The 2016 edition of the 5 Day Deal: What's in it for you?

From now until Wednesday, October 19th, noon PST, it's 5 Day Deal time again! The 5 Day Deal is a unique bundle of photographic training content. If you were to buy every item separately, you'd be looking at a total bill of over $2.500. Now, you're only paying $97, a savings of more than 95 percent! The bundle contains over 60 hours of video training, 15 eBooks and almost 500 Lightroom presets and Photoshop actions. In total over 25 gigabyte of training goodness.

From Lightroom presets over video courses on how to shoot wine or photograph models to a complete landscape postprocessing photography course: there's something for everyone in this bundle.

Of course, the real question is: 'What is this bundle worth to you?' Unless you're really into all genres of photography, probably not the full $2.500. But I can guarantee you that even if you're only remotely interested in photography, the 5 Day Deal bundle is certainly worth more than the measly $97 it's selling for. In fact, this bundle will do more for your photography than the umpteenth camera bag or a shiny new UV filter. 

To help you determine if it's worth your dollar (well, 97 of them), I've broken the bundle down into three typical areas of interest: general postprocessing, landscape photography and portrait photography. You'll see that even if you're only really into one of those three areas, the bundle is a steal. Heck, if you're into two or more, you should already be ordering!

1. You're into Lightroom and Photoshop

Postprocessing seems to be the main theme of this year's bundle, so if image editing is your thing, you're in for a treat. The bundle is ideal to hone your editing skills over these cold winter months and get you ready for a great start in 2017. There's hundreds of Lightroom presets and Photoshop actions, textures and loads of training videos. There's also a lot of HDR training, and I mean photographically interesting HDR, not the headache-inducing variety! The total value of the highlighted items alone is over $1.600. The 5 Day Deal price is less than ten percent of that. If you're a Lightroom or Photoshop user, this bundle really is a no-brainer.

2.  You're mainly interested in nature photography, landscapes, cityscapes and how to postprocess these

The total value of the highlighted items is about $700. From previous 5 Day Deals, I remember the excellent quality of the stuff that people like Jimmy McIntyre, Klaus Herrmann and James Brandon put out, so I'm looking forward to discovering their new courses. Also, note that I've only counted items that have a direct relationship to landscape photography. There are lots of resources, like the many preset packs, that will without a doubt also be useful when you're editing your landscape images.

3. You're mainly interested in portrait photography and portrait retouching

The total value of the highlighted items is also some $700. Again, there are some hidden gems in this line-up. For example, I really enjoyed Serge Ramelli's no-nonsense approach to compositing: he photographs a model and then puts her in front of a different background. This course alone by itself normally costs double the entire 5 Day Deal bundle price.

Other areas of interest

But that's not all. There's also more general, introductory courses such as David duChemin's 26 part email course on the one hand but also some highly specialized ones on the other: how 'bout an in-depth course on Photo Mechanic (I know I can use one since I'm using this app more and more as a front-end to Lightroom). Or what about a course on how to photograph wine? It's all there.

If you're still in doubt, here's 5 final reasons why you should really consider this bundle:

The ever-funny-yet-to-the-point Zack Arias has written an eBook of over 100 pages with business advice for photographers. It's an excellent and at times hilarious read.

1. This way of learning is one of the cheapest to improve your photography skills, at your own pace, when and where you want it. Furthermore, there's always a couple of hidden gems in bundles like this. For example, I thoroughly enjoyed Zack Arias' 'Get To Work - Business Primer' eBook. It's not something I'd probably buy (in fact, I didn't know it existed), but it was included in the bundle anyway! 
2. A lot of this bundle's resources are new and if they aren't new, at least they've never been in any other 5 Day Deal bundle, so there's no overlap with previous 5 Day Deal purchases.
3. If you're more interested in the business side of photography, there's a couple of interesting items as well, like the afore-mentioned guide by Zack Arias. Zack's studio is doing great now, but he once was nearly bankrupt. So, he knows what he's talking about.
4. The bundle is gone forever on October 19th, noon PST (that's 9 PM Brussels time).
5. 10 percent of the entire turnover (not the profits, but the turnover, so almost $10 on every sale) goes to charity. Since the start of the 5 Day Deal in 2013, over $650.000 was donated to good causes. For this year, the 5 Day Deal team is hoping to achieve $250.000 of charity donations and they even silently hope to reach $350.000, which would bring their total over one million since 2013. To that effect, upon checkout, you can choose to pay an extra 10% ($9.7) which goes entirely to charity. And, as a token of good karma, you get an extra bonus-download worth $250. Some 50% of people who bought the bundle so far have chosen this option. It's called 'Charity Match', you'll see it on the 5 Day Deal page.

You see, I'm shutting up already. Yes. I'm that easy :-)

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 :-)

5 products that caught my eye at Photokina 2016

I have just returned from a bustling two days at Photokina, the biannual photographic gear lovefest that is held in Cologne, Germany. I was travelling in the exquisite company of fellow Belgian X-photographers Isabel Corthier and Ioannis Tsouloulis. I want to thank the people from Fujifilm Japan and Belgium for inviting us over. Trade shows like Photokina are as much about people as they are about products. So, it was great to reconnect with longtime friends such as Tom, Bert (who used Tom’s bald head as a reflector during his 'Small lights, big results’ demo on the Fujifilm stand), Rob, Damien (energetic as ever), the German ‘rock star’ trio Dieter, Jens & Peter and Marco, Julia, Shusuke and Kunio. I also had the privilige of being introduced to new people such as Patrick La Roque, Jens Krauer, Martin Hülle and their impressive work. Finally, I am happy I got to meet Rico Pfirstinger. He’s the author of the unofficial Fujifilm manuals. If you are struggling to get the most out of your camera, his books and workshops are among the best resources to turn to.

Now of course, apart from the social aspect, Photokina is obviously also about gear. Lots of gear! In fact, it's probably the most GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome)-inducing show on the planet. Even during those two days, I was unable to visit each hall, let alone each booth. Yet, there were a couple of products that caught my eye. Because the Internet loves lists, here's five of them, in no particular order. Well, except maybe for the first! 

1. Fujifilm GFX

The GFX looks like a beefed-up X-T2. Image © Fujifilm.

Call me biased (I'm an X-photographer after all) but the Fujifilm GFX was the star of the Fujifilm booth and probably even of the entire Photokina. In case you've just returned from another planet, the GFX 50s is Fujifilm's first digital medium format camera. It has a sensor size roughly 4 times that of the other X series cameras and a pixel count of 51.4 megapixel. The GFX 50s will be available with three lenses at launch, which you should be ‘early 2017’. By end of 2017, another tree lenses should be available.

Literally everybody wanted to get their hands on the camera of which only a couple of prototypes exist. I was lucky enough to get to hold it in my hands for a couple of minutes. I was surprised at how well it focused even in the dark venue where I was and also at how lightweight it was: this beast of a camera weighs less than many a professional DSLR! If you want to read more about the specs (even more than is available on Fujifilm's own website) read this excellent article by Rico Pfirstinger.

The price of the GFX hasn't been set yet, but Fujifilm management did promise it would be 'well under $10.000' with the standard lens. We have yet to see into how many Euro that will translate...

Official press release here.

You'll be able to use two EVF viewfinders with the GFX: a regular one and one that can be tilted and rotated, allowing almost every imaginable capture angle. It will even be possible to use an external monitor.

2. Phottix Spartan beauty dish

As you know, I use a lot of artificial (flash) lighting in my images, so I'm always eager to learn about cool new lighting accessories. One interesting modifier I came across was at the stand of Phottix. The Spartan beauty dish (full specs here) is a modifier that seems to come straight out of a Transformers movie: it's easy to set up and you can remove the disc in the center to turn it into an octabox. I also like the fact that it comes with a grid. More and more, I seem to be using grids in my own lighting. The Spartan comes in two sizes: 50 cm and 70 cm. Price for the latter is about $145. That is very affordable, considering that some companies charge about that much for just a grid!

3. SMDV BRiHT-360

The SMDV BRiHT-360 is a lightweight 360 Ws battery-powered barebulb flash with removable battery that slides into the main unit.

Just as I thought I could finally finish the manuscript of the second edition of my Making Light e-book, I came across the SMDV stand... I could not help but notice their BRiHT-360 portable barebulb flashes (there were about 10 of them placed along the counter). As you may know from previous blog posts, I am a fan of their easy to set up (and even easier to break down) Speedbox series of softboxes. At Photokina, it was the BRiHT-360 that stole the show, though. As its name implies, this is a 360 Ws barebulb flash. What I like about it is that it's super lightweight at only 1.25 kg including the battery. The latter lasts about 300 full power pops. Basically, this thing produces the same amount of light as four Speedlights at the weight and price of only two. What I also like, is that it works well with SMDV's Speedboxes, who happen to be also very lightweight: the combination of the BRiHT and an 85 cm Speedbox only puts 2 kgs on the scale!

The BRiHT does TTL and HSS with Canon and Nikon cameras (using a compatible SMDV Flashwave 5 trigger) but luckily enough it also works in manual mode on my Fujifilm cameras. I am looking forward to testing this unit more in-depth and to see whether I might even be able to get some sort of HSS with my Fuji cameras by using the Cactus V6 Mark II triggers, which I reviewed here.

In the mean time, you can read the full specs of the BRiHT 360 here. In Europe, the BRiHT will be available through www.foto-morgen.de. Price should be somewhere around €700 / $750.

4. Godox

The AD600 exists in a Bowens and a Godox mount and in a TTL and manual version. All versions support HSS with Canon, Nikon and Sony (provided you use the matching Godox X1 trigger). Image © Godox.

Godox, whose Lithium battery-powered Ving V850 speedlight I’ve reviewed here, also had a stand at Photokina. Their AD600B battery powered studio flash has recently been reviewed in Shoot, the Belgian photography magazine I write for (Dutch link here). This unit packs 600 Ws of power in an affordable package with TTL and HSS support for Nikon, Canon and Sony. By default, it comes as an all-in one light with a battery that attaches directly to the body of the flash. The advantage is that you don’t need cables and you don’t have a separate power pack to worry about (or carry around).

The potential disadvantage is that if you put your light on a boom stand, especially with a heavy modifier, the setup can get a bit top-heavy. Also, if you’re using an assistant instead of a light stand, it’s quite a workout to hold a setup like this in the air for any prolonged period of time.

Image © Godox

So I was happy to see the 600 Ws Extension Head. This accessory allows you to separate the pack from the head. Just unplug the flash tube from the AD600, plug it in the Extension Head, connect the power cable to where the flash tube used to be and boom, you've transformed your all-in-one into a pack-and-head system.

Godox also had a 1200 Ws Extension Head on display: this accessory has a special, more powerful flash tube which effectively allows you to turn 2 AD600s into one 1200 Ws pack-and-head system. With so much power, you can overpower the sun even when using larger modifiers. Or, you can benefit from faster recycle times.

Finally, Godox also had an AC adaper on display which allows you to turn the AD600 into a mains-powered flash. The adapter includes a fan as well.

If you live in the US, note that the AD600 is sold by Adorama under the Flashpoint XPLOR 600 brand name.

Image © Adorama

The 600 Ws Extension Head ships without a flash tube because you use the one that comes with the AD600. Price is around $80. Image © Adorama.

The 1200 Ws one has a special flash tube which actually consists of two 600 Ws tubes. Price is around $300. Image © Adorama.

5. 3 Legged Thing Albert Tripod

I have been using the Three Legged Thing Brian tripod during my travels for the last couple of years. The main reason is that it is a lightweight travel tripod that still can be extended really high. For me, it serves a dual purpose: I can use it as a traditional tripod for long exposure photography (in which case I obviously don't extend it all the way up) but I actually use it a lot more as an impromptu light stand. Having this versatility (transformability really seems to be a theme in the products I selected in this blog post) allows me to travel with less weight without compromising on photographic opportunities. Alas, the Brian is no longer available. At Photokina, I was introduced to his successor: Albert. The Albert was improved on a number of points but still shares the Brian’s adventurous and multi-purpose DNA. Price of this carbon-fibre travel tripod system is about GBP 400 (including a ballhead).

Full specs here.

The Brian used as a light stand.

So there you have it, a quick round-up of some of some of the products that caught my attention at Photokina. If you were there, I’d love to hear what caught yours!

Tutorial review: The Complete Guide To Portraiture by Sandro Miller

When I first heard about ‘The Complete Guide To Portraiture & Building A Body Of Work For Print & Publication’ I knew this was one I just had to watch. After all, it’s about all the things I love in photography: travel, portraiture, lighting and retouching. So I contacted the guys over at RGG EDU (that's short for Rob and Gary's Great EDUcation), the producers of this video, and they were kind enough to set me up with a review copy and a really cool discount code for readers of this blog. Full details are at the end of this post but basically, it means that as a reader of my blog, you can get RGG EDU's newly released 6 hour Capture One Pro training video as a free bonus when you purchase the Sandro Miller tutorial.

UPDATE: the discount code no longer works, but there is currently (until May 29th, 2017) a 66 percent discount on this tutorial, making this an even much better deal than the one I had for you back when I originally wrote this review...

This tutorial follows internationally acclaimed photographer Sandro Miller from start to finish on a project in which he photographs indigenous tribes in the remote and sometimes downright dangerous parts of Papua New Guinea. Here's the official trailer below.

This day and age, everyone and his dog seem to be producing video tutorials geared towards photographers. As I can tell from my own area of expertise, Lightroom training, there’s a lot of chaff amongst the wheat. Yet, the videos from RGG EDU, a relatively young photography tutorial website, definitely fall in the ‘wheat’ category. Having bought, watched and highly appreciated their ‘The Complete Guide To Composite Photography, Color & Composition with Erik Almås’, I knew I could expect high quality, and I wasn’t disappointed. By the way, here's an in-depth (Dutch-only, unfortunately) review of the Erik Almås tutorial.

Sandro Miller

One of Sandro's most recent books is the result of a seventeen-year collaboration between photographer and subject. I'll try and keep that in mind the next time I make a one-minute portrait of someone :-)

To be really honest, I did not know Sandro Miller. At least not by name. But I did know some of his work, and chances are you do, too: just google his latest book Malkovich Malkovich Malkovich, which features photographs that Sandro made during his 17 year friendship with this incredibly versatile actor.

Incidentally, this is just one of the things this tutorial taught me: getting a book published takes time and patience. Sandro visited Cuba 14 times before he did a book on it. But... it is not undoable, especially after watching this tutorial...

What’s in this tutorial?

In this tutorial, we get to follow Sandro while he is preparing a new book project: a series of portraits of tribal people in Papua New Guinea. 

Obviously, the highlight of the tutorial is the actual documentary in which you get to see him set up a makeshift studio, set up his lights and interact with the people he photographs. If this tutorial where a five course dinner: this would be the main course. But the appetizers, served as 'prerequisites' and desserts (the compositing tutorials and final interviews) are just as... mouthwatering.

Gear and Lighting Prerequisite 

First of all, there are a number of so-called prerequisites or series of introductory videos: there's one about the gear that Sandro uses and then another series of videos about lighting where you can see how he puts that gear to use in his studio in Chicago. The contrast between the high-end equipment (Sandro's studio looks like a mix of a Profoto and Broncolor flagship store) and what he used in Papua New Guinea could not be bigger. It’s another proof that it’s the photographer matters more than the gear, or as the publisher of my own eBooks, David duChemin would say: Gear is good, Vision is better!

The idea of the prerequisite videos is to teach you some of the basics so that you can follow along better when the tutorial shifts to a higher gear. To that effect, we see Sandro make 2 portraits: a moody male portrait and a fashion portrait of a woman. During these sessions, Sandro explains why he uses a certain light and how he modifies it with flags. We also get to see that lighting is often a game of inches...

“‘I can create a novel in a man’s face by the way that I light it’”

— Sandro

I found it interesting to see the progression in the images: from ‘I can do that, too’ to ‘Damn, that’s a setup I have to remember’. It was also kind of comforting to see that even a highly respected portrait photographer has to work a scene and a model to get to great results. Success does not come easy. In fact, if there’s one theme that recurred throughout the work of Sandro Miller in general and this tutorial in particular, it’s the importance of practice, perseverance and attention to detail. I really picked up lots of little nuggets from those prerequisites.

Digitech prerequisite

Another thing that I found really interesting was the interview with Shad Wilson. Shad works - amongst others - as a so called Digitech: a digital tech assistant. He even has his own custom truck stacked to the roof with tripods, pelicases and light stands. Sandro being a high-end photographer, he can afford the budget for a Digitech to come along on this project.

'I'll be in the shed...' Shad WIlson talks Gary from RGG EDU through how he turned a regular Pelicase into a sun-shielded laptop case.

But even for mere mortals like you and I, this section has some really interesting advice on backup and workflow that can be helpful when you have to be your own Digitech. I also learned an interesting idea from this section: Sandro already had a specific idea from the start as to how the final images should look. He created that specific style in Photoshop and then gave that file to the Digital Tech. Shad emulated the look in Capture One so that he could apply it to the images while shooting tethered.

Postprocessing and retouching prerequisites.

As this tutorial is as almost as much about postprocessing as it is about photography, there’s also a couple of introductory videos on postprocessing and retouching.

In these videos, we get to know Pratik Naik of Solstice Retouch. Pratik is a world renowned retoucher and another example that RGG EDU will only work with people who really know their stuff.

Pratik has some interesting ideas on how to redefine some of Photoshop's shortcuts so they are grouped together better for retouching. Even though these prerequisite tutorials were primarily aimed at beginners, I picked up a couple of interesting tips, not in the least about Capture One, which I I'm not so familiar with as I am obviously more of a Lightroom user. Yet, the things I learned definitely made me want to check out Capture One more in detail.

Again, the idea is to get you up to speed for the ‘real’ postprocessing sections towards the end of the video, where the Papua New Guinea portraits that were taken on a green screen are composited into the backgrounds which were also photographed on location, but separately.

Sandro shot the backgrounds separately. At first, I had a hard time understanding why but after seeing the whole series come together, it made sense!

I have to admit that at first, I thought it was a strange idea to be shooting people against a green backdrop and then, sometimes as little as 100 feet further, shoot the actual backdrop separately, only to combine them later in Photoshop. I mean, why not just put your subject against the backdrop of your choice and photograph him right there and then, right?

It's what I have been doing so far with all of my travel portraits. It was only after viewing a number of finished images that I understood why this at first sight overly complicated procedure made sense: by having separate control over the background and the foreground and by also being able to exactly control the lighting of the subject in his makeshift studio (much more than under the glaring Papuan sun), the resulting photographs work much better together as a series. This in turn makes the work better suited for a book. It's definitely something I might also try in the future. 

The actual Papua New Guinea documentary

Although ‘only’ slightly over an hour, this is obviously the ‘pièce de résistance’ of this tutorial. Here we get to see Sandro created the raw material (pun intended) that will form the basis of an actual book project. We see Sandro check out locations that can either be suitable to create his makeshift studio or as a so called black plate, a background for compositing.

The setup (left) and the resulting raw file (right). Sandro used a digital Hasselblad on this shoot so he has virtually unlimited postprocessing options in terms of recovery and dynamic range.

To me, the most important take away from this video was that you don't need expensive or complicated lighting setups to create really impactful images. Everything was done within a relatively simple, double diffused soft box. No rim light, no reflectors, nothing.

The video below has some behind-the-scenes footage and it gives you a good idea of what to expect in the full-length tutorial.

For me, the tutorial also re-emphasized the importance of having a good fixer on location. When you spend a lot of money on a location project in an area or a country that you're not familiar with, it really is a good idea to set some money aside and hire someone who can help you, not only logistically but most importantly help you scout interesting locations and faces and interact with them.

In terms of makeshift studios, it does not get much more makeshift than this :-)

On my most recent trip to India, I did exactly that: we hired a really great local guy who helped us find interesting people and locations and who at the same time could translate  as my own Hindi is limited to ‘Hello’ and ‘Look this way’ and ‘Look that way’.

I would rather buy an f/1.8 portrait lens and have some money left for a fixer, than buy the most expensive lens there is and not have any budget left for travel, let alone a fixer. If you're interested, below you can find a short video with some of my own location lighting work. Although it's not in the Hasselblad range, I'm very happy with the dynamic range of my Fujifilm X-Pro 2 and I'm even happier its price isn't in the Hasselblad range, either!

The Compositing videos

As much as I liked the actual on location video in Papua New Guinea, I was even more looking forward to the compositing videos. And again, I was not disappointed. Pratik does a really good job of explaining how to blend these rather complex subjects with all their feathers and beads into the background. I found his explanation on how to get rid of the green fringes that remain (shooting against a green backdrop is no miracle solution) and how to use the blur and smudge brushes to tweak the mask, invaluable.

Before... As you can see from the screenshot, the original mask leaves a lot of problems in terms of green fringing. Pratik shows a couple of really interesting tips that I have never seen before (and Lord knows I've watched my share of compositing videos) on how to get rid of those.

And after... The final image is dark and moody. Yet, by keeping everything nicely organized in layers, adjustment layers and groups, everything can still be changed should the photographer prefer a different blend of foreground and background, or a different white balance. By the way, these quick screen grabs don't do the images much justice...

As a photographer, you have to have your own characteristic style. Part of that style is obviously created during capture, but this tutorial really made clear that an important part is also added in postproduction. The original files were rather dark and flat. Using a bunch of adjustment layers and filters, Pratik turns them into very moody portraits. As a nice extra, the tutorial includes a number of backgrounds and original raw files so you can follow along with the compositing videos. And I really recommend you do because it's the best way to learn anything. 

Two images waiting to be combined into one...

Another advanced technique I picked up was how to use Photoshop's Blend If options to restrict the effect of an Adjustment layer to specific areas.

The printing videos

In these videos, we see Sandro meet up with his longtime friend and printer, Jon Scott of JS Graphics. We get to see Jon prepare the final images for print and if you have ever printed on a large format printer yourself, you'll recognise the mix of anxiety and excitement that you feel when an expensive large-format print comes rolling out of the printer. This section wasn't as in-depth as I wanted it to be but on the other hand, you could probably easily fill another 11 hours with just a printing tutorial.

Sandro and Jon inspecting a large format print. As an interesting side-note, this image, which was shot with available light and was not composited, is one of my favorite images of the entire series.

Final interviews: hug a book!

This tutorial wraps up with two more interviews: the first is with Sandro’s publisher, Martha Hallet from Glitterati. It's an interesting talk about the publishing business and all of the artistic, financial and marketing considerations that go into  publishing a book. I chuckled when I heard Martha say that Sandro wanted to use seven inks for the Malkovich book (compared to the standard of four) and how they finally settled for five.

“I dont’t want to look at a book on an iPad. That’s ridiculous. You want to feel a book. You want to hug a book!”

— Sandro

This section really is an ode to the printed photo book and rightly so. One thing I found missing was some insight as to how to actually layout a book like this. The publisher goes briefly into it but an interview with the graphic designer would really have interested me, too. Well, I guess the RGG EDU guys had to draw the line somewhere!

The final interview not only gives an insight in Sandro's career, which spans four decades, but also in his amazing collection of photo books, which seems to span 40 feet!

That ode continues in the last interview with Sandro about his life and career. Sandro is filmed against a bookshelf that literally contains hundreds of photo books. After all the tech talk of the previous videos, this more inspirational interview is a great way to end a great tutorial.

Conclusion

As you may have guessed by now, ‘The Complete Guide To Portraiture & Building A Body Of Work For Print & Publication’ is an excellent tutorial in my opinion. If you're into location portraiture, postproduction and the entire process of working towards a published book, whether it's self published or with a publisher, this is something you must watch and then... probably watch again.

“Everything is relative”

— Einstein

Update: the discount codes in the next paragraph are no longer valid but as mentioned in the introduction, there is currently (until May 29, 2017) a Memorial Day discount on this tutorial that offers no less than 66 percent off, making the price only $98. And, even better, if your total bill exceeds $99 (in other words, if you buy two tutorials), code REMEMBER gets you an additional 25 percent off your entire bill AND if you spend more than $300, code REMEMBER35 shaves 35 percent off your total bill! Only for two more days!

Two fantastic RGG EDU discount codes for readers of this blog

Now... about the price. At first sight, $299 isn't cheap but as Einstein said: 'Everything is relative'. For the price of a camera bag, you get 11 hours of very well produced, in-depth, concise and above all very motivating training that will probably do more for your photography than any camera bag ever will!

Knowing what it already takes to produce a relatively simple Lightroom or Photoshop tutorial, I can only imagine the planning, effort, time and money it has taken to create the Sandro tutorial. So I would say that although not cheap, the price is more than fair for the length, quality and production value of the tutorial.

“With code MTW25, you basically get RGG EDU’s new 6 hour Capture One Pro tutorial for free!”

And if $299 is too much to pay in one go, you can even finance it in monthly installments of $29.

Better still, I’ve got two very cool discount codes for you, my dear readers: code MTW10 gets you 10 percent off the Sandro tutorial (or any other RGG EDU tutorial, for that matter). Code MTW25 even gets you 25 percent off on any order that's over 375$. That basically means you can get RGG EDU's freshly announced Capture One tutorial (a $79 value) completely free: the trick is to add both tutorials in your shopping cart, enter the code MTW25 and you'll pay less for both than the regular $299 price of the Sandro tutorial alone! But don't wait too long, because these codes expire end of August, 2016.

Before I forget: the RGG EDU contest!

When you buy the tutorial, you also get access to a private Facebook group and you get to enter the Sandro Portrait Photography Contest which RGG EDU specifically set up for this tutorial. The contest has $50.000 in prizes! I told you these RGG EDU guys don’t do half work… Find out more about the contest here.

Subscribe to my newsletter and get my '10 Tips for Better Travel Photographs' for free.

And - shameless plug to end this long review - if this tutorial gets you in a traveling mood, don’t forget to subscribe to my newsletter: you’ll receive my 10 tips for better travel photographs absolutely free.

Finally, if you want to do more than just read about travel photography, Matt Brandon and I have just announced the 2017 edition of our Location Portraiture and Lighting Masterclass in Delhi and Varanasi, India.

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.

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?

Honoured, humbled, frightened and excited: 2 months with the X-Pro 2

When a while back, Fujifilm offered me the opportunity to test a pre-production sample of the upcoming X-Pro 2, I felt honoured, humbled, frightened and excited all at the same time.

Honoured, because I was one of a limited number of photographers worldwide to receive an early sample. Humbled, because the list of the others included big name photographers that I regard very highly, such as Damien Lovegrove, David Hobby and Zack Arias, to name but a few. Compared to these guys, I'm just a grown-up kid with too many cameras, too many lenses and waaaay to many flashes. I felt like taking a shower with the highschool football team. When I had just been out in the freezing cold...

“You know the old joke ‘How many photographers does it take to change a light bulb?”

Frightened because I had a tight deadline to give Fujifilm four images, preferably from different shoots. Four images that would be looked at, pixel-peeped, scrutinized by the whole world. Four images of which Fujifilm would choose one to display during the Fujifilm X Series Five Year Anniversary Exhibition in Tokyo. You know how photographers can be ruthless for each other’s work. I couldn’t help but think of the old joke: "How many photographers does it take to change a light bulb?" The answer is: "Eleven: one to actually fix the bulb and ten to comment afterwards about how that one guy could have done it better."

Charleroi, one of Belgium's old industrial cities. I scouted this cool location without ever leaving my house, thanks to Google Maps and Google Street View. The actual hike up the hill made me appreciate a lightweight camera system like the X-Series even more. Hills definitely look lower from Google Earth than they do when you're standing in front of them! My original plan was to do a Long Exposure here, but the wind was so strong I could not keep the camera steady enough.

Excited

But I also felt excited: I had been slaving away at my new Lightroom book for months (the Dutch version is available now and the English version is in layout) and I hadn’t really been photographing a lot. This opportunity and the deadline it included gave me a much needed kick in the butt. So I rustled up some models, fired up Google Maps and Google Street View to scout some cool locations, charged the battery of my Jinbei flash, dusted off my Formatt Hitech ND’s and my B+W Vari ND's (Dutch link, English link) and planned a couple of shoots.

Shooting JPEG (and actually liking it)

It was freezing cold but model Stéphanie was a real champ. Shot with one of my favourite lenses: the 10-24 mm. I used the Jinbei HD600 II and the Phottix Luna Folding Softbox. In very contrasty, backlit situations like these, it's good to have an Optical Viewfinder, too. Especially the X100T-like one, where you can still have a small EVF inserted in the bottom right corner to help you with your composition. The X-Pro 2 also has a 1/3rd stop faster sync speed than the X-T1, which comes in very handy when you're trying to overpower the sun in bright daylight.

The camera being a pre-production sample, the camera’s firmware was also still beta, so there were a couple of limitations. First of all, the ‘Preview Exposure and White Balance in Manual Mode’ feature was not working on my sample. It’s a feature I rely on heavily when using flash, because it lets me easily set the desired ambient exposure. However, my model will generally be too dark in this mode, so once I’ve determined how dark or bright I want the background to be, I will switch this mode off.

“I use the ‘Preview Exposure and White Balance in Manual Mode’ so much that I’ve assigned a function button to it.”

I’ve even dedicated one of the function buttons to it. To assign a function to a function button, press and hold it for a couple of seconds and then choose the desired function from the list that appears. When off, the EVF goes to a normal brightness level so you can choose your composition and your focus point more easily. Being able to switch between both views and having a live histogram is one of the key advantages of mirrorless cameras. Needless to say, the feature will work as expected on shipping X-Pro 2’s.

Another thing that slightly worried me was the fact that there was no RAW support yet. In fact, there still isn’t (as is always the case with new cameras). As a Lightroom user, author and trainer, I eat RAW files for breakfast. Although I love the quality of Fuji’s out-of-camera JPEG files (they’re probably the best in the whole camera industry), I prefer to shoot at least RAW + JPEG for the added postprocessing leeway that RAW files give me. Partly, that’s for creative reasons, as I like to edit my images quite elaborately but partly it’s also to cover up for the underexposure mistakes I sometimes make while shooting. When you know your way around Lightroom, you run the risk of becoming a sloppy photographer because you know the tricks to cover your ass after the shoot.  

Just like David DuChemin, I firmly believe in Vision-Driven Postprocessing. I always try to maximise the mood in my images to make them convey what I felt at capture time. As you can see from the behind-the-scenes shot, this image was actually taken during the day, but I thought the loneliness I felt from shooting from the top level of a parking lot, would be better expressed by a "dusky" postprocessing. I used one of my Colorific Colour Grading presets.

Old X-Pro 1 shoots new X-Pro 2 :-) This is what the scene really looked like. The dusky atmosphere was added in post. I was surprised to see that even a JPEG could survive this much postproduction, so that's very promising for the RAW files!

For that reason, I chose to shoot with the Standard Profile, rather than with Classic Chrome which I normally prefer: that film simulation blocks the shadows and without the fallback option of a raw file, I preferred to keep my options open. The X-Pro 2 also has a new Black & White film simulation and a new grain feature, but I did not test that for the same reason.

In this blog post, I will list my top 10 favourite features of this incredible new camera. To conclude this post, I was amazed with the quality of the JPEG files and the flexibility they still offered in terms of further processing. It almost made me wish Fuji would offer an option to save images as 16 bit TIFFs: you would get the benefit of near-raw like editing options along with the beautiful out-of-camera film simulations.

So, these were the four images I submitted to Fujifilm. I’m as curious as you to know which one they picked for the 5 Year X anniversary exhibition. I hope they picked at least one. And even if they haven't, I still had a hell of a time shooting! For me, the X-Pro 2 is already a fantastic camera: it made me get up from my couch and go shoot. Isn't that what all good cameras should do?

This location, an abandoned cooling tower, had been on my to-do list for quite some time. But writing books, magazine articles, creating Lightroom presets and changing the occasional diaper kept coming in the way. The X-Pro 2 deadline was the necessary kick in the butt to finally load up my F-Stop Loka UL backpack and go explore. And that's probably what I like most about Fujifilm cameras: they inspire me to just go out and shoot, experiment, learn from my mistakes and shoot some more.

My trusted F-Stop Loka UL backpack and me at the foot of the hill overlooking Charleroi.

My favourite new camera with my favourite old lens: the 10-24. I think I make about half of my shots with that lens. In fact, three of the four images on this page were shot with it.

All images in this blog post are JPEG images coming from a pre-production X-Pro 2. They were processed in Adobe Lightroom with my Colorific Lightroom presets. A big thanks to Serge from www.fotografieblog.be for the behind-the-scenes shots (made with an X-Pro 1).

The 5 Day Deal: Save over 95 percent on top-notch photography training!

Chances are that by the end of this week, your inbox will be overflowing with emails about the 5 Day Deal. Even more, I'll put in my own two cents through my mailing list, Facebook and Twitter. The reason is that if you're reading this blog, you're interested in photography education in general and in postprocessing in particular. And that's what the 5 Day Deal has to offer. In spades. It's an unmissable opportunity to learn a lot about photography and image editing for relatively little money. Oh, and in the mean time, you get to do some charity as well. Where's the catch? There isn't. Other than you'll be needing a good internet connection to download all the stuff!

What is the 5 Day Deal?

The 5 Day Deal is a bundle of photography-related training videos, eBooks, Lightroom presets, Photoshop actions and the like. These are offered at a bundle-price of $127 (+ VAT for Europeans, if you have a valid VAT-number, you can order VAT-free). So far the 'Deal'-part. The '5 Day' part means the Deal is only valid for five days: from now until September 15th.

All the instructors are big names in their field so this bundle really is 'All Killer, No Filler'. To name but a few of the 20 photographers and retouchers: Lindsay Adler and Jeremy Cowart (portrait photography), Zack Arias (flash photography) and Serge Ramelli (French Lightroom-instructor, who's worth checking out if only for his super-enthusiast French accent. It's like being taught Lightroom by 'Inspector Clouseau'!) And let's not forget Joel Grimes (flash photography and compositing in Photoshop). Even yours truly is featured in the list!

Lindsay Adler's excellent course is but one of over 40 training resources in this bundle.

When purchased separately, the total bill of these resources would amount to over $3300. Now, they can be yours for less than 5 percent of that price. Or a discount of over 95 percent! Even if you're only interested in half of this bundle's content, the 5 Day Deal is a great deal to fill your iPad with training and reading material for the coming winter. Some of the over 40 training titles separately cost more than the entire bundle.

And, as the proverbial cherry on the pie, a part of the sale goes to charity! More on that later.

Yes but is there also something interesting for me?

Of course, I cannot decide for you, but I've already had a sneek peak and below is my personal, highly subjective top-10.

1. Zack Arias - On Assignment - The Art of the Editorial
   Flash expert, Fujifilm user and all-round nice guy Zack Arias takes you behind the scenes of a couple of commercial editorial shoots. You can see how Zack tackles challenges and makes the best of a situation and an environment and turns these into really nice portraits. On top of that, this tutorial is brand new! What can I say? I love Zack! 
2. Joel Grimes - Start To Finish Tutorials
   Joel Grimes is a US commercial photographer with a signature (and oft-copied) style. He's also known for his compositing work. The 5 Day Deal brings you two of his training videos. 
3. Jimmy McIntyre - Art of Digital Blending
   This Photoshop training teaches you all about advanced Photoshop selections and masks and introduces you to the concept of Luminosity Masking. Recommended!
4. Lindsay Adler - 5 Creative Studio Lighting Setups
   Famous New York portrait photographer Lindsay Adler shows us 5 easy yet powerful lighting setups.
5. Klaus Hermann Lightroom Preset Power Pack
   The previous 5 Day Deal had Klaus Hermann's Mask it like a Pro video training which I really liked. Now, Klaus is back with a Lightroom preset pack and a 100+ page eBook that covers all you could possibly want to know about Lightroom presets. He not only covers Develop presets (the most popular category) but also metadata presets, tool presets and so on. German thoroughness or 'Deutsche Gründlichkeit', as they say in Germany.
6. Lightroom for Landscapes
   We stay in Lightroom-territory (litterally) with this Lightroom training designed specifically for landscape photographers. It covers everything from import over editing to exporting your images. Another training that by itself costs more than the entire bundle.
7. James Brandon: POST Video Tutorial
   Photoshop wizard and acclaimed landscape photographer James Brandon shows us how he processes his images with Photoshop and he throws in a bunch of Lightroom presets just for fun!
8. The Art of Sculpting Splashes by Alex Koloskov
   This is the beauty of the 5 Day Deal: the subject of this video training interests me, but I would have a hard time paying the normal $250 price tag. Now, I don't have to: I can get this training for almost half of its suggested retail price and get dozens of other books, presets and training videos in the process!
9. Serge Ramelli - Lightroom CC Complete Training
   If you think I'm sometimes overdoing it in my Lightroom edits, wait until you see what 'PhotoSerge' does with his raw files! Personally, I find his training to be very entertaining, if only for the funny Franglais.
10. The Created Image Series Volume 2
    Last but not least this one: the video recording of last year's Created Image Seminar in Vancouver, Canada. Great motivational keynotes by David duChemin and three super-interesting lectures by Steve Simon, known for his 'The Passionate Photographer' book. 

The total value of this top-ten alone is over $1.100. And there's more, depending on your interests: a newborn photography video tutorial, Photoshop skin softening actions, a Wedding Photography Planner Guide, it just goes on and on. In fact, you can find the full list of all included resources here.

Oh, and lest I forget, you also get Clarity by Topaz Labs, a fully functional Lightroom and Photoshop plugin that is like Lightroom's Clarity slider on steroids.

The full list of all the 5 Day Deal goodies.

I am proud to be featured in The Created Image video series, which is just one of the over 40 training resources. I talk about speeding up your Lightroom workflow, Dodging and Burning and Black and White conversion. The entire 5 Day Deal bundle contains 70+ hours of video, 10+ eBooks and hundreds of Photoshop Actions and Lightroom presets.

The funny thing is that even yours truly is - indirectly - represented in the 5 Day Deal: in the Created Image Video Tutorial I mentioned earlier, you'll find three sessions in which I talk about Lightroom efficiency, Black and White and Dodging & Burning.

Did you mention something about charity?

If you need an extra push, you can always ease your conscience (or your partner) with the knowledge that 10 percent (i.e. almost $13) of every bundle sold goes to the four charities the 5 Day Deal team picked. Even more, you can opt to double that amount upon checkout and you get to choose the charity of your liking, too.

You can choose to which of these 4 charities your 10 percent goes. By default, they all get 2.5 percent. Or, if you think the 5 Day Deal's actually too cheap, you can double the amount that goes to charity, too!

Last year's 5 Day Deal gathered a whopping $200.000+ for these charities and this time they're aiming at breaking the $300.000 mark. 

All 4 charities look great, but I have a soft spot for the BOMA project, if only because my good friend David duChemin already did some pro bono work for them: if it's good enough for him, it's good enough for me! Boma helps very poor women in rural African areas to the financial means to start small projects. 

I rest my case!

Disclaimer: if you purchase the 5 Day Deal bundle through the links on this page, MoreThanWords receives an affiliate commission (which cost you nothing extra, by the way). However, this does not influence my opinion about this bundle: on my blog, I only recommend things I find worthwhile. For instance, a while back, there was another bundle which I decided not to recommend because I knew this one was coming and I liked it better.

Fujifilm Audio Podcast with fellow X-Photographer Matt Brandon

As you probably know, I have a passion for India, for photography and... for Fujifilm gear. I'm proud to be a Fujifilm X-Photographer for Fujifilm Worldwide and a Fujifilm Ambassador for Fujifilm Belgium. You might also know that I share these passions with another X-Photographer, Matt Brandon from www.thedigitaltrekker.com. 

This shared interest has resulted in Matt and I organizing a number of photo workshops in India. Most of the images you can see in the galleries on this website were shot during those workshops. At the end of each workshop, it has become a tradition of ours to do an audio podcast about the Fujifilm gear that was released over the past year. Last year's podcast even included Matt and I ducking under a blanket to kill the noise of the AC in our Delhi hotel room. We'll do anything for quality!

This year we didn't have the time to do record the podcast in India, but thanks to the miracle of Skype, it's now here. So, if you have some time to spare, you can not only hear what we think about the new 90 or 16 mm but you'll also hear some inside tips and techniques, for example on how to use the X system for flash photography.

We have also just opened registrations for our new workshop: from February 14 to 24, 2016, our North India workshop will bring its participants from Delhi over Agra, home of the Taj Mahal, to Varanasi, one of India's holiest (and most photogenic) cities. This intimate ten-day workshop is limited to a maximum of nine participants.

Matt and I will teach you how to get the most out of this beautiful environment, how to make striking portraits and how to tell visual stories. Finally, for those interested, there will also be ample time to talk about postprocessing: being an Adobe Certified Lightroom expert, I eat Fuji .raf files for breakfast!

The workshop's official language is English, but if English isn't your first language (in fact, it often isn't for most of the participants), I'll be happy to assist you in Dutch or French, too! If you have any questions about this workshop, feel free to contact Matt or me.

In the podcast, Matt and I refer to a couple of our earlier blog posts. For your convenience, you can find those here:

Matt’s Posts

1. Fujinon 50-140mm f2.8 LM OIS WR: Review
2. First Look: Fujinon XF 16-55 mm f/2.8 R LM WR
3. Views of Kenya with the Fujinon XF 16mm f/1.4 WR
4. Fujifilm’s 90mm Makes a Colorful Splash on the Set of Indian Summers 2

My Posts

1. My 10 favourite accessories for Fujifilm X-cameras – Part 1
2. My 10 favourite accessories for Fujifilm X-cameras – Part 2
3. 10 reasons why I love my Fujifilm X100T
4. Review: The Jinbei HD 600 II: Portable Flash Power for my Fuji X cameras
5. Review: Godox V850 manual Li-ion flash: a perfect manual flash for my Fujifilm X-cameras

10 reasons why I love my Fujifilm X100T

In this blog post, I want to examine some of the reasons why I like Fujifilm's X100T so much, even though its fixed focal length of 23 mm (35 mm Fullframe Equivalent) is not what I normally like to shoot at. If you're on the verge of buying one, you may find this information interesting. If you already have one, I'm interested to hear in the comments what you like about it. So here's my - entirely subjective - top-10!

1. It has all manual dial controls

The X-100T's all manual controls. Image © Fujifilm

I love manual dial controls. Always have. I don't understand why at some point camera makers stopped adding aperture rings to their lenses. The X100T's got them all: an aperture ring (now also with 1/3 increments), a shutter speed dial and an exposure compensation dial. Only the ISO has to be set from the camera's Quick Menu, although you can minimise the need to change it by using the camera's auto-ISO functionality. Furthermore, you can add ISO to one of the function buttons so you can still easily set it without taking your eye from the viewfinder. Retro is hot, nowadays. But the X100T's retro style, contrary to some of the what I would call 'faux-retro' cameras out there, is actually functional retro.

2. It's my favorite 'get out the door quickly' camera

You know that feeling when you go out the door for a family stroll or a quick bike ride and you want to take a camera with you, just in case... So you grab a camera body, a lens, another lens and before you know it, you need a sherpa to carry all the extras because you cannot make your mind up what to bring. Well, with its fixed lens, the X100T makes your mind up for you. It's great for people with decision-making problems like myself!

When traveling with a toddler, generally the diaper bag is already heavy enough so you don't want to bring a loaded camera bag, too. The X100T comes to the rescue! Instead of extra lenses, you can bring extra diapers!

FUJIFILM X-100T | 1-500 sec. @ f/8,0 | ISO 200

3. It's the camera that forces me to try things differently

I must admit: 23 mm (35 mm Fullframe Equivalent) normally isn't my favourite focal length. I generally like to shoot a lot wider than that. Still, all the other advantages of the X-100T make it so that I've actually learned to appreciate the focal length. After all, if it was good enough for Cartier-Bresson, it should be good enough for me, right?

What I have found is that it forces me to be creative with my point of view. For example, on a family city trip to Lisbon, I had my X-T1 and my X100T with me. The first hardly left the bag. Instead, I used the second almost all of the time. And I'm convinced that having the fixed lens gave me some shots that I wouldn't have thought of otherwise, because using the X-T1 and my favourite 10-24, I'd never have left my favourite 'at 10 mm, I can make anything look dramatic' comfort zone.

(Images below processed with my Black & White Lightroom Preset bundle)

FUJIFILM X-100T | 1/240th sec. @ f/ 11 | ISO 200

FUJIFILM X-100T | 1/170th sec. @ f/ 9 | ISO 200

FUJIFILM X-100T | 1/500 sec. @ f/8 | ISO 200

4. I can expand my options with two conversion lenses

You can add two high-quality convertors to go a little wider or a little more telephoto than the standard 23 mm (35 mm Fullframe Equivalent) focal length. Image © Fujifilm

Having just said that I have started to appreciate the 23 mm field of view, there are always occasions where going a little wider or a little more tele would be welcome. And even though you can 'always zoom with your feet', sometimes a different focal length can make for a better perspective: not every face looks great up close at 23 mm - I know mine doesn't! There are two high-quality conversion lenses out there: one turns the camera into a 28 mm Fullframe Equivalent, the other to a 50 mm Fullframe Equivalent. I especially like having this option because I use the X100T a lot in my flash photography (more on that in point #9) and instead of being limited to just one focal length, I now have three somewhat different ones.

5. The hybrid viewfinder is great for street photography

The Hybrid Viewfinder combines the best of both worlds: Electronic and Optical. You just switch between the one that meets your needs best at any given point in time. Image © Fujifilm

Although I use the EVF most of the time, it's great to have an Optical Viewfinder as well: especially for street photography. I like to use the OVF on two occasions: first, when it's so bright and contrasty outside that I have a hard time seeing the EVF (it's rare, but it happens) but more importantly, when I am staking out a location and I'm waiting for a subject to enter the frame. The framelines in the OVF don't cover the entire area. In other words, you can see people entering the viewfinder before they enter the actual frame. This makes it much easier to anticipate the 'decisive moment'.

6. It's light and compact

I still use the old X100 case but the latest edition has a latch that lets you access the battery and SD-card compartment. Image © Fujifilm

Although not a featherweight, the X100T is certainly light enough to carry around all day. Even when I add a flash, a flash trigger and an umbrella I can still manage to keep my total gear kit under 2 pounds. Back in my Fullframe DSLR days, that would have meant a camera body and a body cap - not even a lens! I generally carry it around in its leather case. Unfortunately, when you use the optional lens hood, the case doesn't close anymore. In that case, you can still use the bottom half of the case, though.

7. The joys of an Electronic Viewfinder

Whether it's the effect of a square crop or a special film simulation, the Electronic Viewfinder shows you what you're going to get, not what you think you're going to get...

When you first switch to mirrorless, one of the harder things to adjust to is no longer having an optical viewfinder. Well, in the case of the X100T, you actually still have one but as mentioned earlier, I only use it on specific occasions.

For the rest of the time, I happily use the EVF (Electronic ViewFinder) and I have grown so used to it that I actually miss having one on those rare instances when I still pick up a DSLR. I'll do a separate blog post on the advantages of an EVF, but suffice to say for now that I like the fact that the EVF shows me the image that I will wind up with rather than the image I think I will wind up with.

I also love the instant feedback and the fact that I no longer have to chimp. Instead, I see the image I just created in my EVF, free from the glare of the sun. Finally, I love the fact that I can set up different aspect ratios or film simulations (I love Classic Chrome and Black + White) and that I can preview exactly how a specific aspect ratio or film look would work. In other words, having an EVF helps me with my composition. And as I shoot RAW + JPG, I still record the full colour sensor data anyway!

8. It has built-in WIFI

The X100T has built-in WIFI, which is great for three things: first of all, you can send images to your phone to process them or put them online. Secondly, you can print directly from the X100T to Fujifilm's Instax Share Printer. I always have that little printer with me: it's great to give people a thank-you picture and it's even better for opening up photo opportunities. Thirdly, I can control the camera from the Fujifilm Remote App on phone which makes it easier for shooting in situations where you would not dare to raise this camera, let alone a big bulky DSLR to your eye. I just let the camera hang from my neck and control it from my phone. Bystanders probably think I'm just texting someone!

9. It gives me up to 1/2.000th second flash sync speed

Because the X100T uses a leaf shutter, I can sync flashes up to 1/2.000th of a second. This means that, if I choose my settings wisely, I can do the same with one speedlight (for example the Godox Ving V850 I reviewed here) as with eight speedlights on a regular DSLR (or an X-T1 for that matter). So, imagine what I can do with an actual 600 Ws portable, battery powered big flash like the Jinbei HD 600 that I reviewed here. Getting more juice out of any flash is one advantage of that fast sync speed, but another consequence can be even more important: at that shutter speed, I can actually freeze motion when I mix ambient light with flash! This feature is so important that I'll dedicate a separate blog post to it...

Shot in the freezing cold. Last frame before the battery died.

FUJIFILM X-100T | 1/500 sec. @ f/8 | ISO 200

10. It just looks great. Period.

I know, it shouldn't matter, but it does. This camera just looks great. My mother, who otherwise isn't interested at all in photography saw me with it one day and actually enquired about it. She hasn't done that with any of the other cameras I've ever brought with me. The camera's look is even functional, in a way, because I firmly believe it changes your interaction with whoever's in front of the camera and as a result, it changes your pictures too, for the better. One of my workshop attendants recently called it 'a friendly camera'. That's exactly what it is. A friendly friend.

I could go on for another 10 points (the excellent image quality, the fast 2.0 lens, the programmable function buttons, the Quick Menu, the built-in ND filter) but I think you get my thrift. So what about you? Do you have an X-100T? What do you like about it? Thinking of getting one but still in doubt? I hope I have made a couple of points to help you decide!

If you want to know more about the X100T (or the X100S), check out Fuji expert Peter Fauland's new eBook on the subject: Mastering the Fujifilm X100T and X100S.

If you're interested in putting your X100 through its paces in one of the most photogenic places on earth, join Fujifilm X-photographer Matt Bandon and me on the North India Photo Tour (Feb. 14 to 24, 2016). You can learn more about this fantastic photo workshop here.

Review: The Jinbei HD 600 II: Portable Flash Power for my Fuji X cameras

There seems to be a consistent pattern among people who start to discover the wonders of off-camera flash: you start out with one speedlight, such as the excellent Godox Ving V850 which I reviewed here, and take that through its paces. Sooner or later, though, you'll encounter situations where that one speedlight just isn't powerful enough, for example on sunny days or when you want to use big diffusers. Diffusers eat flash power for breakfast! So, if you want to photograph people in sunny locations with a diffuser such as an umbrella or a softbox, like I do on my India trips, one speedlight just won't cut it. So you add a second. And a third... and possibly a fourth. 

That's where things start to become complicated and heavy and not to mention: expensive: to use all those flashes, you need special adapters such as Lastolite's Triflash or Quad Bracket or the Foursquare. Also, unless you're working with a flash like the Godox with its custom li-ion battery, working with multiple hotshoe flashes means charging a hell of a lot of batteries before you go out on a shoot, especially if those flashes require separate, battery powered triggers, too. All of a sudden, you're more like a magician juggling up to 24 rechargeable batteries (that's without counting spares) than a photographer.

That's where the more powerful, battery powered studio lights come in. When I started my research, I noticed there were quite a lot of options availble. They break down into two broad categories: the ones where the battery pack and head are separate and the ones where battery and head are integrated. Both systems have their pros and cons, but for my use (I often work alone), I wanted something integrated. It's just less fuss to set up and most of the shooting I do is rather run-and-gun (or at least as run-and-gun as using a flash allows). 

The HD-600 II and its trigger. The battery slides into the back of the flash and can be taken out by the handle. If you think 500 full power flashes won't help you through the day, separate batteries are available.

I had noticed the Profoto B1 - with that marketing campaign, who hasn't - and although it looks like a nice enough unit, both the price and the specs were a little too much for me. As I was planning on using the flash in conjunction with my Fuji X cameras, I could not use (so I did not want to pay for) features such as High Speed Sync or TTL control. So after careful deliberation I opted for a Chinese brand: the Jinbei HD 600 II. 

What's in the box?

Well, quite a lot for the price, actually: 

• the Jinbei flash head itself, obviously
• the battery
• a battery charger
• a plastic protection cap to protect the flash tube when you're transporting the flash and don't have the reflector attached to it
• a standard reflector
• two handles: one that is meant as a hand grip to handhold the flash and another that is meant to attach the flash to a light stand or tripod: I generally don't take a light stand with me when I travel but I use my 3 Legged Thing Brian tripod as a makeshift light stand - it extends to over 2 meters!
• a nice soft padded carrying case that is actually useful in the field (I'm looking at you, Elinchrom!)
• a custom trigger which also lets you remotely set the power

What are the specs?

I won't bore you too much with the technical details but suffice to say that the Jinbei is rated at a whopping 600 Wattseconds of power and that the battery lasts for about 500 full power pops before needing a recharge (separate batteries are available for purchase). The flash has a user-selectable slow or fast recycle mechanism (with the latter being not as good for the battery life) and the power can be changed (remotely or on the flash itself) from full power down to 1/128th. 

The flash takes between 0.3 to 4.5 seconds (depending on the power level) to recycle in Slow mode and between 0.3 and 3.5 seconds in Fast recycle mode. That's not blazing fast, but remember this is a battery operated flash we're talking about. Also, that four second wait is only at full power... And with 600 Ws under the hood, you won't always be working this flash at its maximum power anyway! This flash at one eight power is about as powerful as a speedlight at full power.

The Jinbei weighs a little under 2.5 kg and measures 124 x 124 x 268 mm.

It has a 5 W LED modeling light but frankly I never use it because I always use the flash outside in bright and sunny conditions anyway where any modeling light would simply be too weak.

How does it handle?

At 2.48 kgs, the Jinbei is of course a lot heavier than a traditional speedlight, although it's still a bit lighter than a Profoto B1. In fact, one of the (many) advantages of the Fuifilm X-system for me is that, since my camera system itself weighs considerably less than before, I can 'reinvest' some of those weight savings back into useful accessories. And the Jinbei sure does qualify as useful! 

Also, when you look at the power to weight ratio, it isn't so heavy anymore: depending on how you calculate, a 600 Ws flash has about the same power output as 6 to 10 regular speedlights! Try schlepping those around, let alone handholding them in the air or putting them on a light stand!

One technique I like to use is to put my subject between the sun and an umbrella'd Jinbei: the sun then acts as a rim-light, adding a nice glow around my subject while the flash provides a soft fill light. It's basically a 'two lights for the price of one' setup.

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF56mmF1.2 R | 1-180 sec at f - 2.8 | ISO 200

For short sessions, I have no problem handholding the Jinbei. It does help though that in my other hand, I'm generally holding a relatively lightweight X-T1 with a prime lens or even an X100-T... I really love the fact that the EVF lets me previsualize the amount of ambient light I allow in my pictures but that's food for another blogpost entirely! 

The way the umbrella adapter attaches to the flash's base plate is proprietary and a little clunky, but not a deal breaker. On the plus side, this design lets you exchange the umbrella adapter with the supplied handle.

So far, so good...

If there's one gripe I have with the Jinbei, it's the fact that the proprietary mechanism of attaching any of the two supplied handles is a bit fiddly. Not that it will break or the flash will come loose, but the flash just sits a bit wobbly on the umbrella adapter. I haven't had any serious issues with it and my buddy Matt Brandon who bought the same flash after seeing me use it in Rajasthan, solved the issue by changing the screw. I just hate DIY stores!

Oh, and while I'm venting, I might as well say that the trigger is rather basic. I really wish it had an LCD so I could see the power settings but on the upside, it at least lets you change the power remotely. And it's small so it does not get in the way of my Fuji's control wheels... so maybe I should be careful what I wish for!

The Jinbei uses the popular Bowens mount which gives you loads of downright cheap to affordable modifier options. I like to use it with the Phottix Luna Folding Softbox, for example, which I can set up in under a minute. In India though, I generally use it with an umbrella: in fact, as nice as it is, I don't use the supplied carrying case but rather put the flash with a Lastolite Trifold umbrella (closed, obviously) attached to the supplied umbrella adapter in a Vanguard Heralder 38 shoulder bag. I've refitted the velcro dividers in this bag so that there's still room for my second camera body. A nice extra of this bag is that it can also hold my 3 Legged Thing Brian which I use more as a light stand than as an actual tripod! I must say that the flash and the tripod start to weigh after a day of lugging them around so I'm considering putting them in an F-Stop Loka UL backpack om my next trip. I'll let you know how that goes!

When used with an X-100T or any other camera that has a fast sync speed, the power of the Jinbei allows for extreme control over your ambient light while photographing at action-freezing speeds.

FUJIFILMX100T |  1-500 sec at f - 2.8 | ISO 400

Apparently, if you use a different trigger that Jinbei are currently working at, the HD600 II will also do high-speed sync with Nikon and Canon cameras, but not with Fuji cameras. I can't tell you much more about it as I use the Phottix Indra with my Nikon D800 whenever I want to use High Speed Sync. The Phottix, which I'll review later, is also a very powerful portable, battery operated studio flash and does TTL, too with Nikon and Canon. As such, I feel like it's more of an alternative (and a really good one!) for the Profoto B1 than for the Jinbei. 

How much does it cost?

Well, that's probably the best part of this whole review and it's also that part that will make you forgive the flash any of its few shortcomings: the whole lot (flash, reflector, charger, battery, trigger, handles and carrying case) will set you back... a little under 600 €, including 20% VAT! Which, in photography terms is cheap. Really cheap!

With 600 Ws of light at your disposal, you can turn a day scene into a night scene: this photo was shot in the early afternoon. I was able to almost completely kill the ambient light and replace it with flash light.

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF10-24mmF4 R OIS | 1-180 sec at f - 5.0 | ISO 200

The verdict

For the money, this flash is hard to beat. It packs a lot of power in a relatively lightweight package and is easy to handle. The trigger allows you to conveniently set the power remotely and the Bowens mount is handy because there's a really wide range of affordable modifiers available for it. 

Whenever I use this flash during one of my flash workshops, people are amazed about the price/performance ratio of the Jinbei. Add to that a 2 year warranty and even if it totally falls apart on the 731st day, I'd still consider it a great bargain. 

Highly recommended!

What could be improved

• An LCD on the trigger with a power-readout would be nice
• The way the handle attaches to the flash (a bit wobbly now)

What I like

• High power: 600 Ws
• All-in-one design, no cables or separate power pack!
• At 2.5 kgs, relatively lightweight for the power
• Battery lasts some 500 full power pops
• Bowens mount means lots of affordable modifiers
• Complete package with reflector, handles and trigger
• Very competitively priced

Where can you get one?

Oddly enough, distribution of this flash is very limited here in Europe. I only found one store that carries this HD 600 II: I bought my unit at the ever so friendly guys of Fotomorgen.de, a German online reseller that has great service. They speak English (click on the Online Chat icon at the top left of their website) and if you have a VAT number, they will ship VAT-free outside of Germany. I can really recommend them. They are very knowledgeable and also carry a great range of lighting accessories.

If you're in the US, Adorama sells a rebadged version of this flash called the Flashpoint Rovelight RL-600. I believe the attachment of the handle is a little different - which can only be an improvement - but otherwise it has the same specs. It exists in two versions: one with Adorama's own mount and one with a Bowens mount just like the actual Jinbei.

FUJIFILMX-T1 | XF56mmF1.2 R | 1-180 sec at f - 1.2 | ISO 200. Without the use of a flash, the light coming in through the back wall would have been disturbingly bright.

If you want to practice your off-camera flash skills in one of the most photogenic places on earth, join Fujifilm X-photographer Matt Bandon and me on the North India Photo Tour (Feb. 14 to 24, 2016). You can learn more about this fantastic photo workshop here.

If you want to learn more about off-camera flash, then my Making Light 1 and Making Light 2 eBooks might be of interest to you.

Wirelessly tethering your camera into Lightroom with an Eyefi MobiPro SD Card

In a previous blog post, I did a review about the new Eyefi MobiPro SD Card. You might want to read that blog post first before watching this video. One of the conclusions was that for real-life tethered shooting (e.g. in a studio), wirelessly sending over raw files is just too slow (unless you're paid by the hour). So, in this follow-up article, I want to investigate an alternative workflow, which is a lot more efficient. Basically, I use this technique to wirelessly tether my 3 year old Fujifilm X-Pro 1 into Lightroom and it works like a charm! You can pretty much use this technique with most cameras that use SD cards.

The main workflow is as follows:

1. Set your camera up to shoot raw + JPG
2. Only transfer the JPG files wirelessly from the Eyefi card to your computer (that's the default Eyefi setup anyway)
3. Use Lightroom's Auto-Import feature to import the wirelessly transferred JPG files into Lightroom
4. Make any edits, add star ratings, keywords and pick or reject flags to the JPG files during your tethered shoot
5. At the end of the shoot, copy the raw files over from the SD card to the same Lightroom folder the jpg files are in, 'the old fashioned way', i.e. manually using Lightroom's regular Import dialog
6. (And this is the magical part) Have Lightroom automatically synchronise any edits (except for cropping) and metadata from the jpg files to the corresponding raw files, using John Beardsworth's Syncomatic plugin.

That's the short and sweet version. You can get the full lowdown in this video. 

An audio interview with me on Faded & Blurred

I am very honoured to have been interviewed by Jeffery Saddoris from the well-known Faded and Blurred blog. I just love that url, by the way: Faded and Blurred. It makes me think of a Lightroom preset, but I digress!

Jeffery is a great interviewer: an hour passed by and I hadn't even noticed. Anyways, if you have an hour to kill between charging your camera batteries and you want to hear me ramble about how I think of Lightroom graduated filters while I am driving in my car and other stuff, the interview is here.

From that page, you can also subscribe to the podcast. There's some excellent interviews in there!

Review: Eyefi Mobi Pro 32 GB wireless SD card

Eyefi kindly sent me a Mobi Pro 32 GB wireless SD card to review. The timing was right, because I had been looking for a way to create a tethered workflow in which I can send images I take with my Fujifilm cameras to Lightroom. Although Fujifilm have announced a tethering solution, it is not yet available and once it will be, it will still require you to use a cable.

What is it?

The Eyefi Mobi Pro 32 GB wireless SD card is, as its name implies, a 32 GB SD card that includes a wireless transmitter so you can send your photos wirelessly to your smartphone, tablet or computer. It's priced at about $99 / €89. Eyefi also has a cheaper wireless card, the Eyefi Mobi, that exists in 8 and 16 GB versions. The difference between both is that the Pro version can...

• also transfer raw files
• has an option to only transfer selected photos (the regular Mobi transfers all photos)
• use its own wifi network but also be integrated in your existing home or office network

Note that these options are off by default, but you can enable them by putting your card in your desktop computer's card reader and going into the Eyefi Desktop App's preferences. More about that later.

Working with mobile devices

The Mobi Pro not only allows you to transfer raw files to your computer, you can also send images (JPEG only, if I'm correct) to a mobile device. You only have to install the Eyefi Mobi app, enter the card's serial number in the app and connect your mobile device to the wifi network that the card emits. It was really nice to see the images that I was shooting with my wifi-less X-Pro 1 appearing on my iPhone. 

My X-Pro 1 now has wifi capabilities, thanks to the Eyefi Mobi Pro!

So, if nothing else, this card enables you to transfer images that you shoot with a non-wifi equipped camera to a tablet or phone, from which you could then share them to Instagram, Facebook or edit them in an App such as Snapseed. Heck, if you're a Lightroom CC user, you could even have them automatically imported in Lightroom mobile and that way have them wind up in your desktop version of Lightroom, too. Lots of possibilities there! 

The Mobi Pro turns (almost) any non-wifi equipped camera into a camera that lets you share images to your mobile devices

On your mobile device, select the Eyefi Mobi Card's network and you're good to go!

By default, the card sends out its own ad hoc wifi signal, so you can even do this in the middle of nowhere: you just have to select the card's wifi network in your phone's wifi settings and you're good to go. As mentioned, by default it sends all the images over but you can configure it (computer required) to only transfer those that you mark on your camera as locked or protected. On the X-Pro 1, when in playback mode, press the OK key and choose the 5th option from the Playback menu: Protect. 

So far, so good. I was starting to think it would be nice to use this setup during workshops: I do a lot of teaching and it would be fun to have the images appear on an iPad that I could then pass around to the students. It sure beats looking at a camera LCD or viewfinder (especially the X-Pro 1's EVF)!

The (jpg) images transfer nicely and relatively quickly to the Eyefi Mobi App

However, that's where things didn't quite go as hoped: each time the camera went to sleep, I had to reestablish the wifi connection. So I set the camera to not go to sleep, but then the card's internal settings wrecked havoc: apparently, to conserve power on the camera, the card will shut down the connection after 1 to 2 minutes of non-use. Which is too soon for a real world tethering workflow. I've looked around but there seems to be no easy fix to this. According to Eyefi Customer Care, this cannot be changed. Which is a bummer, because it makes the card unusable for the teaching use I had in mind. Mind you that this auto-disconnect issue does not seem to happen when you shoot to a laptop or desktop computer.

Eyefi Cloud

The Eyefi Mobi Pro also comes with a complimentary free year of Eyefi Cloud: this service lets you upload an (unlimited) amount of images to the Eyefi servers, from where you can also share them or you can use this service as a cloud backup (you can even upload old photos so the service isn't limited to photos you took with an Eyefi card). Eyefi Cloud lets you display your images in a timeline no matter which device you used to take them with. The pictures are shared across all your devices and available for viewing even when there's no internet connection. Of course, you can also share pictures with other people.

Although the concept sounds nice enough, I personally won't be using this service as I already have a full computer backup through backblaze.com and I use Lightroom mobile to display and sync my images online across different devices.

Tethering to a desktop or laptop computer

Being able to transfer images to a phone or tablet is nice, but the main reason I was interested in this card was to wirelessly transfer my raw files to a watched folder on my computer, and have Lightroom pick them up from there using the Lightroom's Auto Import feature. This way, I was hoping not only to shoot tethered into Lightroom, but to do so wirelessly!

The first time you use your card, you have to enter the activation code and then take a couple of test shots. Once your card is recognised, you're good to go. This setup procedure only has to be done once. Make sure to save the card with the activation code in case you change computers or want to use the card with a different computer, too.

I installed the Mobi Pro Desktop App (make sure you have the latest version of that specific app - the version that works with the regular Eyefi Mobi card will not support the extra features of the Mobi Pro card) and set the card up to transfer raw files, too. You have to insert the card in your computer to make that change. A nice touch for raw + jpeg shooters is that you can send both file types to different folders if you want.

The Pro card offers the ability to add up to 32 Home Networks, transfer raw files and enable selective transfer of files.

Again, so far, so good. Just like with the iPhone, after the initial setup procedure is over, you select the card's wifi signal in your computer's list of available networks and you're good to go. However, then came the disappointment: it took about 30 seconds to download a 30 megabyte raw from the X-Pro 1. On top of that, sometimes, the desktop app would not immediately start to download after I made a shot. So I would shoot again and then both shots would be downloaded from the card together. Oddly enough, the second shot would sometimes arrive on my computer before the first, making it hard to judge my shoot's progress. I checked this with Eyefi's (excellent and quick) customer support and they said the maximum speed of the card, using the card's own network, is between 10 to 15 megabit per second, which means that theoretically, that raw file could download in about 15 seconds. But even that is quite long a wait in the heat of a shoot. Eyefi also recommends to keep the card close to the receiving device when transferring. If you're using a megapixel monster like the D800 then those times would easily double.

One of the other exclusive features of the Pro version of the card is that it can also work via your own WIFI network: in fact, you can store up to 32 different networks in the card and it will then default to any of those if it finds one and otherwise it will fall back to creating its own ad-hoc network. This has two advantages: it keeps you from having to switch back and forth between your own network and the card's network and you can use your computer for things such as internet browsing while using the card. I had hoped that the transfer speed might improve, too but I was unable to confirm that. In fact, when I tried the card over my own wifi network, transfer speed was slower than through the card's own ad hoc network. Working via my own network did give me one (important) advantage: even if I put the camera down for a while, I could just pick it up again and start shooting and the files would automatically transfer again. When using the Eyefi's ad hoc (own) wifi signal, just as with my iPhone, the network connection dropped after a minute or two. It's really a pity though that we cannot configure this timing. I would be interested to hear other user's experience with this.

Back to jpgs, then?

So I decided to try how fast a jpg would transfer. FINE jpgs from an X-Pro 1 are about 3 megabyte and those downloaded in 3 seconds. A burst of 10 shots downloaded in half a minute. Unless you're shooting very fast, I consider that workable. So at least, when I'm in a situation where I can use another network than the card's own (because of the reason explained at the end of the previous paragraph), I seem to be able to tether jpg files to the computer steadily enough.

Conclusion

Unless you're a very slow and deliberate shooter, raw tethered shooting in a professional environment is possible in theory, but not in practice, IMHO. Does that mean I won't be using the Mobi Pro? No, on the contrary: I find it to be a valuable tool, as long as you set your expectations right, which was the point of this blog post.

First of all, I like the fact that I can transfer selected shots from my X-Pro 1 to my iPad or iPhone for social sharing or quick editing. And as far as tethered shooting to a computer goes: whenever there's a shoot where I feel I can benefit from shooting wirelessly straight into Lightroom, I will shoot raw + jpg on the card but transfer only the jpg files wirelessly and import those into Lightroom. I will do my ratings, flags and possibly some minor editing on those jpg images. After the shoot, when the client or the model have gone home, I will copy the raw files over the old-fashioned way: by putting the card into my computer!

And before you pity me for having to manually copy over my edits from the jpg to the raw files or even worse, doing everything over again, don't: I've got a trick up my sleeve that I will share in next week's blog post. Stay tuned!

UPDATE: 'next week's blog post' is now live, here! In this blog post, I'll show you how to automatically import your images into Lightroom and how to transfer any edits you've already performed on the JPGs to your raw files.

Cons

• wireless raw transfer too slow for tethered shooting use in studio or outside, using jpg is recommended
• auto-disconnects too quickly when used with iPhone / iPad for tethered use with these devices

Pros

• turns cameras without wifi into wifi-enabled cameras
• works with Mac and Windows, iOS and Android
• wireless transfer of raw files, ok for one-offs
• option to transfer only selected files
• if configured, works with your own network
• fast customer support