Tuesday 4 December 2012

Fuji X-E1

Australia is getting it's share of Fuji X-E1 zoom kits: CameraPro shop in Brisbane shows a black Fujifilm X-E1 kit with XF18-55mm lens as "available". Digital Camera Warehouse got the black X-E1 kits at the end of the last week.

It seems that on the Fujifilm X system forum at the DPReview people switched from the complaining about lack of third party support for RAW development from X-Trans sensor to "slow autofocus speed" on Fuji X-E1 compared to the latest Olympus mirrorless cameras such as OM-D E-M5 or E-PL5. Frankly, this is _very_ old news. Yes, the latest Olympus cameras do focus faster than Fuji X-E1. Does it matter in "a real life" situation? It depends. For still objects the autofocus on X-E1 and XF18-55 lens is more than adequate. On some subjects it focuses even faster than my Olympus E-30. But in most situations the DSLR wins over the X-E1. But because I do not shoot action, it does not really matter much for me. The autofocus speed is good enough for me. How accurate is the autofocus? I did not have enough time to make any solid conclusion on this topic. I just got the camera a few days ago. It seems that the autofocus is fairly accurate. A windy weather creates more challenges for me that the autofocus but switching off the OIS increases the shutter speed and partially solves my problem. I wish there would be a minimal shutter speed for aperture priority mode coupled with Auto ISO.

If the fast autofocus is "must to have" than a DSLR is the best choice at the moment. Nikon 1V1 comes close. Mirrorless cameras cost more, produce few shots per battery, don't have through the lens optical viewfinder, have slow autofocus.  The only advantage of mirrorless cameras I can thing about is a small size and weight. Some people also like EVFs or live histogram. As for photos - I suspect the difference in quality is rather small unless you go to extremes.

Duhig Building

Duhig Building | Fuji X-E1 with XF18-55mm F2.8-4.0

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