Fuji Fuji XF 50-140 first impressions or review coming?

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Hi Rico,

will you be writing a first impressions article about the XF 50-140 anytime soon? I assume you are already playing with it and have a lot of first-hand knowledge about it. I'm basically waiting for your review about it before deciding whether to sell my 56 1.2 for it or wait. Reasons to keep the 56 is the "1.2" obviously, while I hope the 50-140 will have fast AF and be usable for action/sports.

Thanks for sharing!
 
I don't have the lens, and I have no information when or if I'll get one. It will probably happen sooner or later, though.
Currently, I'm playing with an X100T.
Based on the prototype I used at Photokina, the 50-140 will be very good.
 
A shame, I had hoped for a (p)review in the near future. Does Fuji provide test examples to you or do you need to buy them yourself?

I'm sure it is a very good lens - it should be for 1500€. ;) The question for me is just if it can replace the 56 1.2 & 55-200 combo. Sure, I'd lose some reach and speed @56mm, but I would not need to change lenses and hope for better AF performance on the long end...
 
For me:
55-200? Yep.
56mm? Nope.

That's my very personal opinion, though.

I could and would have stayed with the 60mmF2.4 if the 50-140 really could replace y 56mmF1.2.
 
TBH, the 50-140 doesn't really appeal to me. I'm very pleasantly surprised by the 18-135 and love the 55-200. This is counter to my normal modus operandi with SLRs. For Contax and Nikon, back in the day, I always had a twin-lens constant 2.8 setup covering 28-200mm. I never bothered with the slower 75-300 or any superzoom, but with Fuji I have gone the other way. I welcome the extra reach on the 55-200 and the OIS makes the 18-135 very usable. I also have the 18-55 and that is a lightweight and very high quality standard zoom.

The 56? You will have to pry it from my cold, dead fingers. I have used fast 85 and 90mm lenses from Nikon, Contax and Leica and fully rate the 56 as their equal. There is nothing else for the Fuji system that offers the killer combination of speed, bokeh, compactness, reach and value.
 
TBH, the 50-140 doesn't really appeal to me. I'm very pleasantly surprised by the 18-135 and love the 55-200. This is counter to my normal modus operandi with SLRs.
The 70-200 2.8 is/was probably the most used lens I had for Nikon. So I'm curious: Why did you change your lens choice for Fuji? Is it really only the reach? Don't you feel you miss speed on the 55-200? I don't have it yet, but I fear I would.

I already own the 56 1.2 and while I really enjoy using it, I'm not totally blown away by the images it produces. Sure, it is a nice lens and it offers nice speed and shallow depth of field. But center sharpness is still less than on the 70-200 2.8 - but that may be the X-trans files in Lightroom... Nevertheless, I like it and in the future I may own all three of them. But for now I will need to make a choice - at least once the reviews for the 50-140 are available. ;)
 
Well...


A number of things spring to mind.

First is quite prosaic - the 55-200 was the only game in town when I moved to Fuji. Now I have it, I really like it and it will take a lot to make me shift.
For the photography I do, I don't miss the speed at all. Bear in mind that the 55-200 has OIS so it is actually very usable hand-held, thus:
34659639.70eb38ed.1024.jpg

Wings and Wheels Dunsfold August 2014 X-T1 Spitfire Mk IXB Mustang P51D 6 par Lightmancer, on ipernity

I am largely a prime lens user, and I use the 55-200 at the far end most of the time. I use it mostly for sports, airshows and wildlife, so yes reach is important to me from such a lens. For most other uses, I prefer lenses between 28 and 85mm in old money. For street in particular, it is either 50mm (35) or 35mm (23). For travel I take the 23, 35, 56, occasionally the 14 and the 18-55. The two things I would really like from the Fuji system in the future is a long (600mm equivalent) tele and a 1.4x teleconverter.

I never use Lightroom ;)
 
I am looking forward to the 50-140. In my view, it, the 55-200 and 18-135 have completely different uses. I'm probably going to keep all three.
The 55-200 is a nice small lens with nice reach. A great combination. Even better when paired with 18-55 and XE2 as a travel kit.

The 18-135 is ideal with XT-1 as a all weather walk around lens. The slower max aperture makes it less desirable in low light situations, especially if there is much subject movement. OIS is great for helping with steady camera, but the slow shutter speed is still a problem with subject movement.

The F2.8 max aperture on the new lens will undoubtedly help with low light focus and the extra shutter speed in a given light will help with subject movement.
It doesn't look too large when combined with the XT-1. And, of course, the WR makes it a great companion with XT-1 for all weather shooting at events.

For years I've relied on 24-70, 70-200 F2.8 on full frame Canon bodies for weddings and events. This and the upcoming companion lens give me the same set with the XT-1.
 
Hi Rico, I had a question about the 50-140 that I have not seen discussed. Does it have an OIS panning mode? There is no switch for it, so it might auto-detect panning and enable that mode automatically. The Fuji features page says nothing about panning in the OIS section: FUJINON XF50-140mmF2.8 R LM OIS WR | Lenses | FUJIFILM X Series & GFX – Global

If a panning mode is missing this would be an oversight on a lens with sports intentions.
 
Hy Rico, i'm new in this forum, i'm italian so please be gentle with my grammatical error...
I bought your book when i had the X-E1 and i consider you one of the photographer most prepared about the fujifilm system.
So now that i sold my 56 and i bought this sublime 50/140 i would like to ask you some questions.
One is about the contunuos focus, when i zoom in or out, during the shooting i notice that the X-T1 fail in more occasion, instead if i shoot at a stable focal lenght is far more reliable, i'm missing something or is a problem known?
Two is about the face detection, because i have the impression (but i'm not sure) that the autofocus C is working better when is off.
The third question, maybe absurd, is about the OIS, in fact i was thinking that when i'm shooting action and i want to freeze the subject, if the stabilization is On it can put hinder on the performance of the autofocus C, considering that in this occasion we shoot 1/1000Sec or more.
Thanks in advance, and keep the good work!
Christian
 
Yep, FD is not supposed to be used with AF tracking, so better turn it of. FD disables the PDAF, leaving the camera with CDAF.

OIS can (sometimes) blur images, so better turn it off with fast shutter speeds that don't require OIS.

Of course, AF tracking perfomance may decrease when the lens is zoomed during tracking. Is that what you are doing?
 
Yep, FD is not supposed to be used with AF tracking, so better turn it of. FD disables the PDAF, leaving the camera with CDAF.



OIS can (sometimes) blur images, so better turn it off with fast shutter speeds that don't require OIS.


Of course, AF tracking perfomance may decrease when the lens is zoomed during tracking. Is that what you are doing?

Thanks, i 've doubted about the FD, but now i'm sure.

Yep i know this but i was thinking that the processor of the XT1 may be less responsive, for the energy and menory used to stabilize the lens, however in the future i'll turn it Off.

When i follow my dog,while is trying to cacth a fresbee, i start from 140mm and i try to follow him when is running towards me until i reach 50mm, in this occasion i find the AF tracking far less reliable, in fact i've the impression that when i zoom out and i reach 100 mm (from 140mm) the AFC start to fail the focus.

Again...sorry for my grammatil error.

Thanks!

Christian
 
When i follow my dog,while is trying to cacth a fresbee, i start from 140mm and i try to follow him when is running towards me until i reach 50mm, in this occasion i find the AF tracking far less reliable, in fact i've the impression that when i zoom out and i reach 100 mm (from 140mm) the AFC start to fail the focus.

No surprise here. The lens would probably be much heavier (yep!) and more expensive if it performed like a cinema lens with a steady focal plane during the full zoom range. There is a reason why those movie lenses are so terribly expensive, and this is one of them.
 
No surprise here. The lens would probably be much heavier (yep!) and more expensive if it performed like a cinema lens with a steady focal plane during the full zoom range. There is a reason why those movie lenses are so terribly expensive, and this is one of them.

Well thanks for the clarification, i'll make some experiment in the future and i'll post the results in my site.
I'll let you know my hit rate and the keepers, now that i spoke with you i've much clearer ideas on what to do.

P.S. have you noticed the problem with the ES shutter in presence of pulsed light bulbs? I think there is no solution for that...
20122014-183056.jpg

See the lines underexposed.

Thanks for all.

Christian
 
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