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Fuji x-t10 impressions

raist3d

Well-known member
So I got a loan, or maybe I bought one. Frankly not quite where I saw myself now but whatever, it happened, not proud of that part but something has to settle and either this camera stays with me or the OMD EM5 MKII stays with me. I can't have both. And before anyone asks all cameras are good now. Been saying that for at least a year now...

So first some impressions vs/coming from the X-E1. I took the X-t10 for a good street day and night spin already.

- Love Classic Chrome "film"
- JPEG engine has gone up in complexity- I see that it keeps more detail now.
- Camera is pretty responsive and to my surprise, easy to configure/custom configure the buttons.
- Biggest surprise- the Auto focus is actually pretty good - once you get to grips with what modes to work and what works for what. It even makes the XF35 F1.4 prime AF look fast. Really, an outstanding job from where they where.
- EVF as those with XE2 and XT1 know, is pretty "real time." The lag sure seems to be what Fuji claims because it's the lowest EVF lag I have ever seen.
- Finally the darn exposure compensation button and power button (vs XE1) are solid enough that they won't drift around easily in a coat pocket. This a for me a major pet peeve on the X-E1.
- Exposure metering is crazy insane good- reminds me of the Nikon 1 J5- they pretty much capture the full data.
- To me eye 14-bit RAW seems to show. The tonality just seems a bit better than X-E1.
- Best JPEG engine in the market.
- In high performance mode the camera startup/LCD info comes up very very fast. I was surprised.

Some odd surprises
- DR auto now goes DR100% and DR200% only, not all the way to DR400% which you have to now set manually if you want it. I was concerned at first this meant a lot of highlight burns, but nope, it's actually even an improvement keeping the ISO at 200 or 400 as its base iso. Highlight recovery for DR400% must be quite insane.
- Found a subject that can trigger color moire on xtrans relatively easy (though probably on Bayer also)- fences at an angle. The color moire seems more controllable and instead of the usual green/red-magenta is more yellow & blue.
- Rolling shutter when panning/electronic shutter isn't all that hot. It's relatively easy to trigger. Somewhat similar to the OMD's, maybe a notch worse here.

Video
- Video on Fuji Xtrans is just bad, though I wouldn't call it useless. But if you want video, look elsewhere. That was easy.

EVF
- Super real time EVF. Better here than OMD's (and the OMD is pretty good to begin with)
- In extreme low light it becomes pretty noisy, to the point that it renders manual focus peaking pretty useless. But it's very extreme low light. Average street night life scene on the street with some light from he street, or a bar does not touch this point.

The OMD does this very well, keeping it clean.

Annoying...
- Fuji's iOS/iPhone program to control the camera seems more cumbersome to setup/buggier than what I see from Olympus, though not impossible to use once you know what works seamlessly.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
On Fuji X-T10 AF / X-T1 Firmware 4.0 Auto focus

The Autofocus of the X-T10 has been quite the surprise. For the subjects I shoot it is actually *better* than the OMD EM5 MKII(!). The issue is:

- on the OMD if a subject is moving you really want to use C-AF, though it depends on light conditions and how fast they are moving
- on the X-T10 when using the PDAF pixel area, the camera just locks, S-AF or C-AF in general.

The time it takes for switching between the focus types on the OMD just leads me to more errors or missed opportunities. The OMD does focus quite well for what it is on C-AF considering it has no phase detection. I can also still focus in super-dark a bit better than the Fuji, but the Fuji can focus in quite low light anyway.

The other surprise with this is that I am using the XF35mm F1.4 prime which is considered to not focus as fast as the other more recent primes or pro zooms. I have to give it to Fuji, they did a really good job here. It's a major upgrade from the X-E1.

The other thing is the metering/DR. I find myself having to worry on the OMD to expose to avoid highlight burn often. On the Fuji I just don't have to worry about it most of the time.

The only thing I am thinking now that is a pro to the OMD is the smaller lens options and the 4/3rd lenses... but I never really looked forward to use bigger lenses than native to the system and I have not been all that crazy about the Olympus regular primes except the 75mm.

- Ricardo
 

4711

Member
Re: On Fuji X-T10 AF / X-T1 Firmware 4.0 Auto focus

The Autofocus of the X-T10 has been quite the surprise. For the subjects I shoot it is actually *better* than the OMD EM5 MKII(!). The issue is:...
- on the X-T10 when using the PDAF pixel area, the camera just locks, S-AF or C-AF in general.

...
- Ricardo
What are your settings for AF, when you want to shoot people moving around on the street?
 

raist3d

Well-known member
Re: On Fuji X-T10 AF / X-T1 Firmware 4.0 Auto focus

What are your settings for AF, when you want to shoot people moving around on the street?
Usually I am using the Zone focusing, reduced to a square of the center phase detection focus points.
On some occasions the single point AF but no smaller than the default.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
I just took the same shot with the Fuji X-T10 and Olympus OMD Em5 MKII. Both with the 50mm equivalents at F1.4. The fuji at ISO 4000 as it metered around there, and the Olympus at ISO 3200 as it metered; both manual exposure.

Those who say there's no difference between Olympus and Fuji APS-C don't seem to have much experience with these cameras- I found easily at least 1 full stop of DR more if not a stop and a half. Pulling from shadows the Fuji completely avoided that dreaded blue noise while the Olympus pulled that in with magenta pretty quick. The Fuji also had more detail, more vivid color.

I will post the comparison later. I suspected that the X-E1 would pull ahead a bit over the Olympus but that the 14-bit RAW of the X-T10/X-T1 would make a bigger difference, and bring the sensor performance more on par with the likes of other known Sony APS-C cameras like Pentax and Sony themselves.

Shouldn't be that surprising- apparently Fuji uses Sony APS-C sensors as their base and put their X-trans color filter array on top.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
Bah, just when you think you made up your mind, something happens that gives me pause and tickles my OCD a little.

I was shooting with the Fuji the other night in electronic shutter mode and got some rather nasty frequency banding in some light areas I was walking around. It was pretty repeatable and while not in all lights, there's some specific ones that had a couple of subjects that it repeated and nasty.

I didn't recall the Olympus OMD EM5 MKII doing it that bad in silent electronic shutter mode, so I took it to the very same lights to night to verify. I have seen it band before but as I suspected not as bad and in this case it didn't even band.

GRRRRRRRR !@#$@#@#. :)

Going over some of the RAW files I took with the OMD now and checking a few things.

I guess in some ways it goes to show that all cameras are good and have their own precious advantages and cons, and you have to pick/choose according to your needs and wants.

And also a first world problem. Probably.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
So figured out what this problem is and I kicked myself about it for not thinking it sooner- it's related to light frequency (knew) and the shutter speed I am dialing on the camera.

When I dialed 1/125 it pretty much disappeared or was so weak it wasn't an issue. But at 1/250 and up, it looked pretty bad. Then it occurred to me that I seldom saw it on the Olympus- but that often I had the Olympus set to longer exposures due to the IBIS.

But most interesting it made me realize why the OMD EM5 MKII when set to electronic shutter, picks rather slow shutters... it's to avoid this issue!

This is still in some ways related to the sensor size/refresh rate (the first influencing in a way the 2nd). So I feel more calm with the Fuji on that end, but I a curious now to force the OMD to 1/250 in that location i described was easy to reproduce and see how resilient the OMD is vs the Fuji.

That said, this makes me start leaning back again to keep on the X-T10.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
So today I had a chance to put through its paces the X-T10 to cover a street life event- Dorey Alley in SF. Some really weird things happened:

- Single point AF seemed more useful, a tad snapper
- Zone focusing AF which has been quite quite great at night for some reason seemed slower and resorting to what seemed fast contrast AF rather than PDAF.

:wtf:

I was able to get some sort of pace with it and it worked ok but ironically not as good as in lower light situations I have been shooting at? Doesn't make much sense.

Rolling shutter on the Fuji when using electronic shutter is decidedly worse than the OMD EM5 MKII (which in turn is a bit worse than the Nikon 1 J5). In an event like this with music thumping through the entire streets nobody will hear your mechanical shutter, but I still shot electronic to be able to shoot at F1.4 in sunlight. This aspect was great. But you had to be careful not to move the camera much while doing those shots.

More shots later. Tonality and "pizzaz" was all there as I expected in the shots. Would have been great to cover the show a bit with the OMD to get an idea how the OMD would have handled that, but I covered pride with the OMD already.

The following shot is a Provia film (STD) JPEG output from the X-T10, size reduced and water market in post.



- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
At this point I will make more commentary later but will start posting the shots int he "Fun with Fuji X-... " main thread.

- Ricardo
 

raist3d

Well-known member
Strains advantage for AAless / color moire

Shot a quick test with the OMD EM5 MKII and the Fuji X-T10. Equivalent apertures/DOF. The Olympus with the Oly 25mm F1.8 m4/3rds, the Fuji with the XF 35.

I was closer FOV wise with the Fuji, and this can affect at times moire, but I am certainly getting more color moire artifacts with the Olympus for sure. Yesterday I took a few shots and a guy had a shirt that gave a headache to the Olympus.

I have seen Fuji Xtrans color mire but it's more rare. It also seems to dance between blue and yellow rather than green / magenta.

Take a guess which crop belongs to which camera. Both converted with Iridient digital (3.0.4 latest), defaults but taking out any noise reduction and color moire default reduction.

Interestingly, there are 1-2 very localized areas with Xtrans artifacts you don't see in the Olympus but they are very localized.



- Ricardo
 

Tim

Active member
Guess is about right.

I would guess, Olympus top, Fuji Bottom.
Tough to tell from these samples.
 

raist3d

Well-known member
Guess is about right.

I would guess, Olympus top, Fuji Bottom.
Tough to tell from these samples.
You are correct. If you look carefully you can see the color moire towards the right side of the iron bars.

Here's a more obvious case with the Olympus:



- Ricardo
 
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