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Travel with the Fuji X-Pro 1

Braeside

New member
I have recently returned from a 2 week cruise of the Eastern Mediterranean. This coincided with a bad back problem that I seem to have acquired this year. As a result I was not able to carry as much gear with me as I might have wished and I am really glad that I didn't have to take the heavy DSLR gear of recent years. Frankly I struggled carrying what I did take as carry on and that only weighed about 8Kg including the MacBook Pro.

If my back had been better I would have also taken my Olympus OMD gear as I have some excellent longer zoom lenses that may have been handy if we saw any wildlife, as it happened we saw nothing that I couldn't get with a 55mm. Having only one camera (though my wife did have a reasonable Panasonic FZ with here) did actually make things less of a worry, fewer decisions on what to take out on a trip, and more familiarity with the one camera. It is easy I find to get confused if using 2 different systems at the same time.

The reason I took the Fuji X-Pro 1 with me over the Olympus OMD was that I just prefer the simplicity of the Fuji and the IQ from the wonderful X lenses. Now that Aperture supports the Fuji RAW files was the icing on the cake for me.

The OVF was great in the bright sunshine, even when wearing sunglasses. EVF was used for some indoor macro stuff, or where I needed exact framing, but the OVF was used perhaps 80% of the time.

The camera as always was in the Gariz half case. I didn't use the Fuji lenshood on the zoom, preferring a screw on rangefinder type vented hood. No filters, just a lens cap when putting in a bag.

I did take a small shoulder bag with a Billingham insert, but most days I just took the camera with 18-55mm fitted and the 14mm either in a pocket of a small belt pouch. On this type of holiday there is not a lot of chances to change lenses, so a zoom was essential. I did take the 35mm and the 60mm Macro, but used them very infrequently. 80% were taken with the 18-55mm zoom which has the benefit of OIS. The rest were on the 14mm.

I took a total of 5 batteries, 1 Fuji, and 2 pairs of Third Party batteries. One of those pairs performed less well, and shut down without warning. Lesson learned there. I never used up more than 1.5 batteries on any day.

I had 2 16GB cards, and a MacBook Pro to back up to. I'd take more cards next time and maybe a smaller PC like a ChromeBook, as I only want to back up to a USB drive.

I shot RAW + JPG as I always do.

The best move I made was to use GPS4CAM on my iPhone. This allowed me to geotag all of my Fuji camera files before import into Aperture. Even capturing GPS positions every 5 minutes did not run my iPhone battery down during a day's shooting. It is a brilliant piece of software, allowing you to forget about accurately syncing the time on the iPhone and the Camera.

The thing that most impressed me with the Fuji was the 18-55mm lens. I have never used as nice a zoom on other systems, including the Sony and Olympus m43. Mechanically excellent and optically outstanding. Definitely not my idea of a 'kit lens'. I don't have to worry about soft corners, field curvature, CA, it just works. Sure the 14mm is a tad sharper at 100%, but so it should be! They both match up very nicely in contrast and colour.

I didn't have a tripod, and never needed one, including inside dark churches and a night time transit of the Corinth Canal. Auto ISO 6400 covered that.

I did take a few short movie clips, though I found Manual focus worked best otherwise the focus hunted. Some sweep panos worked out well too.

I'll hopefully get round to posting some shots soon.

Cheers

David
 

Braeside

New member
Lady's had to cover their heads in the mosques. Assorted headgear!



Quite impressed by the 18-55mm at 18mm.

 

krist8

Member
Very nice. I like them all, but specially like the sunset scene and the "hand in the door". I tried to find out the exif data using my FireFox browser add-on, and it says you used aperture 1.4, 1.6, 1.7, etc. on the 18-55 zoom. Did you use one of those converters?
Also, did you miss using a long zoom lens? The reason I ask is that I just bought the new 55-200 zoom, and will be travelling soon. Because I feel it is big and heavy, I was going to leave it home, just carrying the kit lens and a small Nikon 35/2 lens.
 

Braeside

New member
Thanks,

No they were shot at about F/5.6 to F/8, so I suspect that FireFox is misinterpreting the aperture in the EXIF somehow. (The plugin I use in Safari appears to show the correct EXIF).

I didn't miss having a long zoom at all, but it would have been nice to have one available should the need have arisen. As I mentioned I did have the backup of my wife's Panasonic FZ bridge camera with a long zoom should I have desperately needed extreme focal length. I generally don't take long telephoto shots on holiday as the heat and atmospheric haze usually ruins them.

If I were you, I would take the 55-200 but only take it out if you were going someplace where you expect to need it. Unless you don't mind carrying it all day.

Unfortunately my back is not good at all currently, so I am restricting how much weight I will take around, and the X-Pro 1 and 18-55mm and the 14mm have been a blessing. I didn't use the 35mm or 60mm much, because I didn't have time for many lens changes and didn't know in advance exactly what I would need.

I have not decided whether I will get 55-200mm, as I have that range covered by the OM-D already.
 

krist8

Member
Thanks David for your advice. The whole point of buying the X-E1 is to minimize the weight and size while travelling. If I bring it, I guess I can leave it in the hotel room.
 

Braeside

New member
Thanks David for your advice. The whole point of buying the X-E1 is to minimize the weight and size while travelling. If I bring it, I guess I can leave it in the hotel room.
Yes, absolutely what I would do if I took it. I hope you have an enjoyable trip and good weather.
 

agoglanian

Member
Wow I just came back from a similar trip, though it wasn't a cruise. I went through Athens, Istanbul and Rome with nothing but the X-Pro 1 (w the 35mm) and a Ricoh GR. Didn't even bring a laptop (which had me a little worried).

Your experience was much like mine, totally positive and for the first time I didn't feel like I HAD to bring my DSLR kit. These 3rd gen cameras really are changing the game.
 

GrahamWelland

Subscriber & Workshop Member
On the road at the moment and my travel outfit has been working well: X-Pro1, 14mm, 18-55, 55-200 and EF-42. I also have an X100s for walk around (and a big heavy MF outfit for lug around :D ).

My only constraint with the 14mm has been a few occasions when I wish I had my CV12mm for that extra bit of wide drama. The zooms have been excellent.
 
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