X100 – First impressions

Posted on July 1, 2011 by Michael Willems

A few first impressions of the Fuji X100 camera:

This, like all my reviews, is a “first impressions from the field”. Not a full review: for those you can read dpreview.com and other sites.

These sites are great. But 23 pages of review are all very well: what do they really mean? I mean – to a user, a photographer, not someone who sits in his loft obsessing?

I have had my X100 for a day so I think I am qualified.

First, I upgraded the X100. And rather than by following the two-page instructions from Fuji that involve at least two files, I did it the simple way:

Download firmware file (.DAT).
Copy this to a freshly formatted card.
Start camera with RAW pressed while powering on.
Say YES to the upgrade dialog.

Done.

Why on earth Fuji needs to include an “upgrader app” file and spend two pages of convoluted instructions making it so complicated I would hesitate to do it, I will not understand. Engineers making it complicated again. I am an engineer so I can comment: KISS. Keep It Simple, Stupid.

On to the camera. I am not worried if the review (of the original, not upgraded) software says bad things about the firmware. I want to know what it means to me, not to a theoretical user. So “Auto ISO is hidden” does not bother me – I do not use auto ISO (or if I do, it’ll be all day, so I will find it). And interface stuff you can learn is not a serious drawback.

In a few words:

The camera is a delight. The hybrid electronic/optical viewfinder is a. ma. zing. The camera is well built. Retro looking. Solid. Offers excellent image quality. Has a JPG conversion engine that does a great job: this camera may be the first one in many years that I actually use in JPG mode. Great 23mm lens (equivalent to 35mm “real” lens).

So this is basically a Leica M9 at a fraction of the price?

Sure. But since there are no free lunches, what are the drawbacks?

That is what I am talking about because this camera is so good. Get one, unless one of the issues below is a showstopper for you. I am skipping through the trivial ones (“auto ISO is hidden”, “The ISO dial turns the wrong way”, and so on.). These, while true, are unimportant. But there are some real ones – “issues that could get in the way”, rather than “issues I’d rather see done some other way”. My main ones among these are:

The focus points are hard to shift. I want a quick way to shift my focus point. I do this in every image. So it must be quick. Instead, I need to use both hands in unusual positions. I can never find the button without looking at the back, necessitating me moving the camera away from my face.
Focusing in low light often fails.The battery/memory card door opens way too easily. Happens regularly.
The central “Menu/OK” button is very hard to press, unless you have the fingers of a six month old embryo. You will inevitably press the other, surrounding, buttons instead.
Battery life is not great if the “quick start” option (which is needed!) reduces it by half.
Focusing is impossible at less than 80cm (ca 2.5 ft) unless you use the electronic viewfinder.
Even with new firmware, startup time is slow.
Not enough buttons are customizable.
The maximum speed goes down with large ISO and aperture settings. At 400 ISO and f/2, the camera cannot shoot above 1/500th second, for instance. And the ND filter which was designed to handle this is many key-presses away.

These are not fatal, but they are the ones I really notice as a photographer. Many of them (though not point 3) will be solved in upcoming firmware, I imagine.

A few snaps (where as per previous posts, I make the viewer tell his or her own story):

I think “street”… I cannot wait to get to Toronto to do some street photography with this wonderful camera. It’s winning – and not in the Charlie Sheen way.

Canadians: Happy Canada Day. More tomorrow.

Post Note: As reader Duke S. points out: I could well refer to this camera as “Preciousssss…”

Post post note: Second impressions and third impressions now also online here.

Gear News

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Michael Willems

OK, OK, I bought a Fuji X100 point-and-shoot.

If you have not heard about this camera, you should: it looks like an old Leica, and in many ways works like one, including fabulous build quality, excellent image quality and quiet operation. But in one way it is even better: it has a viewfinder that is both “purely optical with information overlays” and “fully electronic” – and you can switch between the two options using a switch. Genius. And a great-looking camera:

Talking about looks, here’s Rob Buchelt, the manager of the Oakville Henry’s store, shot just now with the X100:

Yup, the new toy is great for street and impromptu photography and it is small and inconspicuous.

It has drawbacks, of course. More about those soon – but in my case, they are vastly outweighed by the positives.

As a result, I am selling this – much as I love it, because money does not grow on trees (I keep hoping, but no luck so far). This is my Panasonic GF1 with 20mm f/1.7 “pancake” interchangeable lens, and a spare battery as well as a 4GB memory card. I am about to put it up on Kijiji.

I’d like to chat more but now off to run errands and then two shoots to finish!

Chipping away…

Posted on June 30, 2011 by Michael Willems

Let us continue to chip away at learning flash.

Today, more background information. A quick note now on how Canon and Nikon, the two brand leaders, handle exposure differently. (Others follow either Canon or Nikon).

What shutter speeds are allowed by the camera when you are using a flash ?

Shutter speeds can be restricted by the camera for two reasons:

To protect the user from shaky pics, a slow speed is sometimes denied.
To prevent bad flash photos, a fast shutter speed is also sometimes denied.

But Canon and Nikon do this differently – and it helps to know how your camera works. So here goes.

SLOW SHUTTER SPEED RESTRICTIONS:

Shutter speed mode:

Canon: None. You set what you like.
Nikon: None. You set what you like.

Manual Mode:

Canon: None. You set what you like.
Nikon: None. You set what you like.

Program Mode:

Canon: no speeds slower than 1/60th second will be used
Nikon: no speeds slower than 1/60th second (adjustable on some cameras) will be used. Except if “Slow Flash” is selected: then, any speed including very slow ones can be chosen by the camera.

Aperture Mode:

Any speed including very slow ones can be chosen by the camera.
Nikon: no speeds slower than 1/60th second (adjustable on some cameras) will be used. Except if “Slow Flash” is selected: then, any speed including very slow ones can be chosen by the camera.

So there you have it – markedly different behaviour by both cameras.

Clearly, from the above you can see that:

On Canon:

Program mode is not ideal when using indoors flash (you might want slower shutter speeds to allow lighter backgrounds)!
Aperture mode is not ideal when using indoors flash (you might get a 1-second shutter if the background is dark, which you do not want!)

On Nikon:

Program mode or Aperture mode without “slow flash” enabled are not ideal when using indoors flash (you might want slower shutter speeds to allow lighter backgrounds)!
Program mode or Aperture mode with “slow flash” enabled are not ideal when using indoors flash (you might get a 1-second shutter if the background is dark, which you do not want!)

Which is why I use manual when using flash indoors, when ambient light is low.

FAST SHUTTER SPEED RESTRICTIONS:

Canon: when the flash is detected, no speed faster than the flash sync speed (typically 1/200th second) is allowed, except if “High-Speed Flash” is enabled on the flash. This, however, drastically reduces the maximum available flash range.
Nikon: when the flash is detected, no speed faster than the flash sync speed (typically 1/250th second) is allowed, except if “Auto FP Flash” is enabled in the camera’s flash menu. This, however, drastically reduces the maximum available flash range.

All these Flash articles are excerpts from my signature four hour “Advanced Flash” course, in which you learn all these concepts in a hands-on, interactive session.

Polarize it.. don’t criticize it.

Posted on June 29, 2011 by Michael Willems

Look at this shot of this morning:

And now look at this:

Look at the sky, and the cloud. More saturation on the blue. More separation between cloud and sky. More definition in the tree.

Because for the second shot I used a polarizer.

Put it on the lens.
Turn baby turn – until you see the desired effect.
This effect is strongest 90 degrees perpendicular to the sun, i.e. when you are shooting 90 degrees to the right or left when the sun is behind you or in front. It is weakest parallel to the sun, i.e. when the sun is exactly behind you or in front of you.
Do not leave the polarizer on – it eats a few stops of light. Only use it when you need it, and remove afterward.
Do not combine with other filters, or vignetting may result.

Do you have a polarizer in your bag? If you live in a place where the sun can shine, you probably ought to.

Cave Cardem

Posted on June 28, 2011 by Michael Willems

OK, that is rather a lame wordplay on the Latin “Cave Canem”, which means “beware of the dog”. So I mean “beware of the (wrong) memory cards”.

How so?

Bit of background. I always use only Sandisk or Lexar cards – they do work more reliably. And my images are important since I get paid for them, so why try to save? Better is, well, better. That does not mean I buy fast or large cards – but I buy brand names only.

So. My second shooter used an 8GB eye-fi card in her D90 camera the other day to shoot a wedding. This is a card that can connect to WiFi, but it also writes to local storage.

Allegedly.

The moment I inserted this card into my card reader, my iMac crashed. Hard. Grey screen of death. That happened twice. And now the card is unreadable on any machine.

Or not?

Part of a wedding is something you must never lose. And yet this happened. Perhaps Eye Fi (www.eye.fi) can help restore the images? Perhaps, but so far, over 24 hours later, they have not responded to my email support request.

And this, my friends, is why I use only Sandisk and Lexar cards. And cameras that write to two cards at once (my 1Ds Mk3 and 1D Mk4). Live and learn, never again will I allow anyone who shoots with me to use anything except a freshly formatted Lexar and Sandisk. If your images are of equal importance to you, you will do the same.

And the wedding? Well – that is why we have two shooters and four cameras (with another in the car as a backup). The wedding couple will be happy. But I am not.

Lenses: Brand or third-party?

Posted on June 21, 2011 by Michael Willems

When buying a lens, you have two options: brand (Canon lenses for a Canon camera, and so on) or third party (“Sigma made for Canon”, and so on).

Third-party lenses are often half the price of brand name lenses. Brands say “that is because ours are better”. Third parties, like Sigma, maker of the 24-70 f/2.8 Nikon-mount lens below, would probably say “this is because you pay for the name with those guys”. Which is it?

A bit of both, I think.

I would certainly consider a third-party lens. If:

aperture is large,
build quality is good,
focus is silent, fast and accurate,
the lens is sharp, even at the corners,
colour is good,
and importantly, the lens feels good to me..

…then I will most certainly consider it. And third-party lenses often have better warranty than Canon and Nikon offer.

But that also brings me to why – perhaps because these warranties are needed. The lens above is the third one that its owner tried in about two weeks: lens number one did not always focus consistently, so it was exchanged in its first week, and lens two suddenly stopped focusing after just a few days – the focus motor stopped working entirely in mid-shoot. Lens three, we hope, will work well.

Now that is from a sample of one (well, three). So you cannot draw any conclusions from it. But still… in the past, reliability and quality control used to the the third-party lens makers’ Achilles’ Heel. There is either a certain irony, or a wise lesson, in the fact that two samples of this lens failed in two weeks.

But the lower price – significantly lower – is hard to pass by. I think whatever you choose, you will be fine, as long as you go through the check list above abnd make sure the warranty is OK.

And remember: lenses make your photos, much more than your camera does. So whatever lenses you invest in – investing in lenses is never bad.

Open wide

Posted on June 16, 2011 by Michael Willems

My friend Peter McKinnon, of himynameispeter.com, visited me tonight.

Peter is a very talented international photographer (and magician, as it happens: a skill that comes in handy during some of the wedding he shoots, I bet).

Peter and I share a love of wide angle lenses. Like the 14mm f/2.8 lens he shoots with – a lens that is on my wish list. Look at Peter here, holding that lens – all that glorious glass:

Peter shoots with this lens very often, even where others would shy from a wide lens – and I do not blame him: it is wonderful, rectilinear, and very, very sharp (especially when stopped down).

So – something to explain. Why do I say “some would shy away”?

Because some people think wide angle lenses distort.

So do they? Depends.

If you mean “make straight lines into curves” – a good lens is rectilinear. Meaning straight lines remain straight. So in that sense: no distortion.
Very wide lenses are, however, not entirely sharp at the very edge – in that sense, yes, some distortion, if you will.
What they do do is show perspective from the point of view. And if I get close to something, the scene will look dramatic in the corners and at the edges This is not, strictly speaking, distortion. It is showing me basic geometry. If I am one inch away from your nose, your nose will look extra big – that is not distortion, it is reality.

Regardless, for the last two reasons above you should avoid putting important objects at edges and in corners:

But provided you avoid that, a wide lens will work great:

That sense of space, of the subject being surrounded by his environment, is typical of extra wide angle lenses.

Another note. Prime lenses enforce discipline. Instead of zooming, you must move or turn.

And you have to get close. When people are reluctant to use wide lenses, it is because they are reluctant to get close to people. A wide lens forces you to get close – which is a good thing. Photographers need to interact with their subjects.

So I encourage you to go wide. Meaning as wide as 8-20 on a crop camera (equivalent to 14-35mm on a full-frame camera) – that sort of range.

And have fun!

Lens reminder

Posted on June 12, 2011 by Michael Willems

Choose your lenses wisely, like these people at the recent Imaging Show, where I spoke about lenses through the three days:

Your camera is just a box. The lens makes it into a great tool. So, be prepared to spend on your lens; and look at properties like:

Aperture – the lower the f-number, the better
Sealing against dust and moisture
Distortion: the lower the better, of course
Sharpness (both wide open and at, say, f/8)
Mechanical construction
Image Stabilization
Chromatic aberration
Resistance to flare
Focus system speed and noise – and accuracy
Consistency

These properties, and more, determine the quality, and cost, of your lens. And high cost is OK because the lens determines the shot – and a lens lasts decades, both in terms of usage and of value.

Now I am off to go shoot softball kid portraits!

Opposite to what beginners think…

Posted on June 8, 2011 by Michael Willems

A working photographer does some things differently from the way beginners might think. Like these ten points:

I do not use lens filters. Unless it is raining, snowing, grubby little fingers reach out, or I am at the beach or in a sandstorm.
I always use a lens hood. Even at night, even indoors. Even at night, indoors.
I often use flash outside. To fill in shadows and back lit faces.
I often do not use flash in dark. To allow the shutter to stay open, and to use available light.
I do not have a camera bag. Just a bag for lenses, flashes, and so on.
Indoors, I point my flash behind me.
I avoid zoom lenses when I can. I often prefer to use primes instead.
I do not install software from my camera maker. Brrrr!
I do not use all the focus points – I use only one.
I set ISO manually. No auto ISO for me.

As you see, the obvious is not always right. Look at how the pros do it, and see if that might work for you.

TTL phenomenon

Posted on June 1, 2011 by Michael Willems

If you have ever shot with TTL off-camera flash, you will have ensured that the on-camera flash is “off”. It still fires its “Morse Code” commands at group A, B or C flashes in the room, but when the actual image is taken a fraction of a second later, it is off.

Except that you may have noticed noticed the following phenomenon: Especially on Nikon cameras, but on Canons as well, it is not totally, 100%, off.

There is a tiny bit of afterglow, which causes an extra little catch light in the very centre of the eye. You can see it in this image by my student, photographer Laura Wichman:

You only see this if you view the image at full size. It is not really very annoying, but if you are determined to get rid of it, simply “Lightroom it out”.

Anyway – learn to recognize this. This is how I know we shot this image in remote TTL mode.

One more of Laura’s shots from this Creative Light session. Here’s we thought a gelled direct light might add some kick. And I love colour – this bright egg yolk yellow Honl gel is great. Easiest gel to get saturated colour with:

Don’t you love those shadows? Today’s tip: hard shadows can be good. If intended and if created by an off-camera light.

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