Compagnon Explorer+ Photo Backpack Review

Compagnon Bags are what you could call a ‘boutique bag’ maker. I came across them a couple of years ago at Photokina. I was looking for a bag that I could put my Fujifilm GFX, lenses and accessories in. Compagnon’s then-released Weekender Bag looked like the perfect deal. Normally, Compagnon bags use lots of natural materials like waxed canvas and leather. It makes their bags look more like regular bags instead of photo bags.

Compagnon’s Weekender Bag is the perfect home-away-from-home for my GFX kit.

Now, as lovely as these natural materials are, they are also a bit heavier and sometimes, you just want to keep the weight down. Especially in backpacks. A while ago, Compagnon launched a Kickstarter project in collaboration with Deuter, a big name in the backpacking world. I have been using regular Deuter travel backpacks for years. The result of that project was the Explorer and the Explorer+. Deuter brought their knowhow about carrying comfort to the table and Compagnon added their knowledge about what photographers need in a bag.

Compagnon Explorer+

Curious to see what that love-child would look like, I contacted Compagnon if I could put their bag to the test and they kindly send me a unit. Up until recently, I have been using an F-Stop Loka UL. That is still a backpack I highly recommend if you want a really lightweight backpack, but since I’ve been using the Fujifilm GFX system, the Loka UL is a bit too small – it especially lacks depth – and the padding of the straps is not soft enough to carry a heavy load for any prolonged period of time.

The Explorer+ somewhat disrespectfully used as a sandbag to weigh down my light stand…

… and the resulting portrait :-)

I’ve been using the Explorer+ on my last two trips to Ethopia and Kolkata and I really love the bag! At 2.2 kilograms, it’s still relatively light, especially given its volume of approximately 25 liters (+ 12 liters in the rolltop) and its carrying comfort. And what I like best is that it’s fairly deep, so it has no problem with big camera bodies like the GFX 100. It can even hold a Godox AD600 Pro flash! With airlines checking your carry-on weight more and more, the actual weight of the bag is becoming increasingly important. It’s the reason I stopped using roller bags when flying because those bags will often weigh five kilograms… empty. Put in a camera and a lens and you’re technically already overweight :-) A backpack also has the advantage that, once arrived at your travel destination, you can continue to use it on the streets.

Ethiopia, Omo Valley. Portrait of a young Hamar girl carrying water. Fujifilm GFX 100, Godox AD600, SMDV Alpha 110 Softbox, Godox AD400 Pro, SMDV Speedbox 70.

Have a look inside my portable flash photography studio!

In the video below, I show you how I set up the Explorer+ backpack as a portable flash photography studio and I walk you through why I like it and I also show you how a small modification can make it even better!

The full specs of the bag can be found on Compagnon’s website, so I won’t be repeating them here. I’m looking forward to exploring other parts of the world with the Explorer+ and I’m also going back to Ethiopia with it later this year. If you feel like joining me, check out this page!

Ethiopia, Mursi girl. Fujifilm GFX 100, Godox AD600, SMDV Alpha 110 Softbox.

Kolkata. Rickshaw wallah on a chai break. Fujifilm GFX 50S, Godox AD600, SMDV Alpha 70 Speedbox.

Kolkata: A sadhu photographed with the iconic Howrah bridge as a backdrop. Fujifilm GFX 100, Godox AD200 Pro, SMDV Alpha 110 Softbox.

i always like it when a company listens to their users. It’s one of the reasons why I like working with Fujifilm so much, and also with Compagnon. Along with a couple of other users, I had told them that I thought the roll-top compartment needed an extra way of securing it in addition to only the buckle and low and behold: their next backpack, the Element, which is currently on Kickstarter.com, along with two sling bags, will have a velcro strip to seal off the roll-top compartment.

I’m looking forward to putting the Element through its paces as well and comparing it to the Explorer+.

Disclaimer: I’m a brand ambassador for Compagnon Bags. As such, Compagnon will occasionally send me a bag to review. Given the fact that I have a zillion other bags in my closet, the real test for me is: ‘Do I keep using the bag after I’ve reviewed it or do I send it back?’ In this case, it looks like I’ll be using the Compagnon Explorer+ for quite a few trips to come, as I really like it, especially with the small modification that I talk about in the video.

How far can you take a Fujifilm GFX100 file in postproduction?

TL/DR version: pretty, pretty far ;-)

Fujifilm GFX 100 | GF110mmF2 R LM WR @ 110 mm | 1/60 sec. @ f/2 | ISO 200

Longer version:

I had the honour of doing a demo with the GFX100 during the camera’s launch events in The Netherlands and Belgium. During the demo in Belgium, which took place in the incredible Lites Studios, I wanted to showcase both the IBIS feature and the ability to recuperate underexposed images. In fact, the ‘postprocessability’ – if that is even a term – of the GFX files is probably what I like best about them, even more than the resolution. In the video below, you’ll see me increase the image’s Exposure by more than three stops and apply a liberal dose of positive Shadows. So… how does the GFX100 hold up?

I’m by no means a Capture One expert, but I wanted to try C1 as Lightroom’s support for the GFX100 is still preliminary. I have to say I was amazed by the quality of the output.

Master Off-Camera Flash with this practical PDF ebook.

Disclaimer: the above links are affiliate links. If you buy Capture One true these links, MoreThanWords will receive a commission which is already included in the price. So you don't pay extra compared to purchasing directly. This commission helps me to run this website and to produce the many free video tutorials that you can find here. Thanks for purchasing through my links.

My GFX 50R Review

A couple of weeks ago, I had the opportunity to test drive a preproduction model of the GFX 50R in Ethiopia. My buddy and fellow X-Photographer Matt Brandon came with me and documented our trip for a short video that will be released later. But because the shipping date of the GFX 50R is getting nearer, and because I get a lot of questions from people what it was like shooting the camera and if they should get it or rather the GFX 50S, I decided to make this video review.

3 disclaimers:

1. I’m a Fujifilm X Photographer and a Fujifilm ambassador so I’m probably not the most neutral judge. But on the other hand, I became an ambassador because I love the quality of the Fujifilm cameras. I have been shooting with them for almost seven years now, starting with the X-Pro 1. After trying out the GFX 50S in India, I bought one myself and I would not have done that if I did not love the system and believe in its potential.

2. All the images you’ll see in the video have been processed (many of them with my Lightroom Creative Profiles Starter Pack). They are not straight out of camera images. As much as I love the Fujifilm film simulations, for me they’re just a starting point. I love processing images, in fact I probably love it even more than actually making them. Through my processing, I try to convey the way the scene felt to me when I was there. In fact, one of the reasons I love the GFX system so much, is because these files can take a beating in postproduction. The dynamic range is stellar and the sharpness of the lenses incredible. I can do just about anything with a GFX50 raw file. In Lightroom! I love having that amount of flexibility.

3. Other than the fact that the GFX 50R has a 50 megapixel, 33 x 44 mm sensor inside, I won’t bother you with other technical specs. You can find those on the Fujifilm website.

So, with that in mind, here’s my review. I suggest you only watch it if you have some money to spend, because chances are you’ll either want a 50R or a 50S by the end of the video… Don’t say I did not warn you :-) I have included some sample images but the poor compression really does not do them much justice. If you have any questions or remarks, hit me in the comments.

By the way, this was also a scouting trip for a new photo workshop on location lighting and portraiture in Ethiopia. We’re currently working out the details for a 2019 trip. If you want to know more about that, sign up for the newsletter and you’ll be the first to hear. As a thank you for signing up, you’ll also get a set of 10 free Lightroom presets.

As you may have noticed in the video, I use a lot of flash in my travel images. I like the way how flash can amplify, modify or sometimes even downright overpower the available light and let me create my own lighting rather than having to deal with what the climate gods decide to throw at me on any given day - which in Ethiopia is a glaring, way too contrasty sun from early morning until late in the evening. If you want to learn more about using flash on location, have a look at my Light It Up! ebook: it’s loaded with advice on how to use flash for travel and location portraiture.

Fujifilm GFX 50R | GF32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 64 mm | 1/125 sec @ f/8 | ISO 100

Fujifilm GFX 50R | GF32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 32 mm | 1/500 sec @ f/8 | ISO 200

And here is a 1:1 crop of that image:

Special thanks to…

Special thanks to Fujifilm Belgium and Fujifilm Japan, Matt Brandon, Billy, Jan and the entire team at Starling travel and their Ethiopian counterpart for organising this trip. Also thanks to Lacie, Compagnon and Godox importer Disnet for providing us with some of the essential other tools we needed to make this trip happen. Could not have done it without all of you!

Location portraiture with the SMDV Mega 180 Speedbox and the Fujifilm GFX - part 2

In the previous blog post, I introduced you to the SMDV Speedbox Mega 180. I took it for a spin - and if it had been any windier, it would have taken me for a spin - in the city of Ghent, Belgium, where I live. We made about 5 different set-ups in a little over two hours time because our talented dancer Lana had to be back home in time for rehearsals! When you’re a bit in a rush, you don’t want to spend half of whatever time you have setting up your lights. In part 1, I showed you that I managed to set up the Mega 180 in under a minute - quite a feat for a softbox this size and that has everything to do with its design and not with my two left hands :-) In the video below, you see us creating the first shot. I call this my ‘warming up shots’. It’s a safe shot that technically isn’t too challenging and we made it in a quiet area. This allows for the model, the team and myself to get to know each other and get in the flow of things, without too many tourists looking along. It’s also reassuring to have at least one useable shot right from the get-go.

The essential guide to working with small and big flashes on location. This ebook will show you all you need to know to create killer flash images.

One of the things I love about this SMDV Mega 180 is that it creates super soft light, even for full-length portraits. I even helped it a bit, by putting it in the frame and then masking it out afterwards, a technique I’m using more and more.

Below, you can see a high-speed behind-the-scenes video of the actual shoot and the retouching. I was shooting on the GF23 on my trusted Fujifilm GFX 50S because I wanted to take in the entire castle. But working with such a wide angle caused a bit of distortion on her left arm and hand, which is why you’ll see me use the Liquify tool in Photoshop. The colour grading is done through one of my Creative Profiles for Lightroom Classic CC, Photoshop CC 2018 and Camera Raw.

The Fujifilm GFX 50S is my favourite camera ever. You can do just about anything with the files that come out of it. The potential for shadow recovery without noise is amazing. If you don’t believe me, check out this blog post, where I recuperate a four-stop underexposed image… But be warned. I’ve know at least one photographer personally who bought a GFX after reading that blog post :-)

The GFX has made me slow down and work on a tripod more. This is my Sirui Traveller T2204-XL. You can also see me use the right-angle finder on my camera. I love that accessory. I’m wearing a Spider Holster and the GFX has a Spider plate with an Arca Swiss compatible base plate. It makes me look like a bit like Robocop but I’m past the desire of looking fashionable when I’m shooting. I’ll leave that to my models :-) Image © Frank Verheye.

Location portraiture with the SMDV Mega 180 Speedbox - part 1

Introduction

If you're a regular reader of this blog or you've read my Light It Up ebook (available in Dutch as Flash!), you know I'm an avid user of the softboxes of the South-Korean brand SMDV. One of the main reasons I like them so much is because they are super fast to set up and even faster to break down. As most of the stuff I do is location portraiture, often with non-professional models who have better things to do than sit around and wait while I set up a softbox, this is an important advantage.

My favorite softboxes so far in the SMDV range have been the Speedbox 70 and Speedbox Alpha 110. I manage to set up the Alpha 110 in less than 15 seconds. Breaking it down is even faster: 2 seconds. These softboxes are dodecagonal, which is a fancy word for being 12-sided. As such, they create an even more circular catchlight than regular octas.

The 110 is probably my absolute favorite: it's still light enough to carry around and I've used it everywhere from India to Mongolia. It just fits in my North Face Rolling Thunder 36 bag, without having to disassemble it. With smaller speedlights, I sometimes use the 70 as well. Apart from the quick setup and breakdown, what I also love is the build quality and the fact that I can add grids to the softboxes. As my style of portraiture is pretty dark and moody, I like the extra control that a grid can bring. Below you can see a setup shot where I use the 110 and the 70 together in this impromptu street portrait of a lawyer-turned-sadhu in India. This portrait was made during the first Location Portraiture and Lighting Masterclass. Details of the 2019 edition can be found here.

The grid helps to control the rim light and to avoid flare in my lens.

Fujifilm X-Pro2 | XF50-140mmF2.8 R LM OIS WR @ 129.2 mm | 1-250 sec. @ f/8 | ISO 400 | This one was done with my Jinbei HD600 flash - I'm using Godox AD600 and 200 flashes now. | Camera left: SMDV Alpha 110 - Camera right: Gridded SMDV 70.

This is Matt Brandon's SMDV Alpha 90 being used to make a portrait of these Mongolian Eagle Hunters... It took two people just to hold the 90 so the 180 would not have been an option here...

Fujifilm GFX 50S | GF32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 56.5 mm | 1-125 sec. @ f/13 | ISO 100 | SMDV Alpha 90 with Godox AD600B

The SMDV Mega Speedbox series

However, sometimes, I want an even bigger light source, so when SMDV announced the Mega Series of softboxes and more specifically the Mega 180, I was all ears and eyes. They were kind enough to send me a review copy and so I took it out for a spin in the city of Ghent, Belgium where I live.

The Mega series consists of five softboxes, ranging in size from 90 cm to 180 cm. The three smallest (90, 110 and 130 are deep octa style softboxes, except for the fact that they're not eight-sided but 24-sided! The two biggest ones, the 160 and the 180 have a more regular width-to-depth ratio. Weights range from 2.1 to 3.24 kg.

Now mind you, this is one big softbox. In fact, it's taller than most of the people I shoot. So, although it's probably a softbox that most photographers would use indoors, I wanted to see how I fared with it outdoors, as this is my natural habitat.

Construction and setup

It's actually 181 cm, but who's counting :-) Image © Frank Verheyen.

When you take it out of its bag, this softbox just oozes quality and sturdiness. SMDV managed to maintain a quick setup system but they improved and reinforced it, which was necessary because of the additional strain a softbox this size puts on the entire folding mechanism. Furthermore, as this softbox has no less than 24 sides, setup takes a little longer than the SMDV Alpha 110 but it's still doable in less than a minute, as you can see from the video. The first couple of times you set it up, it can feel a bit tight but that improves a lot: after the tenth time I set it up, I could do it in under a minute. One thing that helps is to not secure every rod in a clockwise or counterclockwise direction, but to secure every other one and then give it a second pass with the ones you left out on the first go. That same trick also works on the Alpha 110, by the way.

24 sides means there's also 24 rods to click into place. Still, after some practice, I manage to do it in under a minute! Breaking down is even faster. Image © Frank Verheyen.

In one way, I like the new setup even system better than the old one on the small and Alpha SMDV speedboxes. On those units, one thing you have to watch out for is dust or sand getting inside the speedring. The new setup system of the Mega series is all external, so there's no risk of sand or other dirt getting inside and blocking the setup system. I've once had to open the speedring of my Speedbox 70 and the inside is almost as complex as a Swiss watch :-). It's a great system - I just wouldn't do any beach shots with it...

Another difference between the Mega series and the regular SMDV softboxes lies in how you break them down. The latter are broken down by depressing a couple of switch-like buttons, which is as fast as it gets. With the Mega series, however, you have to flip each of the 24 switches individually. Again, it's something that can be done in 30 seconds or so. So it's still very fast for a softbox this size (and with this many sides), just not as fast as its smaller siblings.

On my regular SMDV softboxes, I generally leave the middle diffuser and the front diffuser (and sometimes even the grid) attached when I break them up. While you could do so on the Mega series, especially on the 180 I think it's probably just as fast to take at least the front diffuser off when taking it down because leaving it on adds some extra tension when you tighten the rods to put it back together. This is one huge softbox, after all! 

In the video below, I show you how easy it is to set up the softbox. In fact, putting on the front diffuser takes longer than setting up the actual softbox.

That's it for the first part of blog post. In the next part, we'll actually put the SMDV, our model and our assistants to work and make some images!

Fujifilm GFX 50S | GF32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 33.8 mm | 1-125 sec at f - 8,0 | ISO 100 | 2 x Godox AD600B with H1200B head in SMDV Mega 180 Speedbox.

Rock the Cashback: great deals on the Fujifilm GFX and GF lenses

I've been shooting for almost one year with the Fujifilm GFX now and it has become my favourite camera of all times. Especially now that more and more lighting manufacturers are already offering full High-Speed Sync flash support (e.g. Godox) or have announced that they will (e.g. Profoto). If you've been on the fence about buying one, now might very well be the time because Fujifilm Europe has launched what is probably the best cashback deal on the GFX and the GF lens lineup so far. Even the just-released GF45 and the also fairly recent GF23 are included. The cashback started yesterday and lasts until January 15th, 2018. It's a direct cashback at the store, so no need to fill out any annoying online forms and wait for your money back. It's deducted right at the counter. The cashback varies from 300 € to 1300 €. Hey, that money buys you some nice lights to go with your GFX :-)

Here are the numbers (all including 21 % Belgian VAT, Recommended Retail Prices)

• GFX + 63 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 7298 €
• GFX + 32-64 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 8198 €
• GFX + 120 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 8598 €
• GFX + 110 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 8698 €
• GFX + 23 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 8498 €
• GFX + 45 mm: 1300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 7498 €
• 63 mm lens only: 350 € cashback. Price after cashback: 1249 €
• 32-64 mm lens only: 550 € cashback. Price after cashback: 1949 €
• 120 mm lens only: 640 € cashback. Price after cashback: 2259 €
• 110 mm lens only: 660 € cashback. Price after cashback: 2339 €
• 23 mm lens only: 620 € cashback. Price after cashback: 2179 €
• 45 mm only: 300 € cashback. Price after cashback: 1499 €

Still in doubt? Here's two videos of the GFX in action. One by me, using a prototype back in November 2016 in Varanasi and one by Tom Museeuw, in which he uses a confetti blaster to cover his model with cocoa powder. I've chosen these two because they show just what a versatile camera the GFX is: from the alleyways of Varanasi to a studio environment: it captures life in all it's fine colours and details. You might also want to check out my Fujifilm GFX review and the blog post called 'No Flash? No Problem' in which I show you what you can do with a 5 stop underexposed image.

Finally, Fujifilm have also announced a 24 month lease plan for the GFX camera at 0% interest. Check with your Fujifilm GFX dealer for more info.

Featured in the Official Fujifilm X Magazine!

I am honored to be featured in the 20th issue of the official Fujifilm X Magazine in an article about travel photography. I not only talk about classical travel photography, but also urbex photography, which I consider to be traveling back in time! You can download this and the previous editions of the magazine here for free.

The cover image was shot mixing flash and available light during my 5 day GFX Challenge shoot in India, the video of which you can see below. If you're interested to know more about flash photography, check out my latest book Light It Up! Techniques for Dramatic Off-Camera Lighting (in English) or Flash! Flitsfotografie op locatie (in Dutch).

No flash? No problem! Lightroom and the Fujifilm GFX.

At the Photo Days photographic trade show in Brussels this weekend, I had the honour of doing some GFX studio demos with two lovely and very talented models: Rosalinde Kikstra and Sooraj Subramaniam. I had a number of Godox flashes and modifiers set up and I'll post some images later of those results but the image that probably underlines the GFX's fantastic capabilities the most was one I made by accident: on one of the shots in a Black and White portrait series, I had misaligned the trigger so the flashes did not fire. All I got was a heavily underexposed ambient exposure shot.

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GF120mmF4 R LM OIS WR Macro @ 120 mm | 1/125 sec @ f/5.6 | ISO 400

So, in front of a live audience, I said, jokingly... let's try and see what we can make out of this... I increased the Exposure slider by almost 5 stops (the maximum in Lightroom), dragged a couple of other sliders around and half a minute later got this result... 

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GF120mmF4 R LM OIS WR Macro @ 120 mm | 1/125 sec @ f/5.6 | ISO 400

Here's the two of them side by side in the Lightroom interface.

And below is a 1:1 crop. I added 25 Luminance Noise Reduction in Lightroom and of course there is still some noise but considering the fact that my ISO wasn't even at the base of 100 but at 400, I think the result is nothing short of fantastic...

For me, the takeaway from this accidental experiment is that if Lightroom and the GFX can do this on a completely underexposed file, imagine what you can do with a halfway decent exposure. Just about anything, I guess...

Oh... and just for the sake of being complete... here's the actual image with the flashes firing :-)

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GF120mmF4 R LM OIS WR Macro @ 120 mm | 1/125 sec @ f/5.6 | ISO 400

The Fujfilm GFX Files, Part 2 - More videos

A video interview with about the GFX and the accessories I used in India

As you could read in part 1, I have been using the brand new Fujifilm GFX in India and Belgium for a couple of weeks. I also made a 3 minute video about it for Fujifilm. Well actually, I did not make that video: fellow X-Photographers Matt Brandon (www.thedigitaltrekker.com) and Serge Van Cauwenbergh (www.fotografieblog.be) filmed it - entirely with X-T2 cameras by the way - and Matt also edited it. In case you haven't seen it yet, here's that video:

On the way back from Varanasi to Delhi, Matt interviewed me about the GFX, but also about some of the other accessories we have been using, like the SMDV BRiHT 360 and the SMDV Speedbox 85 that you can see me use extensively in the video. We also talk about using monopods and tripods and how to back up images like this while traveling. You can check out the video interview on Matt's site. There's some cool 100 percent close-ups of shots!

Check out my video interview here.

More GFX Challenge videos

If you haven't overdosed on GFX news by now, here are the latest GFX Challenge videos that Fujifilm have released:

Ollvier Wehrli - Switzerland

Watching Oliver's beautifully filmed video gave me vertigo. I guess I'm not cut out to be a landscape photographer!

Joshua Loh - Singapore

Joshua Loh appreciates the small form factor and fast focusing capabilities of the GFX. I also take away from the video that I really need a Mercedes SLS to complement the GFX... That car features in no less than three GFX Challenge videos :-)

Supalerk Narubetkraisee (Thailand)

Supalerk also lauds the universal nature of the GFX and has a couple of really nice star trail photos in his video.

Shiro Hagihara (Japan)

Shiro - like me - appreciates the EVF which lets him decide on exposure and color without having to take his eye off the viewfinder. He loves the Velvia simulation for his landscape work. He says the GFX lets him capture details that even his eyes could not see.

Saiichi Nakmura

Saiichi's work involves still life photography with water. The video offers an interesting view into his studio set-up. He praises the quality of the CMOS sensor and the standard 4:3 aspect ratio which he finds better suited for commercial use.

Jonas Rask and Palle Schultz (Denmark)

The detail and sharpness of Jonas' lifestyle shoot images with a biker almost bite you from across the screen. A must-see if you're into motorcycles or good-looking guys :-)

Sangsun Ogh (Korea)

Sangsun takes us to a shoot of a model wearing traditional Korean attire. Needless to say, the resolution of the GFX helps to bring out every little bit of texture.

Knut Koivisto (Sweden)

Knut appreciates the fact that the camera works as well in the studio as it does outside of it, in the streets. He uses the X-T2 and the GFX intermittently. For him, DSLRs have been sidestepped now.

The Fujifilm GFX Files, Part 1 - Review

Today Fujfilm have officially announced their Medium Format Mirrorless camera, the GFX 50S. The camera had already been pre-announced at Photokina, but now we have the full specs and, not unimportant for a camera of this calibre, the price!

Specs

I won't bore you to death with all the tech specs (they can be found on Fujifilm's own website) but here's the most important ones:

• All new G Mount with 12 pins to ensure a maximum of information can be exchanged between camera and lenses. Diameter of 65 mm and a flange back of 26.7 mm.
• 43.8 x 32.9mm CMOS sensor, rumoured to be the same as in the Pentax 645Z but with Fujifilm tweaks added to it (and of course Fujifilm's own processing which is done by the X-Processor Pro). This means the sensor is 1.7 times as big as a fullframe sensor and almost 4 times the size of a regular X system sensor.
• The crop factor is 0.79. To know what a G-mount lens is like in fullframe terms, multiply the focal length by 0.79.
• The sensor array is Bayer, not X-Trans. Personally, I think that's a good fact. As it's still unclear as to whether Capture One will support the GFX, Lightroom currently seems to be the only mature raw converter that will support it and it does a great job with Bayer sensor patterns.
• 51.4 megapixel sensor with 8256 x 6192 files (4:3 native aspect ratio). Other aspect ratios can be set in the camera and, contrary to medium format cameras with an optical viewfinder, the GFX can show you an exact preview of what your crop is going to look like in its EVF.
• Base ISO of 100. ISO up to 12.800 and extended ISO modes up to 102.400.
• Mirrorless design
• Focal plane shutter to 1/4.000th of a second, electronic shutter up to 1/16.000 of a second
• Weather sealed
• Dual SD Card slots
• WI-FI
• Contrast-detection AF with joystick for quick focus selection (just like X-T2 and X-Pro 2)
• 117 focus points all around the frame, pretty unique in the medium format world!
• Tethered shooting support (Lightroom)
• HDMI, PC Sync Port, USB3 and Remote Control connectors
• Flash Sync Speed of 1/125th - HSS should be available through Fujifilm's own EF-X500
• Detachable viewfinder with a 3.69 M-dot viewfinder
• Two-way 2.36 M-dot tiltable screen (like the X-T2) with touch capability
• New, more powerful battery
• E-ink display that shows essential shooting data even when the camera is turned off
• Full HD Video @ 30 FPS. Although, if you want a video camera, get the X-T2: it's four times cheaper :-) Matt Brandon from www.thedigitaltrekker.com and Serge Van Cauwenbergh from www.fotografieblog.be used the X-T2 to film my GFX challenges video and we were all amazed by its video capabilities!
• Weight: 825 grams including battery and card for the body-only. That's less than typical pro-level DSLRs. 1230 grams with the 63 mm attached. Or in other words: medium format quality for fullframe weight!

 

G-Lenses

Of course, no system is complete without lenses. Just like the X-Pro 1 some five years ago, the GFX is available with a choice of three lenses, and a promise of more to come. Of the three lenses that are currently available, the 32-64 is the one I used the most. In fact, Lightroom tells me I shot 87% of my images with this very versatile lens. In order to know what these lenses are like in fullframe terms, you have to multiply their focal length by 0.79. This means this lens translates into about 25 to 50 mm. My second-most used lens (ten percent of all shots I made) was the 120 mm f/4.

The Filter Bar in Lightroom: a great source for information. It's no surprise that I used the 32-64 the most. I cannot wait for the 23 mm that is announced for later this year!

I really appreciate the fact that it's stabilised and while waiting for the announced 110 mm f/2, it makes for a nice portrait lens which has the advantage of having macro capability and being stabilised. Finally, the lens I used the least (only 3 percent) was the 63 mm f/2.8. Not that it's not a nice lens, in fact, with it's relatively light weight and relatively fast aperture (in medium format terms), it's got a lot going for it. It's just that 50 mm fullframe equivalent is not my favourite focal length to shoot at.

The 120 mm is a crazy sharp portrait lens. This downsampled, compressed JPEG does not really do the lens much justice, unfortunately. Its OIS came in really handy for making this hand-held available light portrait. All images in this blog post were processed in Adobe Lightroom using my Lightroom preset packs | www.lightroompresets.be

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX120mmF4 R WR @ 120 mm | 1/125 sec. f @ 4 | ISO 500

Price

At Photokina, Fujifilm had already hinted at a price 'Well below $10,000' and it looks like they have kept their word. Body-only price in the US is $6.499. In Europe, it's $6.999, including VAT. So, for you professionals out there who can reclaim VAT, that's under €6.000! This makes the camera not only a serious contender for other suppliers of digital medium format cameras like Pentax, Hasselblad or Phase One, but this aggressive pricing strategy is clearly also aimed at winning over people who now shoot high-end fullframe DSLR cameras.

So what about the lenses? In Europe (Belgium) the price is as follows:

• Camera: 6.999 € including VAT
• 63 mm: 1.599 € including VAT
• 32-64 mm: 2.499 € including VAT
• 120 mm: 2.899 € including VAT

In the US, the prices are (excluding sales tax):

• Camera: $6.499
• 63 mm: $1.499
• 32-64 mm: $2.299
• 120 mm: $2.699

So, the camera is indeed 'well under $10.000', even including the standard lens. Although still a considerable investment, as far as I know, this is not only the latest, but also the most affordable medium format camera you can buy new, today.

Using the GFX in the field

The internet will probably explode with opinions about this camera, lots of which will be based only on the spec sheet. After all, few people have had a chance to really use the camera for a prolonged period of time. As you probably know by now (see this blog post), I was one of those lucky guys who had the opportunity to test a prototype for a couple of weeks, back in November. Below is the video I made for Fujifilm about it. Special thanks to Serge, Matt, Matt's wife Alou and fixer Manoj for their help!

The actual camera felt very finished, but the firmware was still very beta and buggy. However, this still gave me a very good idea of what it should be like to use the finished product. In summary, the GFX gives you the quality of medium format while combining the best in handling from the mirrorless and the DSLR world. If you're used to a traditional DSLR or - even better - any Fujifilm camera and especially the X-T2, you'll feel right at home. If you're used to using other medium format cameras, you'll probably appreciate the ergonomics and all the little extras that aren't necessarily present on the camera you're currently working with.

My Top-10 features

This brings us to my favourite features of the camera. 

1. Image Quality

When I saw the first shots in the viewfinder and later on my monitor, I was simply stunned, and I still am. And mind you, this is even without having worked with the RAW files as there currently isn't any support for them, yet. I did capture uncompressed RAF files along with Super Fine JPEGs (a new setting, delivering JPEGs of up to 20 Megabyte in size). 

What you might think is natural light, is actually a flash firing through a window. Just don't tell the available light purists. They're everywhere :-)

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 36.2 mm | 1/60 sec. @ f/4 | ISO 1000

2. 24 megapixels is plenty, 51.4 is plenty more! 

I was (and still am) happy with the 24 megapixels of my X-Pro2 and X-T2 bodies and especially for the APS-C sensor size, I think that is a nice sweetspot. However, with the GFX's sensor being almost four times as big, there was obviously room for more megapixels. The GFX 50S should actually be called the GFX 51.4S, as this is the actual pixel count. It's funny, really, that the number just gets rounded off. 15 years ago, the first affordable digital cameras were about 1.4 megapixel. Now, that is considered pocket change! The GFX has a 4:3 aspect ratio, which takes some getting used to. However, I have started to appreciate this aspect ratio, especially with regards to printing. The images are 8256 by 6192 pixels tall.

This Lightroom screenshot might be the best way to give you an idea about the size and the detail in the files. This is a screenshot of my 2560 x 1440 iMac monitor. The image in the middle is zoomed to 1:1. In the Navigator to the left, the rectangle shows you how tight I'm zoomed in.

The first advantage of having this many megapixels is obviously the resolution if you want to print really big. At 300 dpi, without any upsampling in Photoshop, you can print images that are 28 inches or 70 cm on the long side. Now, if you're printing on inkjet printers, 200 to 150 dpi is actually a much more common resolution. This means that you can print up to almost 60 inches on the long side, without needing to upsample in Photoshop. With some upsampling, even larger, sharp prints are absolutely possible. Simply amazing.

The second advantage is cropping. Although I try to get my crops right in camera, there will always be situations where you could not get the crop you wanted, or a layouter wants to use a crop from a shot because it better matches the layout. In the example below, I was actually shooting vertically. It was a staged, lit shot which I wanted to be quite dramatic. However, suddenly, the dogs - a quintessential part of Indian daily life - came walking through the frame and I wanted to capture that, too. I had no time to change the camera's orientation. The horizontal crop puts the focus more on the street scene. And it's still some 25 megapixels, so even more than an uncropped shot of my X-T2.

I was actually setting up for this type of more posed shot... when some dogs walked by. 

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 35 mm | 1/125 @ f/4 | ISO 200

I had no time to turn the camera, but made a vertical photo and then cropped it into this 4:3 landscape shot. The resulting image still measures 5701 x 4276 pixels! The blue light in the background is a Cactus RF60 flash with a blue gel on it. I chose the colour because of the contrast with the warm, orange clothing.

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 44.9 mm | 1/125 @ f/7.1 | ISO 320

3. Dynamic Range

Another reason many photographers invest in Medium Format, is to have more dynamic range and much more postprocessing leeway with the raw files. As I mentioned, there still is no raw support so it's hard to fully appreciate this already. I will report back on this as soon as I can but from tests I did with the camera's built-in converter, I'm very optimistic!

The best angle for this shot was when the diver was back-lit. Not a problem for the GFX. And... this is based on a JPEG. Can't wait to see what Lightroom can pull out of the GFX raw files.

4. Autofocus system

Traditionally, with medium format cameras, autofocus is the achilles heel of the system, requiring you to either use the LCD in Live View mode or the central AF point and then focus and recompose. This makes these cameras rather slow to use. The GFX is different. Although not as fast as its smaller, recent X-siblings (because it's contrast-detection only) it was surprisingly fast to focus (in medium format terms) and, more importantly, the 117 focus points cover the entire frame, so no need to focus and recompose. The latter technique could really cause you to lose your critical focus if you're working with shallow depth of field (like the upcoming 100 mm f/2 lens offers). To change your focus point, you can use the 'joystick' which most of us know (and love) from the X-Pro 2 and the X-T2. And of course, in those cases where the autofocus does not work, it's an easy switch to manual mode, where the manual focus aids (like 3 or 10 times magnification in the EVF) can help you focus manually. Try that with an OVF!

I rarely put my subjects in the centre. Which is why I really appreciate the fact that the GFX has autofocus points everywhere across its viewfinder. 

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 36.2 mm | 1/100 @ f/4 | ISO 800

The optional grip turns the GFX into a squarish block. This improves the ergonomics when holding the camera vertically.

5. It's mirrorless!

Analog viewfinders are so 20th century... I really like the EVF on my other Fujifilm cameras and it's no different on the GFX. I like that I can see what I'm going to get even before taking the shot, the live histogram and the fact that I can set the camera up to show me a preview of my ambient exposure in manual mode. This is super handy when working with flash. Set the ambient, dial in the flash and review the picture immediately in the EVF. No need for chimping! I have done a full blog post covering the advantages of an Electronic Viewfinder in more detail. Check it out here.

6. Dual SD card slots

I love the fact that Fujifilm sticks to SD cards. They're readily available and so are card readers for them, unless you happen to own the new MacBook Pro, of course. 

7. A lens roadmap

Remember when Fujifilm only had three lenses available at the launch of the X-Pro 1? Some people were hesitant to buy into the system but Fujifilm was smart: they released a lens roadmap that shared all the lenses they were considering making for the X-system. That not only showed that they were committed to the system, but it also made it easier for people buying into the system. If your favourite lens wasn't among the three initially available, you at least had an idea if it was coming. Fujifilm are repeating this launch strategy with the GFX. Already we know that 3 more lenses are scheduled for this year: a 23 mm f/4 super wide, a 45 mm f/2.8 and a 110 mm f/2. I love super wide angle shots. So, the fact that I know that the 23 mm wide angle is under development is important to me. The same goes for the 110 mm f/2.

These 3 extra lenses have been announced for 2017. As mentioned, I am really looking forward to the 110 mm f/2 and the 23 mm f/4. Together with the 32-64, they would be my personal 'holy trinity' of GFX lenses.

8. Size and weight of the system

Although the lenses are what you'd expect from medium format lenses that have to cover a sensor this large, the actual body is surprisingly small and lightweight. It's about 1.2 kg with the 63 mm lens. Size-wise it's more compact than most other digital medium format cameras, except maybe for the Hasselblad X1D. However, with that camera, goodlooking as it is, I cannot help but feel that the design process has emphasized form over function. And although the GFX (or the X-T2, for that matter) don't look as retro-sexy-good as the X-Pro 2 and definitely not as the X100 series in my opinion, in the end, it's the handling that matters most. 

With the 63 mm 'standard' lens, you could almost consider the GFX as a 'walkaround' camera. Only one that delivers 51.4 megapixel files. It certainly isn't much bigger or heavier than typical pro-DSLRs.

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX63mmF2.8 R WR @ 63 mm | 1/125 @ f/2.8 | ISO 400

How would you like your GFX today? From full-blown battle dress with the EVF and the grip to minimalist and as lightweight and small as possible, with the EVF detached. The modular design lets you adapt the camera to the needs of your shoot.

9. Love those old view cameras?

The GFX has got you covered! One of the things I love about the old view cameras is that you can hold them at waist level and then look down in the viewfinder. The GFX lets you simulate that with the two way tilt screen. You can tilt it both horizontally and vertically. If you're more into EVFs, then you will be able to purchase an accessory for the EVF that lets you rotate and tilt it. But back to the LCD: it also features a touch screen, which wasn't working yet on my prototype. So I can say nothing about it but from what I saw it will definitely be useful, if only when reviewing images.

10. Other odds and ends

There's really so much more to like about the camera: the fact that it will have tethering support (for Lightroom; apparently Phase One are still on the fence if they will open up their Capture One for the GFX) or the fact that it has built-in WIFI and that you can print to an Instax printer. That might seem like a gimmick, but I can assure you that for travel photography, the Instax really is a door-opener. Or how 'bout the C-position on the lenses. They have aperture rings (like in the good old days) but for those of you who have forgotten how these work, Fujifilm have added a C-position on each lens. Put your lens on the C-position and you can control the aperture with the command dial, pretty much like you can with a DSLR. Finally, another nice feature are the crops you can set in the camera. If you shoot RAW, you still record all the image data, but seeing only the crop in the EVF or the LCD really helps you with composition, especially with the new panoramic 65:24 format, which I really like and which I plan to do more with. It's just another one of those EVF advantages, I guess.

The new panoramic 65 x 24 Aspect Ratio is almost 3:1. The preview in the EVF is a big help in composing these shots. The resulting images are still 8256 x 3048 pixels, or more than 24 megapixel. If you change your mind afterwards and want a different crop, the full 51.4 megapixels are still available in the raw file.

FUJIFILM GFX 50S | GX32-64mmF4 R LM WR @ 32 mm | 1/60 @ f/5.6 | ISO 200

Just another one of those cool features. The small LCD on the top left of the camera shows you the shooting essentials. It stays on, even when the camera is turned off.

What could be improved?

Well, nothing is perfect. Not even the GFX :-) For example, the position of the Play button takes some getting used to. The eye cup is a little too easy to lose (at least it was on my unit), but those are all minor things. Probably the biggest drawback is the 1/125th sync speed. I use a lot of flash outdoors, and the faster your sync speed, the more you can overpower the sun with a flash of a given power. I was a bit worried that this would prove to be a problem in India but it actually wasn't. I used a lightweight yet powerful 360 Ws portable battery-powered flash (the SMDV BRiHT 360) and most of the time, that was powerful enough, even when used with a softbox. I'm also happy to hear that HSS support is available with the EF-X500 flashes and the next time I have a GFX at hand, I will try if the Cactus V6 Mark II, which offers HSS with other brands' speedlights and even studio flashes on the other X-series cameras (see this blog post), will also perform that same magic with the GFX.

In conclusion

The GFX is a mighty fine camera. Or, as Jonas Rask calls it in his review, a 'portable beast'. All 825 grams and 51.4 megapixels of it. I am not a pixel peeper by nature but it's kind of addictive to scroll through those files in 1:1 view in Lightroom or Photoshop, hitting Page Down and being amazed by the level of detail that unfolds in front of your eyes. As is also indicated by the videos of the other photographers who used the GFX, this is a camera that can please a very diverse audience, Except maybe for sports shooters, everyone from the studio photographer over the landscape photographer all the way to the portrait and travel guys like myself should all seriously consider this camera. And you know, although I wouldn't take it to the Olympics, in a pinch, thanks to its 4 frames per second, it can even shoot sports, too :-) As I did in this wrestling school in Varanasi.

I had loads of misses, but I also had a couple of tack sharp shots. Not bad for a medium format camera! In situations like this, or with the boys diving into the water, the four frames per second (which is like Formula 1 in the mirrorless world) really help.

That's it for now. If you want to hear more about the GFX and the other gear I used on this trip in conjunction with it, check out the video-interview that fellow X-shooter Matt Brandon, who also edited and partly filmed my GFX Challenges video, did with me while we were waiting for our plane from Varanasi back to Delhi. There's some great gear tips in there!

Join Matt Brandon and me in Varanasi in 2018

Each year, Matt Brandon and yours truly do a photo workshop in Varanasi, India and we also have a workshop in Ladakh in the works. If you are interested in these, fill out the form below and you'll be the first to hear. We love our newsletter subscribers so they always get the scoop. The 2017 edition sold out in one hour after sending out our newsletter. Although we are both Fujifilm shooters, this workshop is open to all camera beliefs. But you might go home converted :-)

In an upcoming blog post, I will show you some still unreleased images of that I shot back home, during a couple of urban exploring photo sessions I did with dancers in order to get to know the camera a little better, before embarking on a plane to India with it.

Looking to add that extra 'oomph' to your images?

All images in this post have been processed in Lightroom with my Black & White or Colorific Color Grading Lightroom preset packs. Buy them all and save 25 percent | www.lightroompresets.be

Fujifilm releases new GFX Challenge videos

Fujifilm today have released no less than 7 new GFX Challenge videos. For the GFX Challenge, some 20 photographers worldwide got to work with a prototype of the upcoming GFX medium format camera and the three lenses that are going to ship with it when the camera is released: the 63 mm f/2.8, the 32-64 f/4 zoom and the 120 f/4 stabilised macro. 

The photographers were free to do what they wanted. The only thing is they had to make a three minute video of using the camera. It's really refreshing to see what people do with the camera. Not only the photography is truly breathtaking, but some of the videos are also beautifully made and most of them were filmed in 4K with Fujifilm X-T2 cameras.

Gary Heery (Australia)

Australian photographer Gary Heery uses the GFX and the macro lens to create some really beautiful still lifes (litterally) of objects frozen in time. I cannot wait to see these printed large. And neither can he, apparently!

Roméo Balancourt (France)

French portrait, architecture and food photographer Roméo Balancourt uses the GFX on location to shoot upscale restaurants and their crew. It's interesting to see him set up an entire lighting studio on location. He mixes available (tungsten) lights with flash and fresnel spots. He appreciates the Q menu and the Electronic Viewfinder that shows him exactly what he's going to get. I blogged about the advantages of an EVF a while back in this post. Roméo admits that before using the GFX, he always had to add extra sharpening to his images before delivering them to his clients. With the GFX, he no longer has to, he says. I also loved how the images he made during the video come together in a final composite, at around the 4 minute 5 seconds mark.

Luciano Romano (Italy)

For his GFX Challenge, Italian photographer Luciano Romano wanted to combine his three favorite elements of photography: art, architecture, and theater. He loves the excellent ergonomics of the camera (something I can confirm: if you're used to working with a DSLR or Fujifilm's X-T2, you'll feel right at home).

Victor Liu (Canada)

Perhaps it's slightly over-the-top, but I just love this Canadian landscape's photographer's video. I love the low angles, the fades from the video to shots of the GFX and back. It's like a trailer for a blockbuster movie. Or should I say, a blockbuster camera? Victor shows that the GFX absolutely feels at home in very rugged conditions. Now I want to go to the Rocky Mountains, too...

Ivan Joshua Loh (Singapore)

Medium format and cars. It's a marriage made in heaven. As such, the Mercedes SLS appears to be a hot ticket amongst car photographers: Ivan Joshua Loh from Singapore is the second GFX Challenger to photograph this gull-winged beauty of a car, yet he does so in a completely different way than Satoshi Minakawa.

Per-Anders Jörgensen (Sweden)

Swedish photographer Per-Anders Jörgensen describes his own work as "faked documentary" (a term I have to remember as it kind of reflects some of the stuff I do). Just like Roméo Balancourt, he takes the GFX to a restaurant but he uses it to photograph the preparation of food. It's interesting to see hem use a curtain as a diffuser tent and get under it to get the softest light possible. That's the nice thing about these GFX videos: you always pick up a thing or two that you can insert in your own workflow...

Minoru Kobayashi (Japan)

Japanese Minoru Kobayashi takes the GFX outside to photograph a sports car. I'm no petrolhead, but I think its a Honda NSX. Its 573 bhp sure goes well with the GFX's 51+ megapixel. He loves what he calls the "resolution with density" that only medium format can provide. His favourite film simulation is Velvia back from in the days where he shot Velvia on film, at ASA 50 or 100. He really loves the fact that he can now shoot Velvia digitally, with a previously unthought of ISO of 1600 and above!

With a price point of "well under $10,000" including the standard 63 mm lens, the GFX might very well wind up to be not only a "medium-format-killer" but also a "high-end-dslr-killer". And we've still got a couple of more GFX Challenge videos to come! In the mean time, if you want to see how the GFX behaves on the busy streets of India, have a look at (shameless plug, I I know), my own GFX video:

And in case you still need some more convincing, here's the other GFX videos that have been released thus far:

Testing the GFX was a lot of fun. Actually, it only had one drawback. I want one, now... 

Honoured, humbled, frightened and excited, part 2: my Fujifilm GFX Challenge

About a year ago, I published a blog post called 'Honoured, humbled, frightened and excited'. These words best described my feelings when I was invited by Fujifilm to test a pre-production sample of the X-Pro 2.

Fast forward to November 2016. I got a call from the Belgian Fujifilm office, inviting me to participate in the GFX Challenge: a limited number of photographers worldwide would get the opportunity to test drive a preproduction sample of the long-awaited and even longer-rumoured Fujifilm Mirrorless Medium Format camera, the 50 megapixel GFX 50 S.

So I was feeling humbled, honoured, frightened and excited all over again. Well, maybe even a little more humbled and honoured and definitely a lot more frightened, as the group consisted of only 20 photographers. Compared to last year, we not only were supposed to make images with the camera, but we were also asked to produce a short video clip. Other than that, we were free to do choose how, where and what we wanted to photograph.

I thought it would be cool to see how a camera that is thought of by most people as a typical studio camera, would behave outside of its natural habitat. So I rustled up fellow Fujifilm photographers Matt Brandon and Serge Van Cauwenbergh as cameramen and within days of being asked, we were on a plane to one of my favourite places to shoot: Varanasi, India.  

Below is the clip on the official Fujifilm Youtube channel (with Japanese subtitles). It was filmed entirely in 4K with X-T2 cameras, by the way. For now, that is all I can share. More pictures and a more detailed account of my experience with the GFX will follow when Fujifilm releases the embargo.

In case your Japanese or your English are a little rusty, below is the clip on my Vimeo account. It's the same, but it gives you a choice of Dutch and English subtitles.

A huge thanks to Serge, Matt, Matt's wife Alou (who acted as my voice activated light stand) and our guide/fixer/translator Manoj. This would not have been possible without you, guys (and gal)! Further thanks are obviously due to Fujifilm Japan and Fujifilm Belgium and finally also a big thank you to Ruth and Noah for letting me embark on this unexpected journey on such short notice.

Join Matt Brandon and me in Varanasi in 2018.

If seeing this video got you excited about Fujifilm and/or photographing in India, know that Matt and I will be leading another Location Portraiture and Lighting Masterclass there in 2018. The 2017 edition of this workshop sold out in just one hour. We'll be releasing details about the 2018 one within the coming weeks. If you want to be notified as soon as dates and details are available, you can sign up for information via the form below. Please make sure to click on the link in the confirmationi email you receive.

Young meets old in the narrow alleyways of Varanasi. An orange-gelled Cactus RF60 was fired through a gridded SMDV70 Speedbox to produce this image. 

How WYSIWYG is your DSLR? 5 Advantages of an EVF

As most of you know, I’m an avid mirrorless camera user. In my case, that mirrorless camera is a Fujifilm, well, actually a couple of them! I often talk to DSLR users who want to switch to a lighter, mirrorless system, but the fear that they will miss the Optical Viewfinder (OVF) of their DSLR is holding them back. I can relate to that feeling, as I had it too, when I took the plunge almost five years ago. But you want to know something? After years of shooting mirrorless, I have come to love the Electronic Viewfinder (EVF) on my Fuji’s so much that my only fear now is not having one. Luckily, this happens only rarely, like when I'm writing a magazine article or a blog post about an accessory that's only available for DSLRs.

So for all of you still on the fence about EVFs, let me tell you what you’re currently missing out on by not using one. If you’re already using an EVF, I hope you can get some tips from this article as to how to get the most out of it and I’m looking forward to reading your own tips in the comments.

1. An EVF is WYSYWIG, an OVF is WYSIWYTYG

Back in the early days of Desktop Publishing, WYSIWIG (What You See Is What You Get) was all the rage: finally, you could see your layout as it would come rolling out of your printer. An EVF is just the same: it shows you what you’re going to get. An OVF on the other hand is WYSIWYTYG: What You See Is What You Think You Get. And that can lead to quite some disappointment when you finally get to view your shots on your monitor. After all, we all know that the human eye can see a lot more dynamic range than a camera sensor can (regardless whether that sensor is in a DSLR or in a mirrorless camera style body). An EVF shows you what your camera makes of the dynamic range in front of you, and lets you adjust your settings accordingly before you take the shot.

An EVF shows you the image you're going to wind up with, not the image you think you're going to get. Image © Fujifilm

If you’re shooting RAW, you can even tweak your in-camera settings so they are as close as possible to showing you what your RAW file is capable of. For example, by setting the Film Simulation to Pro Neg Standard and dialing down the Highlights and Shadows to -2, I get a relatively flat looking image in the viewfinder. Using one of the more contrasty film simulations like Velvia would unnecessarily make me underexpose my shots to preserve highlight detail.

Have you ever shot with a DSLR with the intent to crop your images to a square afterwards? You just have to imagine that crop while you’re shooting. Not so with the Fuji: set it to a square crop in the Quick Menu and … what you see is what you get. This makes it much easier to accurately frame your shots in-camera. Best of all, while the JPEG you record will indeed be square, if you shoot RAW + JPEG, you’ll still have the full image data in the RAW file in case you want to change your mind later on. By default, the RAW will appear as a square crop in Lightroom but if you reset that crop, you’ll get the full image back. The best of both worlds!

If you love to shoot Black & White with a square aspect ratio, just choose those settings from the Quick Menu and what you see is what you'll get. This is a tremendous advantage in determining the right composition and subject matter. Here, I chose ACROS with a Yellow Filter. By shooting RAW + JPEG, you'll still be able to go change your mind afterwards if you prefer color and/or a different aspect ratio!

The same goes for film simulations. In addition to square, I also love Black & White. And while I have created my own set of dramatic Lightroom presets for B+W, I love the fact that I can set the camera to black and white (on the X-T2, there’s no less than 8 settings to choose from - I’m deliberately not counting Sepia!) so I already get a feel for how a particular scene would work in Black & White. Just like with the square crop, if I shoot RAW + JPEG, I keep my options open if ever I want to process the image in color, too. With a regular DSLR viewfinder, you have to ‘imagine’ the black and white the same as you have to imagine the crop.

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-320 sec. @ f/16 | ISO 400
Being able to already preview the scene in Black & White with a 1:1 aspect ratio through the EVF is a tremendous advantage. With an OVF, you'd have to imagine the square crop and the absence of colour. The in-camera film simulation gave me an idea of whether the scene would work in Black & White. In postproduction, I used one of my Black & White Lightroom presets for an even grittier feel.

2. All the info you want in a heads-up display

In cars, HUDs (Heads-Up Display) are becoming increasingly popular: all essential information like speed, traffic warnings and so are projected on the windscreen in front of you, so you don’t have to take your eyes off the road. An OVF only gives you a very limited amount of information in the viewfinder. In the EVF of my Fujifilm cameras, I have complete control over what information I want to display: Level indicator? Check! Live histogram? Check! Distance scale with depth-of-field information? Check! I even have two settings to choose from: pixel-based or film based, the latter being more tolerant.

Did you know that when I turn my camera to portrait mode, the info on the EVF like the histogram rotates 90 degrees as well so I don't have to read it at a 90 degree angle... Image © Fujifilm

The EVF on the X-T2 is so huge and widescreen, that some people prefer to set it to Normal mode, which makes the image slightly smaller and surrounded by a black band. When in capture mode, pressing the DISP/BACK lets you switch between these two options. When you're in Manual Focusing Mode, you have a third option: DUAL. This mode shows you a split view with the 100 percent view of your image to the left and the area your focusing on smaller and to the right with the focus aid of your choice, e.g. Focus Peaking or Digital Split Image as in this example. Image © Fujifilm.

All this information is available to me without having to take my eye of the scene, resulting in a more informed decision and therefore in less wasted shots. 

You can add as much - or as little - information in the EVF as you want. In this case, the bar at the bottom is the distance scale. It displays a white bar (at 1.8 m) where the actual focus point is. The blue bars left and right indicate the range of acceptable focus. This is ideal for zone-based focusing. Image © Fujifilm

What I also love - in fact I love it so much I have dedicated a function button to it - is the ‘Preview EXP/WB in manual mode’ setting. This does the following: when I’m in Manual Exposure Mode, I can set this so that the EVF reflects the exposure I have manually set on the camera. When I’m mixing flash with available light, very often I’ll underexpose the ambient light by up to two stops. When Preview EXP/WB in manual mode is set to 'on', it lets me preview the available light component of my image, without having to take a test shot like I would have to on a DSLR. However, in that mode, my subject (which I’m about to light with flash), will generally be underexposed. Simply by toggling the function button and switching the setting to off, I can tell the EVF to increase its brightness (the actual exposure will remain unchanged, of course!) so that I can actually see my model's face and the way he or she is posing.

In the camera's settings, you can choose what info you want to be displayed on the EVF. You can do this separately for capture and playback. During playback, you can press the DISP/BACK button to cycle through a couple of other screens, including one without any overlays that lets you focus on the actual picture.

An overview of all the info you can choose to display in your EVF and LCD. I just would not display it all at once! Image © Fujifilm and Masami Tanaka.

3. My EVF sees better than my eyes can!

I am finding that I get sharper pictures with my mirrorless camera than I used to with my DSLRs. The reason is twofold. First of all, the AF system on my Fujifilm cameras is hybrid: it uses a combination of a faster but slightly less accurate phase detection system (which is the same system DSLRs are using) with a slower but more precise contrast detection system. Yet where an EVF really shines is in manual focus: first of all, you have two manual focus assist systems to help you. The first is the Digital Split Image, which is similar to how we used to manually focus back in the day. Your image is virtually split in two and by turning the zoom ring, you can move the two halves to the point where they are in line. That’s when your focus is optimal.

The digital split-image function, here on the X-E2: turn the focus ring on the lens until the four blocks in the middle perfectly align and your image is in focus! Image © Fujifilm

As retro-cool as it is, I rarely use this feature, though. I prefer Focus Peak Highlight. What this does is display a fringe in the colour of your choice (Blue, White or Red) around the areas of your image that are in focus.

Add to that the option to zoom into the area you’re focusing on by pressing the rear command dial. If you then turn the dial, you can switch between a 3x and a 10x magnification. I don’t know about you, but I don’t have a 10x zoom built into my eyes when I’m using an OVF!

While I am still predominantly an AF-guy, I have recently set up my X-T2 and X-Pro 2 to AF + MF for this exact reason: this lets me manually override the AF and as soon as I turn the zoom ring on the lens, I get the all the MF assist goodies in my viewfinder, like the Focus Peaking and the magnification options.

4. No more chimping

The advantages so far were all about helping you before you take the actual shot. But perhaps the biggest advantage lies in reviewing what you just shot. As a DSLR user, you probably know how annoying it can be to review a picture you just took on the LCD on the back of your camera, especially in the glaring sun. If anything, your reflection is usually clearer than the actual photo! On top of that, chimping makes you lose the connection with the scene in front of you: if something shoot-worthy happens, you have to bring the camera back to your eye first. None of that with an EVF. On my Fuji’s, I have two ways I can take advantage of the EVF: first of all, I can set the camera up that it always briefly displays the image I just shot in the viewfinder. Because the viewfinder is much more shielded from the ambient light than the rear LCD is (especially on the X-T1 and X-T2) I get a much better idea of what the image will look like on my monitor. The Fujifilm menu gives me a choice between off, continuous, 0.5 seconds and 1.5 seconds. Regardless of those settings, you can always go straight back to shooting with a half press on the shutter release.

The obligatory kitten shot! An EVF only has one disadvantage: it's really hard to take a picture of the EVF itself :-) Here's a crappy iPhone attempt! When in playback mode, pressing the rear command dial automatically zooms in to 100 percent at the focus point you used when you made the shot. No need to take your eye of the viewfinder.

Then, there’s the playback button. This gives me even more options of reviewing my images, whether on the rear LCD or in the EVF. The one I use most is to check for sharpness: simply press the rear command dial in playback mode and the image will zoom to 100% on the focus point you used. Ideal for judging sharpness post-capture. By the way, this is also the reason I shoot RAW + Large JPEG: the larger the JPEG, the more zoomed-in view you get because you’re actually looking at the JPEG, not the Raw. If you’re shooting RAW only, the EVF will only be able to show you the (smaller) embedded JPEG preview that’s inside the RAW. If you’re like me and you’re generally only shooting RAW + JPEG for that reason, it might be a good idea to use two cards and set card slot one up to hold your RAW files and card slot two to store the JPEGs. That way, you only have to import your first card in Lightroom.

5. Shooting sports with an EVF

The Vertical Power Booster Grip VPB-XT2 not only triples your mileage by adding  two extra batteries, it also has a Boost button which revs up the EVF's refresh rate from 60 to 100 frames per second. Image © Fujifilm

There was one area where traditionally OVFs had a clear advantage, and that was in sports photography. Yet - did you note the use of the present imperfect in the last sentence - even that last stronghold is now under EVF-attack with the advent of the X-T2 and the optional Power Booster Grip. By switching the grip to Boost mode, the EVF refresh rate increases from 60 frames per second to 100 frames per second. For general photography, 60 fps is more than enough, but when you want to shoot fast action, 100 fps can make a difference: I’m no sports photographer, but I tried the feature in a moving train: looking outside through the EVF at 60 fps, the image was choppy. At 100 fps it was one continuous, uninterrupted flow. The Boost mode also significantly reduces viewfinder blackout.

So, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that people like fellow X-Photographer Dirk Bogaerts use the X-T2 even to photograph car races like Francorchamps and Le Mans!

The best of both worlds

On the X-Pro 2 with its unique hybrid viewfinder, you can set up the OVF as the main viewfinder but still have the EVF displayed in the bottom right corner. You have 3 zoom levels available: 100% field of view, 2.5x magnification and 6x magnification. This is handy for checking focus, real-time exposure, white balance and what not. It's really the ultimate viewfinder experience. Image © Fujifilm

So, if you’re on the fence about getting a mirrorless camera in general (and a Fujifilm one in particular), the absence of an optical viewfinder should not hold you back, on the contrary! If you want to go EVF all the way, it’s hard to do better than the X-T2. The X-T2 has a bright and large viewfinder and the slightly longer eyecup does a great job of shielding the ambient light. However, if you really want the best of both worlds, you should consider the X-Pro 2: it’s got a unique Hybrid Electronic Viewfinder that marries an EVF with a rangefinder-style Optical Viewfinder: the latter is great for street photography, because unlike the viewfinder of a DSLR, it shows you more than the actual frame you’re going to get (the actual frame is approximated in the viewfinder by a white frameline). So you can anticipate on people or things entering your frame much more easily, which is ideal for those decisive moment shots. Even better: you can overlay a miniature EVF in the bottom right corner of the OVF so you have the benefits the EVF as well, all at once. And of course, you can switch from one viewfinder to the other, as well by using the lever on the front of the camera.

So, I hope this article will have relieved you from any fears you might have of shooting with an Electronic Viewfinder, at least a state-of-the-art one as is included in any of the recent Fujifilm cameras. Try one out in a camera shop near you and when you return to your old OVF, you'll know all the good stuff you're missing out on!

300 € cashback: To X-T1 or not to X-T1?

Met alle hype rond Fuji's nieuwe digitale middenformaatcamera GFX zou je bijna de 'gewone' X-camera's gaan vergeten. Recent nog lanceerde Fujifilm de X-T2, de opvolger van de immens populaire X-T1. Die laatste is overigens nog altijd te koop. De X-T2 (winkelprijs ca 1.700 euro body-only) kost sowieso ongeveer 500 euro meer dan zijn voorganger (1.200 euro body-only). Voor dat geld krijg je de helft meer megapixels, een beter kantelscherm, een handige joystick-controller, een gevoelig verbeterde autofocus en natuurlijk nog een resem kleinere verbeteringen.

Rock the Cashback!

Alsof dat het kiezen tussen beide toestellen nog niet moeilijk genoeg maakt, loopt er tot 31 januari 2017 nog een cashback-actie op de X-T1 waarbij zowel de zwarte als de graphite editie en zowel de body-only als de kit met de 18-55 en de 18-135 in aanmerking komen. Je kan maar liefst 300 euro terug claimen na aankoop. Dat brengt het effectieve prijsverschil op ongeveer 800 euro of anders uitgedrukt: de X-T1 kost momenteel ongeveer slechts de helft van de X-T2!

Is de X-T1 plots een slechtere camera geworden nu de X-T2 uitgekomen is? Natuurlijk niet! En met die 800 prijsverschil euro koop je al bijna een top prime objectief zoals de 56 mm f/1.2, de 16 mm f/1.4 of de 23 mm f/1.4 of... een vliegtuigticket naar een fotogenieke bestemming!

X-T1 of X-T2?

Fotografeer je graag snel bewegende onderwerpen, druk je graag op (echt) groot formaat af of wil je gewoon altijd het beste van het beste, dan zou ik eventjes door de appel bijten en toch maar onmiddellijk voor de X-T2 gaan. Je koopt dan een van de beste spiegelloze systeemcamera's die er momenteel op de markt is. Dat zeg ik trouwens niet, maar de EISA (de Europese foto-vakpers) die onlangs de X-Pro 2, het broertje van de X-T2, tot European Professional Compact System Camera van het jaar verkoos.

Indien je echter meer statische onderwerpen fotografeert en niet onmiddellijk op groot formaat afdrukt, dan is de X-T1 vandaag de dag nog altijd diezelfde goede camera als hij was bij zijn introductie. Eigenlijk is hij zelfs nog beter geworden, want hij heeft nog een aantal firmware updates gekregen. Ik heb fotoboeken gemaakt van 30 x 30 cm. Ik houd er daarbij van om één foto op een dubbele pagina te zetten zodat hij 60 x 30 cm afgedrukt wordt. Die afdrukken zien er fantastisch uit. Niemand die merkt de foto uit 'slechts' 16 megapixels bestond, waarvan ik er door de 2:1 uitsnede dan nog maar 12 gebruikte! 

De 16 megapixels van de X-T1 zijn groot genoeg om een dubbele pagina te vullen in een 30 x 30 fotoboek. Zelf maak ik die met Lightroom (natuurlijk!) en Blurb. Enkel de voor- en achtercover, die je hier ziet, maak ik op in Photoshop

De huidige cashback maakt de X-T1 ook een interessante keuze voor wie in het X-systeem wil stappen op een budgetvriendelijke manier en nog wat geld wil overhouden voor de lenzen.

Hieronder vind je een selectie van tien van mijn favoriete foto's die allemaal met de X-T1 gemaakt zijn. Als je er reiskriebels van krijgt: met het bedrag van de cashback raak je al tot in India! *

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF16-55mmF2.8 R LM WR | 1-180 sec. bij f - 2,8 | ISO 200

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-125 sec. bij f - 4,0 | ISO 800

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-60 sec. bij f - 16 | ISO 400

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-180 sec. bij f - 6,4 | ISO 800

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF50-140mmF2.8 R LM OIS WR | 1-280 sec. bij f - 5,0 | ISO 400

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF16-55mmF2.8 R LM WR | 1-125 sec. bij f - 3,6 | ISO 200

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-3 sec. bij f - 4,0 | ISO 800

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 28,0 sec. bij f - 11 | ISO 400

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-7 sec. bij f - 11 | ISO 200

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 170,0 sec. bij f - 11 | ISO 200

Meer info over deze actie (en hoe je de cashback kan claimen) vind je bij je Fujifilm-dealer.

* Een ticket naar India kost ca 600 €, met de cashback geraak je dus al op je bestemming! En er valt zoveel te fotograferen dat je toch niet onmiddellijk terug wilt... Of je moet twee X-T1's in met cashback kopen :-)

Announcing the second edition of the Location Portraiture and Lighting Masterclass in Varanasi, India

I am pleased to announce that the incomparable travel photographer Matt Brandon and yours truly have teamed up again for the second edition of the Location Portraiture and Lighting Masterclass in Varanasi, India.

You'll learn how to create impactful, cinematic 'environmental portraits' by combining wide angle lenses, shallow depth-of-field and some extra light. At night, there will be plenty of time to discuss the images' catch of the day and suitable postproduction techniques.

Full details will follow in a couple of weeks - UPDATE: full details can be found here - but here's the lowdown: this is not just a travel workshop nor only a portrait workshop. It's not merely a street photography nor just a lighting workshop and it's definitely not only a postprocessing workshop. In fact, it's all five of those elements blended together in an incomparable mix, pretty much like the Indian chai we'll be having when we're discussing images at the end of the day. In short, if you're into any of the above, you should seriously consider coming. If you're into most or all of them, you have no excuse not to come!

We're wrapping up some final details, but the dates are already set and I already wanted to share these with you: this unique workshop will be held from Saturday, February 25th 2017 until Sunday, March 5th. We will meet in New Delhi and after two introductory days of shooting the bustling street life there, we will go to Varanasi. For the rest of the week, this holy city will become the beautiful backdrop for our portrait sessions. In fact, probably the only thing more photogenic than the city itself is its inhabitants. We will photograph sadhus and silversmiths, fishmongers and rickshaw drivers.

We will use available light but we'll help that available light a hand (or two) by bringing our own available lights (in the form of speedlights and portable studio flashes) to the party. 

Best of all, while other workshops often have an 8:1 or even 10:1 guest/workshop leader ratio, we're limiting subscriptions to only 6 participants (so a 3:1 ratio), so you will have ample opportunity to interact with us and with the people we'll be photographing.

In this workshop, you'll learn how to make beautifully lit images even in the harshest of natural light conditions.

This workshop is open to all levels of photographers using mirrorless or DSLR-style cameras who know the basics about operating their cameras. You don't need to be a flash wizard, but we'll help you become one! And if you're already familiar with flash, we'll teach you more than a couple of tricks to take your knowledge and your images up a couple of notches. We've called this 'a Lighting Masterclass' because that's what we want you to be by the time you return back home: a master of lighting, both available light and flash, and any mix in between, for that matter.  Below are some examples of the kinds of pictures we made on the first edition of this workshop last year and previous workshops in Delhi.

If you want to be first to learn when the workshop website goes up and final details and pricing are announced, use the form below. (Note: even if you're already subscribed to the regular MoreThanWords newsletter, I recommend you fill out this form).

UPDATE: No need to fill out the form as the Masterclass' page is now up: you can find it here.

We used a so-called 'Short Lighting' light setup here because it works great with character faces like this sadhu's.

Have your travel juices already started to flow? Subscribe to my regular newsletter and get this free eBook with '10 tips for better travel photographs'!

Flash and the Fujifilm X-system: dramatic lighting in India

After my blog post about my first six months with the X-Pro 2 went online, a number of people asked me how I lit my Varanasi portraits. So I thought this would make an excellent subject for a blog post.

One flash, big or small

In 90 percent of my shots, I use only one artificial light. Depending on how much power I need, this can be a powerful portable, battery powered studio strobe like the Jinbei HD600 (reviewed here) or a simple speedlight. With my X-Pro 2, the latter will generally be a Godox Ving V850 (reviewed here) or a Cactus RF60, triggered by a Cactus V6 transmitter (reviewed here). 

However, as the opening image shows, this does not mean I only have one light source in my shot. On sunny days, I'll generally pose my subject with his back towards the sun. Then, I'll underexpose the ambient. This kills two birds in one stone. First of all, the sun makes for a nice rim light, separating my subject from the background.

Obviously, if you'd do this without flash light, your subject would be in the shade. But that's where the flash comes in! I generally work in manual mode, both on my ambient exposure as on my flash exposure. After having set the background exposure the way I like it, I'll start adjusting the flash power until it looks right to me.

That's one of the reasons why I love Electronic Viewfinders so much: they can give me a preview of the ambient exposure and they also give me a glare-free, reflection-free review of the image in the viewfinder, immediately after I've taken the shot. Ever tried reviewing the image you just made on a DSLR screen in the blazing sun? I rest my case.

Positioning the flash

I love me some drama in my shots. So I'll rarely put the flash behind me. Most of the time, my flash will come from a 45 degree angle or even more, because that lets me create some drama in the face of my subject and it gives a nice triangle of light under the eye on the shadow-side of the face, the famous 'Rembrandt-look'.

Sometimes, I'll have my subjects look straight into the camera, but whenever possible, I prefer to have them look slightly off-camera. When you position your subject that way, you have two ways of lighting them: you can either light the side of the face that's directed towards the camera, or you can light the side of the face that's turned away from the camera. The first is called broad lighting and the second is called short lighting. 

FUJIFILMX-Pro2 | XF16mmF1.4 R WR | 1/250 sec. @ f/1.8 | ISO 200
In the opening image, the flash and softbox were just outside of the frame, to the left. In this image, the flash is to my right, lighting the side of the face that's turned towards the camera. The result is a much flatter looking image.

The latter makes for a much more dramatic look. Compare the opening image of the rickshaw driver (which used the short lighting technique) to this one here, which was lit with broad lighting.

When I shoot against the sun, I'll also try to put my flash diagonally opposite to the sun, and have my subject stand in between them. This diagonal lighting technique is called cross lighting. If this means I have to move my subject, so be it. Of course, in the mean time, I take the background into consideration, too. This makes that sometimes, I'll revisit a certain scene later that day or earlier the following day to assure the best possible combination of sun and background. If there's no sun, I'll recreate the cross-lighting scheme using two flashes 

The 'short'-cross-lighting technique in action. The light falling on this sadhu's shoulder is the sun.

Modifiers

My two SMDV speedboxes in action. The small one on the right is the SMDV Speedbox 70, equipped with a grid. The big one on the left is the SMDV Alpha 110.

Recently, I have discovered the fantastic line-up of modifiers by a company called SMDV. In Varanasi, I used both their SMDV Speedbox 70 and their SMDV Alpha Speedbox 110. The first is aimed at speedlight, the second has a Bowens mount and is aimed at bigger studio lights. They are strong, reliable and can be set-up in under 30 seconds. This means a lot if you're constantly moving around. And, better still, breaking them up is done in literally two seconds. You just press a couple of buttons and off you go.

FUJIFILMX-Pro2 | XF50-140mmF2.8 R LM OIS WR | 1/250 sec. @ f/5.0 | ISO 400
This image only has one light in it: the Jinbei HD 600 fired through the SMDV Alpha 110 softbox.
Postprocessing was done with one of my Colorific Color Grading Presets for Lightroom.

But maybe the best thing about the SMDV Speedboxes is that both of them can be gridded. Especially in the narrow Varanasi alleyways, this can make for a huge difference and lets you control your light much more. In fact, they only have one disadvantage: they're not cheap but you really get what you pay for in this case. In Europe, they can be bought through the fine folks of Foto Morgen. Outside of Europe, I'd recommend the equally helpful staff of 1212world.com. If you want to know more about the SMDV 70, check out fellow X-photographer Matt Brandon's blog post about it.

Another image in which I used short lighting. The softbox is just outisde of the frame. This results in a soft yet contrasty light with a dramatic light falloff (because of the inverse square law). By the time the light that correctly lights his forehead, has reached his ears, it has already lost a lot of power.
Image processed with my new Lightroom preset pack: Piet's Power Preset Pack, Vol 01.

I'll generally put the softboxes as close to my subject as possible, generally just outside of the frame,  for three reasons. First of all, the closer they are, the softer the light will be. Yet, the light falloff will be more dramatic which is what I'm after in the first place, remember? Finally, by putting them close to my subject, I make it easier on my flash because it has to work less hard. If you're familiar with the infamous inverse square law, this says that if you double the distance between your flash and your subject, you'll need four times the light output.

This inverse square law can also work in your favour: if you halve the distance between your light and your subject, you need four times less light!  

ND filters

Finally, there's one other piece of kit in my camera bag that comes in really handy when using flash with the Fujifilm X-system. Unlike most other brands, Fujifilm cameras still aren't capable of performing High Speed Sync. Unless you're shooting the fantastic X100 series cameras, you're limited to a sync speed of 1/250th on the X-Pro 2 and 1/180th on all the other X-series cameras. If there's a lot of sun (and I can assure you that in Varanasi, there is!) this means that you'll have to resort to apertures of f/16 or smaller. In other words, no way of using shallow depth of field to isolate your subject from the background. Unless... you use an ND filter. I generally use a combination of a fixed (by Formatt-Hitech) and a variable one (by B+W) and I'll explain the reason for that in an upcoming blog post.

If you want to know more about working with flash in general and off-camera flash in particular, you might want to check out my Making Light and Making Light II ebooks, available over at Craft & Vision. If you already know your way around the technical sides of off-camera flash and if you're looking for a more inspirational book, make sure to check out the slightly fantastic Joey L's Photographing Shadow and Light.

6 months with the X-Pro 2

I have been using the X-Pro 2 for half a year now and that calls for a celebration. Because I could not find half-year birthday candles, I decided to print a book with some of my favorite images. And then I thought, why not create a small slideshow, while I'm at it? 

Ever since I received a pre-production sample in november 2015, the X-Pro 2 has become my go-to camera. I use it for portraits and landscapes, for urban exploration and cityscapes.

I have taken the camera with me through hot and dusty India and through cold and rainy Belgium. I have shot it in the glaring sun and in near darkness. Long exposures and short ones. Natural light and flash. 

FUJIFILM X-Pro2 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS @ 14.5 mm | 1-250 sec at f - 16 | ISO 200

I love the unobtrusive look that lets me focus on my subjects instead of having them focus on my camera. I love the retro dials on the body and the aperture rings on the lenses. I love the instant feedback of the Electronic Viewfinder and the fact that I can easily switch to an optical one in those instances where I prefer it, like when I’m shooting street photography.

FUJIFILM X-Pro2 | XF56mm F1.2 @ 56 mm | 1-125 sec at f  - 1.2 | ISO 200 | Acros Film Simulation profile in Lightroom

Finally, and perhaps most importantly, I love the quality of the raw files that let me do almost anything I want in postproduction. Yet, I am perhaps even more impressed by the out-of-camera jpegs and the beautiful film simulations like Classic Chrome, Pro Neg and the new Acros.

I have included the EXIF info under each image, so you can have an idea as to what lenses I use and what they’re capable of. My personal favorites are the XF 10-24 and the XF 56 1.2 but I also find myself increasingly using the XF 16-55 and the XF 50-140. Almost all of the lenses in the Fujifilm line-up are sharp, but these two really knock it out of the park. Especially with the new X-Pro 2 sensor.

Even if you enjoy these images only half as much as I have enjoyed creating them, you should be in for a great visual journey, from Brussels to Benares.

P.S. All images have been processed in Lightroom, using either my Colorific Color Grading presets or my Black + White presets.

Review: Cactus V6 Transceiver and the Fujifilm X system

Earlier, I reviewed the excellent Godox Ving V850 manual flash. It still is one of my favorite flashes for off-camera flash photography in general and on my Fuji system in particular. However, recently, I’ve also been working a lot with another manual system: the Cactus RF-60 flash and the Cactus V6 transceiver. As this is a manual system, it isn't exclusive to Fuji users: almost any camera with a central firing pin on the hotshoe can use it. That's the beauty of manual flashes: they work on every camera. In this blog post, I'll focus on the V6 transceiver.

The V6 Transceiver

I still remember using the Cactus V4 on my X-Pro 1 a couple of years ago. It was a small and cheap, no frills triggering system. It got the job done, but that was about it. Two iterations later - I've never used the V5 - the V6 is quite a different beast: first of all, it's a transceiver: the same unit can function as a transmitter or as a receiver. You just slide a switch on the side to set it up. The unit has grown quite a lot in size, but also in specifications: in fact, it seems like remote TTL and High Speed Sync are about the only two things you cannot do with it. And one of those is about to change, as you'll read further down the road! (Images © Cactus)

• Control of up to 4 groups of remote flashes
  The V6 can control 4 groups of remote flashes: either RF60 flashes, or other compatible flashes. In that last case, those flashes have to be attached to a V6 acting as a receiver. The RF60 has its own compatible receiver which obviously makes it a compelling candidate to use in concert with the V6, if you don't already own a flash. To turn a group on or off, you simply press the buttons A through D on the left hand side of the transceiver.
• Change power levels remotely
  You can remotely change the power level of compatible flashes, such as Cactus' own RF60, from the easy to use rotary dial. But, as I'll talk about in the section 'Recycling your old Canon and Nikon flashes', you can even control the (manual) power of those flashes remotely!
• Change power levels independently or in unison
  This one's a biggie if you use multiple groups a lot. Say you're working at f/8 and you've set group A to quarter power, group B to one sixteenth power and group C to one eight power to get the shot looking the way you want it. Now suppose you want to close your aperture down from f/8 to f/11. With many systems, you'd have to increase each individual group's power output by one stop. With the Cactus V6, you can choose: you can change the power individually but you can also change the power of all groups together! A big time-saver.
• TTL passthrough hotshoe
  Although the V6 does not support off-camera TTL flash, it has a hotshoe on top of it. When used as a receiver, this hotshoe obviously lets you slide the remote flash in it, like most recent receivers do. But, when used as a transmitter on your camera, the V6 passes the TTL information from your camera on to a TTL flash you put on it. In other words, you can use the V6 to combine a TTL on-camera flash with manual remote flashes. This is something wedding and event photographers will appreciate. The passthrough hotshoe has another advantage, which I'll talk about later in the section 'Using two trigges simultaneously'.
• A lock system for the selection rotary dial
  Here's another cool thing: because the rotary dial is facing towards you, it's not uncommon on smaller camera bodies, such as the X-series, to have your nose or your forehead inadvertently change settings when your working. In one of the firmware updates, Cactus installed the option of locking the rotary dial. In that case, you have to depress it first to make changes. An ideal setting for people with big noses, such as myself! Here's the how-to straight from the manual:
  • On the TX main screen, pressing and holding the selection dial or the OK button for 2 seconds will lock the selection dial from adjusting all group or single group power level. (Note: The short-cut to adjust a single group power level by pressing a group button and turning the dial simultaneously will be unaffected.
  • To temporarily unlock the selection dial, press the selection dial or OK button once. Alternatively, press and hold any group button to select a group for power level adjustment. The dial will be locked again when no button or dial is pressed or turned for 2 seconds.
  • To permanently unlock the selection dial, press and hold the selection dial or the OK button for 2 seconds.
• Advanced features
  The V6 also has another nifty feature up its sleeve: you can set up a delay in milliseconds. I haven't actually tried this yet, but it looks like you could use this feature as a workaround to do something resembling off-camera second-curtain sync. If you're reading this and you can confirm this, please let me know in the comments. Another nice feature is that you can choose the increments between 1/10th of a stop to half a stop. 

Recycling your old Canon and Nikon flashes

A really nice feature about the V6 trigger is that you can recycle your old Canon and Nikon flashes. After all, if whether you’re only adding Fujifilm camera to your existing Nikon or Canon gear or you’re making the switch entirely, you’ve probably already spent a lot of money on bodies and lenses so anything that you can reuse is welcome. Well, the good thing is that most Nikon and Canon flashes can be used in combination with a V6 transceiver. Although you obviously lose any TTL and high speed sync functionality, you can still set up the system so that you can remotely change the manual power level of your Nikon flash. That’s right: by attaching a V6 transceiver to your Fuji camera and by putting your old SB900 on another V6 transceiver, you’ll be able to manually change the power of that flash! What’s even better is that if you use two different flashes (e.g. an SB-700 and an SB-900) you can set the system up that they have the same absolute maximum output (dictated by the lowest output of both). In other words, when you set them both in separate groups to fire at 1:1, they will both fire at the power of the SB-700. This is handy in situations where you want symmetry in your lighting (think of two lights left and right behind your subject to be used as rim lights) but you don’t have two identical flashes.

Using two triggers simultaneously

This Sadhu was lit by an SMDV Alpha 110 Softbox with a Bowens mount (available in Europe through this reseller), attached to my Jinbei HD 600. The rim light was created by a Cactus RF60, fired through a gridded SMDV 70 Speedbox.

FUJIFILM X-Pro2 | XF50-140mmF2.8 R LM OIS WR @ 129.2 mm | 1-250 sec at f - 8,0 | ISO 400

Let's stack some triggers! Thanks to the hotshoe on the V6, I can stick my Jinbei trigger on top of it and fire both the 600 Ws Jinbei and a smaller flash like the Cactus RF60 together, while still maintaining separate (and remote!) control over their respective power levels.

As I've explained in an earlier blog post, if I want to use a more powerful flash, I often pick up my Jinbei HD 600 II, a review of which you can find here. The problem is that the Jinbei has its own - relatively simple - trigger which lets me change the power of the flash remotely. And this is where the hotshoe on the V6 comes in really handy. If I want to use 2 flashes, one powerful one and a smaller one (e.g. as an accent light), I can slide the Jinbei trigger in the Cactus V6 hotshoe. This makes both flashes trigger simultaneously, and I can still power them up or down remotely (and separately) by adjusting the respective trigger.

Next up: High Speed Sync for Fuji cameras?

This is fairly recent news which got me very excited: Cactus apparently are not resting on their laurels. In fact, they've announced that they are working on a V6 Mk II update that would - through some sort of ingenious hack - allow High Speed Sync with any camera, including Fujifilm cameras. Yes, you've read that right! High Speed Sync on a Fujifilm camera. I'll report back as soon as I've been able to test this out myself. Originally, it was rumored that this HSS hack would also be made available on the current V6 triggers through a firmware update but apparently that's not necessarily the case. Those of you who want to buy a set of V6 triggers now and want HSS, might want to wait a while until things are clearer.

Conclusion

I have to say I really like the V6 transceiver. It's a bit bulky on my X-T1, but on the other hand, unlike some other flash triggers, it is very ergonomical with lots of direct-access buttons and it still gives enough clearance so that I can turn the dials on the top of my camera easily. It just takes some getting used to the fact you can't see the value you set from the top of the camera anymore because the trigger partly obscures it. Obviously, you still see your settings through the viewfinder!

Because the X-Pro 2's hotshoe sits slightly lower (more level with the speed selector dial), there's less clearance and people with very big fingers might find it a more difficult to adjust shutter speed - mine are still ok. However, on both the X-Pro 2 as on the X-T1, you can always turn your shutter speed dial in the T position and then change the shutter speed all the way from 1/4.000th (1/8.000th on an X-Pro 2) to 30 seconds, simply by turning the front command dial. DSLR-style. But you knew that, didn't you?

Availability

• In Belgium, the Cactus V6 Transceiver can be purchased through Grobet.be
• In the UK, Fujifilm X-Photographer Damien Lovegrove is the importer and also sells them through his online shop. Damien is also an avid user of these flashes and triggers.
• International orders can also be made directly through Cactus' own online store.

UPDATE: Contrary to what I said in the original post, it appears that the HSS trick might not be available as a firmwire update after all, but rather only on the soon to be released V6 Mk II triggers. I'll report back on this as soon as I have more info. In the mean time, those of you who are looking at buying a set and want/need HSS, might want to hold off until the V6 Mk II is released. I have updated the blog post.

2 months with the X-Pro 2: my 10 favourite features (part 2)

(Read about features 1 to 5 in this post)

In a month, I’ll be off to India again to teach a travel photography workshop together with fellow X-Photographer Matt Brandon and I hope to take the X-Pro 2 with me. I’m really looking forward to the trip. When I’m traveling, I always hope that nothing bad will happen to my gear because it’s often difficult to replace or repair. That’s why I’m extremely happy with the next item in my top-10 of new features:

6) Weather Sealing

Contrary to the X-Pro 1, the X-Pro 2 is now weather sealed. Now, truth be told I’ve never had any issues with my non-weather sealed Fujifilm cameras and they’ve eaten quite a lot of dust, too, but it’s still a reassuring feature to have.

When you're playing with flour, it's good to have a weather sealed body and lens to keep the stuff on your model and not in your camera. 

Of course, ideally, you then have to pair the camera with a weather proofed lens as well, such as the beautiful XF-16 mm 1.4. I love that lens because, thanks to its wide aperture, it still allows me to play with shallow depth of field although it’s relatively wide-angle.

Belgium's probably got he ugliest coast line in the world (40 miles of ugly concrete skyscrapers) but there are a couple of noteworthy exceptions, such as this the Blankenberge Pier. Working this close to sea and sand, I was happy to be using a weather-sealed combo. Processed with my Colorific Colour Grading presets, but you probably know that by now :-)

One of my resolutions for the new year is to use the 16 mm prime a little more. I used a Formatt Hitech ND filter to get the exposure within reach of the new 1/250th sync speed.

7) Flash improvements

This one is pretty big, at least for me: the sync speed has been increased to 1/250th of a second. That means that when you’re working at the sync speed of your camera, your flashes effectively become one third of a stop more powerful than they were on an X-Pro 1 or an X-T1.

Sofie shot with the X-Pro 2 and the Jinbei HD-600 II flash. To date, still my favourite 'big gun'. I'm very happy that I can now use flash also in Continuous shooting mode. This lets me fire a burst of shots (until the flash has to recharge) rather than one at a time so I dramatically increase my options of having the right expression or composition when using flash). Image postprocessed with my Black & White Lightroom presets.

But even better, you can now also use a flash when the camera is set to continuous shooting. To be fair, it’s something almost every other camera has but it’s great to see that my X-Pro 2 now does it, too. Especially with more powerful flashes like this Jinbei, this means that you can keep on shooting with flash at lower power settings for quite a while until the flash has to recharge. This is the same feature by the way that got introduced for the X-T1 in the latest firmware update that subsequently got pulled because of a bug. So X-T1 users, this one is coming your way, too!

Finally, Fujifilm have announced a new speedlight, the EF-X500, that is capable of doing High Speed Sync. I can't wait to get my hands on that one!

8) Improved Bracketing

I’ve never understood why the bracketing functionality of all Fujifilm cameras was limited to 3 shots with +/-  1 EV. If you want to create HDR images, that range is often too limited.

Maybe it has something to do with the new maximum shutter speed of 1/8000th of a second, but you can now bracket 3 shots with +/- 2 EV. I would still love some more options, like shooting 5 or 7 frames but it's already a big step up. If you want to go beyond what's currently possible, I recommend you do as I do: put the camera on a tripod and use the Exposure Compensation function on the Camera Remote App: this lets you make up to 7 bracketed shots, 1 stop apart, without touching the camera.

9) An improved menu

Image © Fujifilm Corporation

I already like Fujifilm’s menus more than most of the other brands out there, but they have made the menu even better: it’s more legible and there’s also a MyMenu, which lets you assign up to 16 items for quick acess. So between this MyMenu, the (customizable) Quick Menu and the function buttons, there really is no shortage of options of having this camera do what you want it to do, as fast as possible. On thing that did not improve is formatting the card. It takes way too many button presses. Luckily, there appears to be a shortcut which I learned about over at Kevin Mullins' excellent review. If you're thinking about using the X-Pro 2 as a wedding camera, read his review (and then start saving). Oh, the shortcut you ask? Press the delete key for a couple of seconds and then click on the back command dial.

10) 3 Power Management Modes

Let’s be honest. Battery life isn’t the best feature of the Fujifilm cameras. But let’s also be honest in that the batteries (the X-Pro 2 uses the same as the X-T1, X-Pro 1 and X-T10) are very lightweight and compact so adding a couple to your bag won’t break your back. I think Fuji did well in maintaining the same battery. However, what they did is offer three power management modes: Economy, Standard and High Performance. As you might guess, autofocus speed and EVF refresh rates increase as you switch from the first to the latter, but battery life decreases, from 330 shots over 250 to 220. I just use High Performance and I pack a couple of spare batteries. I guess I’ll only use Economy when I see I’m popping in my last spare! Oh, and even in Economy the camera is still a Ferrari compared to the original X-Pro 1. So, as greater minds have already said: ‘Everyting is relative’.

So, that’s it for this highly subjective top 10. As some of these are firmware-related, there's some hope that they might trickle down to other cameras too.

This is what the new interface looks like. Again, evolution, not revolution but it looks and reads better than before. There are loads of smaller refinements, such as this one: you might know there's a digital depth-of-field scale that you can overlay in the EVF and OVF. Only, it did not match up with the one found on lenses like the 14, 16 and 23. Because the lenses' DOF scale was film-based (with a larger Circle of Confusion, in other words, larger tolerance) whereas the digital scale was pixel-based. You can now set the digital scale to film-based as well. If I were a street photographer, I'd love this feature!

There are other features, such as the new black and white ACROS film simulation and the new grain engine, which look nice. But as I explained in this blog post, as long as there is no Raw conversion software that can actually read the raw files of this camera, I set my film simulation to something very neutral as the JPEGs are currently the only thing I can work with. Setting a black and white film simulation would mean I currently cannot work on the image in colour and I want to keep my options open.

If you have any questions, I’ll be happy to try and address them in the comments.

Don't forget to switch off the light.

What about the Tilt Screen?

Yeah, what about it? There isn't one, as you probably know by now. For me, it's not a deal breaker. Sure enough, if the X-Pro 2 had one, I would welcome it, but not if it came at the expense of a bigger, bulkier body. Between the dual card slot and a tilt screen, I'll take the dual card slot any time. Also, don't forget that you'll be able to wirelessly control the camera with the smartphone App. That's even better than a tilt screen, in some cases!

What could be improved?

Some testers have reported the Exposure Compensation wheel is too loose. It did not feel loose on my sample. What I would like is that Fujifilm offer the option of saving 16 bit TIFF files to card. I feel that Lightroom still isn't squeezing everything out of the RAW files and this would be a nice addition, especially for people who shoot rather slow and deliberate, like me. Alternatively, I wish that Fujifilm would release a simple RAW to 16 bit TIFF conversion software. Basically, a desktop-version of the in-camera RAW converter that would allow batch-processing. And no, I don't mean Silkypix, that awfully complex raw converter that ships with the camera. 

Another thing I would like is to see on the accessory list is a 'Long Eyecup' like the X-T1. This helps to block the sunlight and gives more contrast in the viewfinder which is especially helpful on sunny days.

Finally, I would really love to have some more highlight clipping information in the EVF and OVF: we can already program a gazillion warnings in the viewfinder, but the one I would like to see is a Lightroom-style highlight / shadow clipping warning, showing the actual areas that are clipped. Sure, there's the live histogram but that only says there's clipping. It does not say where that clipping occurs. 

As you can see, minor quibbles that are mostly software- or firmware related. Other than that, I really can't think of much. So now, I'm off to shoot some more! Where did I put my spare batteries?

Two months with the X-Pro 2: my 10 favourite features (part 1)

So, I’ve had the privilige of using a pre-production sample of one of this year’s most eagerly anticipated cameras for a couple of weeks. You could already read about that in this blog post. By now, your RSS feed and Facebook status page is probably overloaded with features, comparisons, opinions and what not. The following thoughts are not solely based on specs, but on actual usage of the camera. Given the four year gap between the X-Pro 2 and its predecessor, there’s bound to be a lot of change. In this and the following blog post, I’ll try to outline my personal top-10 improvements of this camera, taking into account the way I use it: as my everday camera, with a focus on travel- and flash photography.

Two of my favourite models: Brecht & Frannie. Shot in an abandoned carpet factory. On urbex (urban exploring) shoots like this, I appreciate the fact that all my camera gear fits in my F-Stop Loka UL, a small and lightweight camera backpack (US link, EU link)

Evolution on the outside...

When I got the camera, it felt like reconnecting with an old friend: it looks almost identical to the X-Pro 1 (which I consider a good thing), especially from the front. In fact, I could probably have taken this camera to a Fuji workshop and people would have thought I was shooting my old trusted X-Pro 1. Outside, there are only a couple of changes, and they're all for the better.

Seen from the front, not a lot has changed: the EVF/OVF lever now not only lets you switch from OVF to EVF, but also between the two OVF modes that we now know from the X100T. Another barely visible - but interesting - new feature is the addition of a front command dial. Image © Fujifilm Corporation.

... revolution within

But on closer inspection, a lot has actually changed for the better. Which brings me to the first point.

1) Improved ergonomics

This one’s so important that I’ve actually put it before the ‘obvious’ advantage (the higher megapixel count, more about that later). The first thing you’ll notice is the joystick on the camera’s back: it has a number of uses but its main use is changing the AF point. The advantage is that this frees up the four buttons surrounding the Menu/OK button. You can now actually program three of them to a custom function. If you like to change your focus points as I do, the joystick works really well, it just takes some getting used to and retraining your muscle memory not to go to the old position. On top of that, there’s 2 more function buttons, bringing the total to 5. There is no dedicated WIFI function button, but WIFI is obviously included, and another big difference with the original X-Pro 1.

Apparently small changes but ergonomically big ones: all buttons are now on the right hand side, enabling true single-handed operation. There's a new joystick-like control that - amongst other things - lets you select your focus point. Image © Fujifilm Corporation.

• One thing I did not like about the X-Pro 1 was that there were some buttons on the left of the LCD. All buttons are now at the right, meaning you can control this camera with just one hand. For you, it might be sipping cocktails, but in my case it leaves the other hand free to hold a flash and an umbrella, for example.
• The grip is slightly bigger and more pronounced. As a result, the camera feels better in your hand. And as mentioned, this is now a camera that you can completely control with one hand! Great news for photographers who like to smoke on a shoot. No more cigarette breaks needed: smoke and shoot as you go!
• There’s also a new Front Command Dial which in playback mode lets you browse flick back and forth through your images (the rear one zooms in and out). While shooting, the FCD lets you adjust the shutter speed to the intermediary settings between the full stops that are marked on the dial. It probably does some other things too, but I haven’t discovered those yet. The manual was even more preproduction than the camera (in other words, non-existent!)

Those clever Fujifilm engineers incorporated the ISO dial into the Shutter Speed dial. To change your ISO, pull up the outside of the dial and rotate it. The EV-compensiation wheel now has a -3 to +3 range and by setting it to the C-position, you can even go from -5 to +5 by turning the new Front Command Dial. Image © Fujifilm Corporation.

• Speaking of dials. Probably the coolest feature is how Fujifilm managed to integrate the ISO dial on the top of the camera. It’s literally on the shutter speed dial: you have to pull the outer ring of the shutter speed dial up and then rotate it to set the ISO. The first couple of times, you’ll probably inadvertently change the shutter speed itself, too, but once you get used to it, it works very well. While turning the wheel, you can see the value adjust in the viewfinder. So no need to take your eye off the viewfinder. Now, in honesty, I liked the old system with the top function button, too but this system has the advantage that you can also see at a glance what ISO the camera is set to. And I do like this implementation more than that of the X-T1. While we’re still talking about dials: the Exposure Compensation dial now has a -3 to +3 range and even a Custom setting that allows you to go from -5 to +5, another use for the new Front Command Dial.
• And finally, another big one in the ergonomics department: a built-in diopter adjustment with the same range as the X-T1. That’s right, no more messing around with little screw-in adjustment lenses that you’re bound to loose sooner or later.

2) 24 Megapixel X-Trans CMOS III Sensor

Same APS-C sensor size but 50 percent more pixels. Image © Fujifilm Corporation.

Although I’ve printed images from my 16 MP X-T1 as large as 30 x 60 cm (12 x 24 inch) and I could easily print even larger, I welcome more pixels any time, provided they offer me the same or even higher image quality. The X-Pro 2 has got 50 percent more of them. So, you can either print prints that are 50 percent larger (in terms of surface, i.e. 22 percent longer and 22 percent taller) or you can crop 1/3 of your image away and still keep the same amount of pixels as the X-Pro 1 or the X-T1. Another nice advantage is that you can experiment some more with alternative crops, like 16:9, or square, while still retaining enough pixels to print relatively big. Especially with the best quality lenses like the 16-55 and the 50-140, the increased resolution actually shows in the image. Those two lenses really are perfect companions for the new sensor.

I have really come to appreciate the 16-55. Sure, it's a bit big and heavier than its prime siblings but boy, what a sharp and versatile lens! If you're an event or press photographer, it's hard not to be impressed by its sharpness. Model: Stéphanie. Image processed with my Lightroom Colorific Colour Grading presets.

3) Faster AF, more focus points and more phase detection pixels

As you might know, cameras use two techniques to achieve autofocus: phase detection and contrast detection. The first is faster, the latter is more accurate. As of the X-T1, Fujifilm has started to combine these two techniques by incorporating phase detection pixels in the sensor. The X-Pro 2 increases both the total number of focus points available and the number of phase detection pixels. By default, there’s 77 points including 49 phase detection pixels, but you can increase this to a whopping 273 points, including 169 phase detection pixels. Just be prepared to use that new joystick controller a lot. Regardless of the number of focus points, what I really appreciate on mirrorless cameras in general and those by Fuji in particular, is that you have focus points all over the frame. If you like to frame your subject off-center, that’s a very handy feature to have. With a DSLR, you’ll be forced to focus and recompose, but if you’re shooting with a shallow depth of field, that can lead to images that are out of focus.

"And how many focus points would you like today, Sir?" I don't think I'll be using the 273 focus points layout a lot...

... but I do like the fact that there are more phase detection pixels (you can recognise them by their slightly larger size in the grid...

I really cannot count the times I have sworn at my DSLR for not giving me a focus point where I needed it. With 273 points to choose from, that’s no longer necessary! Of course, the same AF enhancements that were introduced with the X-T1’s 4.0 firmware upgrade, such as wide tracking AF and zone AF are also present. I just haven’t used them much as most of my subjects are pretty stationary and if they aren’t, like the dancers I shoot, I prefer to pre-focus manually. It’s a matter of habit and preference.

4) Improved viewfinder

Take the hybrid viewfinder of the X-100T, add the resolution of the viewfinder of the X-T1, and turbocharge the framerate to 85 frames per second and you have the recipe for the X-Pro 2’s viewfinder. It’s really as state of the art as it gets. The front lever lets you switch between EVF and OVF and also between OVF modes themselves: simple OVF or OVF with the little EVF screen in the bottom right corner that was introduced with the X100T. This little screen-in-the-screen can be set to three possible zoom levels when you’re in manual focus.

The Hybrid Viewfinder combines the best of both worlds...

... especially since you can overlay a little LCD panel that for accurate framing...

... or manual focus checking options: choose from 100%, 2.5 x en 6 x.

The first is 100 percent view (which basically gives you a mini view of the entire scene in your OVF, ideal for combining the precision of the EVF with the bright viewfinder of the OVF. The second is 2.5 times enlarged and the third is 6 times enlarged. Pressing the rear command dial (you knew that the rear command dial can be depressed, also on the X-T1, didn’t you?) cycles through these magnification levels. Combine those features with manual focus aids such as digital split-level or – what I prefer to use – focus peaking and you have noone to blame but yourself if your pictures aren’t sharp using manual focus on the X-Pro 2! 

5) Dual Card Slot

I haven’t verified this, but according to Fujifilm, this is a first on a mirrorless camera. I know a lot of wedding photographers and generally everyone that shoots unique events that will utter sighs of relief. The card slot can be set to any of the following three options: sequential (when the first card is full, the camera starts writing to the second), backup (anything written to the first card is also written to the second) and RAW/JPEG, where RAW files are written to one card and JPEG files are written to the other.

Needless to say, the write speed to card has also dramatically improved. I remember that on the X-Pro 1, when I accidentally shot a bracketed series of photos, I swore because the camera would freeze up, literally for seconds. None of that on the X-Pro 2. I do recommend that you use fast cards. My sample unit had two Toshiba 16 GB Exceria Pro SD cards installed (the ones with the double row of contacts) and that worked perfectly.

That's it for the first 5 features. In this blog post, I'll cover 6 to 10. But let me leave you with one last image of Stéphanie. After all, it's all about the image, not about the camera, isn't it?