achieve focus lock quickly with just the TV on in the living room. Using rapid AF and pre-AF seems to improve performance considerably sometimes, which is odd because I usually turn these off if they are on by default. Then this morning before walking to the beach I tried a quick portrait with just the light from a 15-inch MacBook Pro using the GF 32-64mm f/4 at an extremely low shutter speed and got a tack sharp image. I think this is largely the result of the super quite shutter that causes very little vibration, it actually makes the new Leica M10 sound loud.

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Fujifilm GFX 50S B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

Waiting is the hardest part, but my Fujifilm GFX 50S finally arrived today from B&H Photo! I have a pretty aggressive schedule that I hope to keep this month to see what the camera’s limitations are including shooting with a local reader, plus a few companies are sending me equipment to test with the GFX in addition to my purchase. If you have any questions at all feel free to ask them in the comments below or in our GFX Owners Group where GFX owners gather to work together on Facebook. At FujiAddict we actually use the gear we write about unlike other sites.

Now it’s time to get ready to go out and shoot. Please continue to support the site by using our affiliate links (Amazon, B&H Photo and Adorama) for shopping at no added expense too you, because the GFX represents a sizable investment. Your support is how we continue to grow our coverage of Fujifilm’s great camera systems. Follow me on 500px and Instagram for the most up to date photos. Plus don’t forget to join our Fujifilm GFX Owners Group and join in the discussion, also follow the GFX Owners Page to get more tailored news on Facebook and follow Fujiaddict on Facebook and Twitter.

Fujifilm GFX 50S B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama

Fujifilm has a series of blog posts explaining some of the key technological advantages of the Fujifilm GFX 50S system and they just released their most significant one. It affectively puts other manufactures on notice that they believe they are making the best glass on the market at this time for a medium format camera. Here are a few of the statements:

“Lenses are a huge factor that contributes to image quality. Lens technology is not everything, but there is a limit to what one can do post-processing if the lens used is mediocre. People see the difference in the result of medium format GFX, largely due to the lens.”

“Are the current medium format lenses in the industry the best in the world? Not quite. With the exception of a few, many of the lenses in the market are not designed with the latest technology in mind. The latest sensors have much greater potential than what these lenses can capture.”

“Let’s be clear. It is unfair to compare GF Lenses directly with existing medium format lenses.”

The claims are pretty aggressive and it will be interesting to see how photographers react, but this all seems to be very much in line with what early testing is revealing. The GFX system is an incredible value compared to other “mysterious” medium format systems that are priced out side of most photographers budget and we know Fujifilm knows how to make glass for reasonable prices.

You can read all of GFX Technologies #3 – Through the Glass of GF Lenses here.

You can also read the other two parts of the series, but they aren’t nearly as interesting or as grandiose in their claims.
GFX Technologies #2 – G Mount: the future here
GFX Technologies #1 -Secrets of the New GFX Sensor here

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Fujifilm GFX 50S B&H Photo / Amazon / Adorama