The Fabulous Fuji X owners thread

Anyone here regularly using Fuji for studio portraits? I’m getting more and more enquiries for studio work and I’m out of my comfort zone with the Fuji system, being used to my old Canon set up. I’d really like to stick with Fuji so any pointers to those using Fuji indoors would be great. Outdoors and landscapes seem plentiful, just can’t find too many studio guides
 
NickTB said:
Anyone here regularly using Fuji for studio portraits? I’m getting more and more enquiries for studio work and I’m out of my comfort zone with the Fuji system, being used to my old Canon set up. I’d really like to stick with Fuji so any pointers to those using Fuji indoors would be great. Outdoors and landscapes seem plentiful, just can’t find too many studio guides
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Yeah, following an accident with my Canon last September, I only have a Fuji X-T1 and 18-55 kit lens for the time being. I have a small home studio and enjoy doing portraits. This combination works fine and technically has no issues in the studio taking pictures. However, you are working in full manual mode, so will need to turn OFF the "preview exposure/white balance" mode, otherwise the camera will try to adjust both, which you don't want.

I do find the blackout lag a bit intrusive and slows down my flow a tad with the X-T1, but later models are much faster in that respect.
 
NickTB said:
Anyone here regularly using Fuji for studio portraits? I’m getting more and more enquiries for studio work and I’m out of my comfort zone with the Fuji system, being used to my old Canon set up. I’d really like to stick with Fuji so any pointers to those using Fuji indoors would be great. Outdoors and landscapes seem plentiful, just can’t find too many studio guides
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I don't actually do portrait photography Sir, but I do use the Fooj (X-T1 & X-T2) units extensively in my studios for everything except when the call is for MF or LF photography. I've found them to be perfectly suitable and easily capable of producing high quality studio work within their limitations obviously.

I've been so impressed with the quality that can be obtained from these units that I have designed & made a system of being able to use my LF lenses on them with a full set of technical camera (lens panel) movements ie rise/fall/tilt/swing/side shift etc, enabling me to use them for some commercial work.

If you ever decide to make a pilgrimage up to Northamptonshire or down to Kent, then if I'm around you'd be made more than welcome to join us for a time, and try things out in our setups.(y)

George.
 
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Help! Preparing for my daughters show tomorrow.

ISO set to AUTO - max ISO set to 3200 (prepared to go that high if I need the light).
Aperture set to AUTO
Shutter speed on manual - playing around between 1/125 (walking speed freeze) and 1/500 (dancing motion freeze).
Lens is the 18-135mm so I can zoom in to stage.

Currently testing in UK twilight, through doors pointing outside. Even as slow as 1/125 it is pushing ISO up to 3200 and still not finding enough light. Am I asking too much of the lens?
 
souldeep said:
Help! Preparing for my daughters show tomorrow.

ISO set to AUTO - max ISO set to 3200 (prepared to go that high if I need the light).
Aperture set to AUTO
Shutter speed on manual - playing around between 1/125 (walking speed freeze) and 1/500 (dancing motion freeze).
Lens is the 18-135mm so I can zoom in to stage.

Currently testing in UK twilight, through doors pointing outside. Even as slow as 1/125 it is pushing ISO up to 3200 and still not finding enough light. Am I asking too much of the lens?
Click to expand...

Possibly, IMO the best feature of the 18-135 is the IS. I suspect that you really want to shoot in the range F2.8-F4 for best results (gives a reasonable DOF to retain focus), the 90mm would be my weapon of choice. What other lenses do you have?
 
Thanks David. I have a 35mm (for street work) which won't get me close enough, or the 60mm (my macro lens). I suspect I will struggle with that too.

On the IS - I think if I slow the shutter I would still be ok with lens shake, my hands reasonably stable, it's freezing the action under low light I'm looking to achieve this time round.

Also zoomed with the lens, best I can manually achieve on aperture is f5.6.
 
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souldeep said:
Thanks David. I have a 35mm (for street work) which won't get me close enough, or the 60mm (my macro lens). I suspect I will struggle with that too.
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If the 35mm is F1.4 it will focus slowly, its not known as a zippy performer, and the 60mm is almost 'send it a postcard' to focus lens (though makes up for it in sharpness).

I suspect your best bet is to use the 18-135, as wide aperture it will go for the given focal length, run up to ISO6400, and to take pictures in bursts, expecting some of them to be blurred/out of focus, but you should get some keepers. Dealing with the noise in PP is better than sorting out blurred images!! Run the images through a noise reduction software like NIK Dfine, and then process them in LR or similar, then on export reduce the image size, as this will additionally smooth out the noise. Watch the luminance slider in LR as skin can go very waxy very easily!!

As long as you don't want to print big, but have the images for social media, sharing with fa,ily etc on their phones, you'll get away with it. Good Luck
 
Thank you very much - it seems like setting the auto ISO to max up to 6400 may be the answer. As you point out - I just want to catch some keepers for memories - not win any photography competitions :D

The 56mm looks like the dream lens for low light - but you got to get in close enough.
 
What's a fair price for a x+t1 and 18-55 do you think? Should I sell them separately?
 
souldeep said:
Thank you very much - it seems like setting the auto ISO to max up to 6400 may be the answer. As you point out - I just want to catch some keepers for memories - not win any photography competitions :D

The 56mm looks like the dream lens for low light - but you got to get in close enough.
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Its another slow to focus lens, the 90 IMO is much snappier and a step up in quality as well.
 
Mr Perceptive said:
Its another slow to focus lens, the 90 IMO is much snappier and a step up in quality as well.
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Interesting - big lens. About the same size as my 135mm.

How do you find the bokeh compares to 56mm?

EDIT - Just checked out your website link. Loving the cinematic widescreen 2.35:1 project. I shoot in 3:2 but have started to post crop down to 16:9. You are taking it all to another level. What ratio are you shooting in?
 
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souldeep said:
Help! Preparing for my daughters show tomorrow.

ISO set to AUTO - max ISO set to 3200 (prepared to go that high if I need the light).
Aperture set to AUTO
Shutter speed on manual - playing around between 1/125 (walking speed freeze) and 1/500 (dancing motion freeze).
Lens is the 18-135mm so I can zoom in to stage.

Currently testing in UK twilight, through doors pointing outside. Even as slow as 1/125 it is pushing ISO up to 3200 and still not finding enough light. Am I asking too much of the lens?
Click to expand...


Have a play with high ISOs. Even a noisy image is better than a (very) blurry image which is itself better than no image at all! As you're pushing the limits, shoot raw and push if necessary. Use Mk1 eyeballs as well as the camera - that way you'll have memories of the show rather than frustration at (possible) image capture failure!
 
Wish Fuji would remake the 35 1.4 with twin or even quad linear motors... actually the 23 (not to bad)/35/56. Would be so happy.
 
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Nod said:
Have a play with high ISOs. Even a noisy image is better than a (very) blurry image which is itself better than no image at all! As you're pushing the limits, shoot raw and push if necessary. Use Mk1 eyeballs as well as the camera - that way you'll have memories of the show rather than frustration at (possible) image capture failure!
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Hi Nod - salute to another X10 ex!

Agree - same point as David.

On your other point - that's kind of how I started the question. Want to switch off and enjoy rather than think about cameras! Lack of good auto means I need to take some control :)
 
souldeep said:
Hi Nod - salute to another X10 ex!

Agree - same point as David.

On your other point - that's kind of how I started the question. Want to switch off and enjoy rather than think about cameras! Lack of good auto means I need to take some control :)
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But you do have auto...
Simply set ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture to the A setting. You are then fully auto.
If you then want to take control of your shutter speed, simply move that dial.

Edit - Ah, I notice you said 'good' auto, so you obvs know how to set it into full auto...
As others have said, set it to the equivalent of shutter priority and accept that you'll need to let the ISO rise (You'd have to on any camera tbh). I wonder if your old camera had something that set a minimum shutter speed in auto.
 
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LC2 said:
But you do have auto...
Simply set ISO, Shutter Speed and Aperture to the A setting. You are then fully auto.
If you then want to take control of your shutter speed, simply move that dial.
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Hi Tim - the problem I'm finding is that AUTO on an XT1 doesn't stack up to the excellent results I got in low light from the X10 when I just wanted to "switch off". This is strange, as the XT1 is by all accounts, is a much more powerful bit of kit. From reading the posts it would seem this is because the XT1 was built for total manual control - whereas it sounds like the XT10/XT20 would have been a more natural progression from my old X10, with the algorithms to support an amateur like me ;)

Anyway - I have an XT-1 now, and he who dares! I found time today to try some different manual/auto scenario's and will experiment tomorrow. A plan b always prudent - so will be sure to ask the mrs to video as a back up :LOL:
 
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souldeep said:
Hi Nod - salute to another X10 ex!

Agree - same point as David.

On your other point - that's kind of how I started the question. Want to switch off and enjoy rather than think about cameras! Lack of good auto means I need to take some control :)
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X10 current (owner and occasional user!)

Not sure if you have an X-T1, 2, 10 or 20 but if it's a 2, you should get useable shots at ISO6400 - noisy but useable (and better than none!) I'd stick it at that, wide open and let the camera decide on a shutter speed to suit. If it still decides that shutter speeds will be too long (to freeze the action), go up again and hope!
 
Crossed post! I'd stick to 3200 on the X-T1 if at all possible, although 6400 will give memories, they'll be a bit fuzzy!
 
It's also worth bearing in mind that your X-T1's sensor is pretty ISO Invariant
So, whilst I wouldn't be recommending shooting at ISO 200 and fixing totally black images in pp, you could wind the exposure comp down a stop or 2 to keep the SS high enough, and then recover in pp.

Here's some testing that a contributor did on dpreview
https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/55138468
I'm sure there are other stories if you search around a bit.
 
Cheers Nod - I still have an X10 as well, but haven't switch it back on since getting the XT-1! I miss it - but I won't be beat.

Because I need to freeze motion (realistically shutter speed 1/250 and 1/500 if I can), in low light, I'm keeping manual control of the shutter speed. Aperture manual (I'll make sure it's as wide as possible on the focal length), but ISO will be left on auto, and my max ISO is now set to 6400. I just couldn't use the shutter speeds I need in my low light tests at 3200 ISO or below. Guess that's not the camera's fault, just the lens and focal length I am going to have to use.

Oh and on focus which hasn't been raised yet - I'll stay auto - spot. I'll just recompose if necessary. And also take the advice to use high drive. Now I just gotta figure the menu option to switch the sounds off. Sounded like a machine gun in tests earlier. They'll kick me out for that o_O

Thanks :)
 
LC2 said:
It's also worth bearing in mind that your X-T1's sensor is pretty ISO Invariant
So, whilst I wouldn't be recommending shooting at ISO 200 and fixing totally black images in pp, you could wind the exposure comp down a stop or 2 to keep the SS high enough, and then recover in pp.

Here's some testing that a contributor did on dpreview
https://www.dpreview.com/forums/post/55138468
I'm sure there are other stories if you search around a bit.
Click to expand...

Funny you should say this - I tried the theory in reverse earlier today. I played with ISO manually - set it lower, upped Exposure. View finder looked almost snow storm white. Images still underexposed. Go figure. Something I'm missing with that one.
 
If you have set +ive exposure comp, it will be over exposed regardless of what you set the ISO to (as long as the camera can alter the other settings sufficiently too achieve it).
And the viewfinder will show you what it looks like. You'll blow the highlight, and I don't think that's something that is recoverable.
 
I just got an X-T10. I tried using the Fujifilm app to transfer images to my Android 7 phone. The app just states "no file to copy" or similar then crashes when I hit the ok dialog. I guess it's a sketchy process. Also I'm now seeing a tiny red light glowing directly below the viewfinder. This remains on even after turning the camera off... So Iremoved the battery and that stopped it. What does that red light mean? I updated the firmware to latest release earlier too.
 
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G.K.Jnr. said:
I don't actually do portrait photography Sir, but I do use the Fooj (X-T1 & X-T2) units extensively in my studios for everything except when the call is for MF or LF photography. I've found them to be perfectly suitable and easily capable of producing high quality studio work within their limitations obviously.

I've been so impressed with the quality that can be obtained from these units that I have designed & made a system of being able to use my LF lenses on them with a full set of technical camera (lens panel) movements ie rise/fall/tilt/swing/side shift etc, enabling me to use them for some commercial work.

If you ever decide to make a pilgrimage up to Northamptonshire or down to Kent, then if I'm around you'd be made more than welcome to join us for a time, and try things out in our setups.(y)

George.
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Apologiers for the late reply George, was a second at a weding all day yesterday. that's a lovely offer which I may well take up, as I'm only over the bridge in Essex (y)
 
Had a strange one yesterday. I was second shooting at a wedding (Pics to follow!) and on a couple of occasions the EVF on my XT stopped working. I'd be framing a shot when the view would disappear and be replaced by a grey screen with lines in it. The best way I can describe it when your TV goes on the blink and you get a grey snowstorm instead. The only way I could clear it was by switching off the camera and switching it back on again. Any ideas as to what this could be?
Cheers,
Nick
 
NickTB said:
Had a strange one yesterday. I was second shooting at a wedding (Pics to follow!) and on a couple of occasions the EVF on my XT stopped working. I'd be framing a shot when the view would disappear and be replaced by a grey screen with lines in it. The best way I can describe it when your TV goes on the blink and you get a grey snowstorm instead. The only way I could clear it was by switching off the camera and switching it back on again. Any ideas as to what this could be?
Cheers,
Nick
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I've heard of this before Sir, I don't know what causes it but the guy rectified the problem without it returning by switching the camera off, removing the battery & cards, then switching the camera on again and leaving for ten minutes switched on. Then switch the camera off again, replace the battery & cards and use normally and all was well. Seemed to work so might be worth giving it a try.(y)

George.
 
G.K.Jnr. said:
I've heard of this before Sir, I don't know what causes it but the guy rectified the problem without it returning by switching the camera off, removing the battery & cards, then switching the camera on again and leaving for ten minutes switched on. Then switch the camera off again, replace the battery & cards and use normally and all was well. Seemed to work so might be worth giving it a try.(y)

George.
Click to expand...

Thanks George, I'll give that a go now. Hopefully it'll rectify the problem as it's a bit embarrassing when you're posing a bride and groom and suddenly you can't see them!
 
Well, I've just re-joined the XT set with the purchase of an XT2. TBH, I always feel a bit humbled when posting in this forum as some of you are obviously in the Premier League whilst I'm kicking around in League Div 4 - I don't have a lot of gear and I don't do much PP.

Anyway here are three I took earlier all on the same day with my old XT-1 and 18-55 zoom

A walk near Cheriton in Hampshire by Andrew R, on Flickr

Hampshire Chalk Stream by Andrew R, on Flickr

Hinton Ampner by Andrew R, on Flickr

Cheers
 
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