Fuji X100 - Is it a keeper?

Still a keeper for me. The irony is I bought it with street shooting in mind and I'm using it less and less for that. I really don't like shooting on the street with a camera up to my face and the OVF is such a big part of what I like about the X100 that I almost always use it that way. And the GRD3 and now the new Olys are so good on the street either shooting blind or with the EPL3 flip screen that I'm finding less and less reason to use the X100 for that. BUT... I like the camera so much that I just find other stuff to do with it. The IQ is unlike any other camera I own and its so much fun to shoot with. So, not as originally intended, but a keeper for sure.

-Ray
 
I did to-and-fro for some (OK a "long") time before jumping on the X100 wagon. I followed this, like most of us, from pre-Photokina 2010. Now it's here and in my grubby little hands I'm as happy as a pig in ....mud! As I said, on my NEX-7 post.
It certainly does what it says on the box "Fall in love with photography all over again." The ergonomics and UI are fantastic - that being that it suits me to a tee! My only challenge now is to learn how to make the image pop like I could when the Sigma DP2s nailed an exposure.
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I simply love the very experience of it, from the handling and viewfinder to the controls and low-light capabilities, and the more I use it the more intuitive my photographic experience is becoming. It's really there with you and it's simply a camera you want to grow with....well I really do anyway!

But honestly, I have much to learn in getting the best out of my files. The Sigma experience was a frustrating one (understatement), but it was often euphoric coming home and witnessing the magic that the sensor, lens and SPP (Sigma software) produced. Now I just can't seem to get the same pop from the X100. I need more time learning off the camera too.

...but be glad for anyone's advice of course. :blush:
 
Mark,
Processing Sigma files in LR etc will help you with the X100 files.
The reason is that these programs are designed for Bayer sensors. When you process the Sigma files in these programs, it's like any other camera.
Processing Sigma files in Sigma software makes the best files for those cameras but unattainable by any camera other than a Sigma.

There's magic in those Sigma files processed in Sigma software. Erase some of the magic and the X100 will have magic also.
 
Thanks Don. A shame that the crippled version of Silkypix that comes with the X100 isn't married up like the DPs and SPP. A real shame since Fuji have married up an amazing sensor and lens....

Yep I need to practice more on Lightroom to get that pop....:blush:
 
I've been reading up on the X100 across a range of commentaries and I get the sense that it is simply an aggravating camera. Great potential, but marred by true usability challenges. For me anyway, it sounds like one to stay away from. If there is an X200 (and I hope there is) I hope they completely rework the camera (mostly the software) to improve the user experience.
 
Andrew,

I'm sure Don might weigh in with some more relevant and objective user experiences, but I for one have not found the X100 at all aggravating. I could say this about the Sigma DP2! I have found it a pleasure in hand, and can't really fault the set-up ONCE YOU SET IT UP! Not being a fan-boy (God knows I've cycled through too many cameras for anyone to take me seriously enough to tag me so) but now when I have the choice of taking out the K-r or the X100, well let's just say the dSLR is gathering dust.

I sometimes wonder whether some reviewers spend too little time using, and getting to know, a camera before writing how it compares to their D3s or 1D Mark IV. It aint one of those....but then again I don't want one of those. And this is precisely why I vested so much in Zack Aria's review, he gave it a red hot go and then, and only then, proffered his opinion....warts and all. Is it perfect, well no....but neither is a D3s or 1D Mark IV. To me the X100 is a great little tool to have with you each and every day. It's never missed a shot...I have!
 
Its a funny camera and a funnier reaction from the masses. It runs the gamut from total unconditional love, to love but wouldn't mind if they made a couple of changes, to like it but really wish they'd make some changes, to annoying to the point that the liking it is diminished, to those who just flat out hate it. I'm in the "love it but wouldn't mind if they made a couple of changes" group, but I still love it even without the changes. It was a steeper learning curve than any other modern camera I've used, but we're talking a few days instead of a few hours - nothing fatal. The only thing that really annoys me about it anymore (and only after I've shot with something else that REMINDS me to be annoyed) is the inability to move between auto ISO and a manual ISO setting quickly. Its a real PIA and so oddly implemented I just don't get what they were thinking. After shooting with one of the new Olympus cams or any of the Panasonics I've had or the GRD3, I just have to scratch my head. But in use, the high ISO is soooooo good, that's there's no real downside to just leaving it on auto ISO with a max of 3200, because it never really needs to go higher and the quality at 3200 is too good to give a second thought to. So its only annoying when I'm forced to think about it and compare it.

You coud conclude by reading about it that its annoying, but you really have to spend some time to know if its annoying for YOU, because for some it is but for lots its not and there's no real way to know until you check it out. I was prepared to love it and then prepared to hate it and after a couple of days of figuring it out, I love it. With very small reservations. But I've had it for more than four months now, so I don't think its just a matter of waiting for the new camera smell to wear off...

-Ray
 
Ray said:
Its a funny camera and a funnier reaction from the masses. It runs the gamut from total unconditional love, to love but wouldn't mind if they made a couple of changes, to like it but really wish they'd make some changes, to annoying to the point that the liking it is diminished, to those who just flat out hate it. I'm in the "love it but wouldn't mind if they made a couple of changes" group, but I still love it even without the changes. It was a steeper learning curve than any other modern camera I've used, but we're talking a few days instead of a few hours - nothing fatal. The only thing that really annoys me about it anymore (and only after I've shot with something else that REMINDS me to be annoyed) is the inability to move between auto ISO and a manual ISO setting quickly. Its a real PIA and so oddly implemented I just don't get what they were thinking. After shooting with one of the new Olympus cams or any of the Panasonics I've had or the GRD3, I just have to scratch my head. But in use, the high ISO is soooooo good, that's there's no real downside to just leaving it on auto ISO with a max of 3200, because it never really needs to go higher and the quality at 3200 is too good to give a second thought to. So its only annoying when I'm forced to think about it and compare it.

You coud conclude by reading about it that its annoying, but you really have to spend some time to know if its annoying for YOU, because for some it is but for lots its not and there's no real way to know until you check it out. I was prepared to love it and then prepared to hate it and after a couple of days of figuring it out, I love it. With very small reservations. But I've had it for more than four months now, so I don't think its just a matter of waiting for the new camera smell to wear off...

-Ray
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So well, and eloquently, said Ray. I cannot dispute a single word. But must reiterate one of your key lines.
You coud conclude by reading about it that its annoying, but you really have to spend some time to know if its annoying for YOU, because for some it is but for lots its not and there's no real way to know until you check it out.
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It strikes me as a photographer's camera, and it all depends on whether it's suited to your individual style. But only one way to find out.
 
Michael Penn said:
I would stop listening to the tech weenies and start to listen to photographers.
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Very little of what I read was from the first category. It seems that in the second category, photographers, the camera seemed to get between the photographer and the picture because they were always trying work the camera or it would hang or it would do some odd thing or make it difficult to do something simple. Just my interpretation / reading between the lines. Nonetheless, hopefully some day I can try one out (without having to buy it first).
 
I hope you get to, as well, Andrew but just be sure to try it for a couple of days. As with any new camera, especially one from a different platform (so to speak), there will be things to learn.
 
I remember reading everything I could find from any source I could get it from.

If I had listened to the people who didn't like it I would not have spent my money on one.

But I am so glad I am terrible at listening and even worse when it comes to buying something I really really want!

I am so glad I bought this camera and I am so glad that it's quirks make me understand it more every time I take it out. I have not had the patience to do that with any other camera because to me they were just a camera, if I didn't like it then it was sold off for the next new model. This may make me sound super silly? And I will be the first to agree!!!

The X100 has taken a place in my heart that no other camera has been able to and it's so hard to explain that to people. But there it is. It's just awesome.

And it's teaching me how to be a photographer and not just a snapper. :)
 
Look, the X100 is the Misfits camera. We as misfits read everything, absorb everything then...against opinions, we buy and use the camera.
If you love it, your a misfit... If ya don't, your...
uh...uh...something else other then normal.
 
Streetshooter said:
Look, the X100 is the Misfits camera. We as misfits read everything, absorb everything then...against opinions, we buy and use the camera.
If you love it, your a misfit... If ya don't, your...
uh...uh...something else other then normal.
Click to expand...

uhoh. I always suspected....

The thing about the x100 for me, which is why I decided I wanted it, sight unseen, when I first saw the rumours and then the advertising, was that big bright hybrid viewfinder, and the seemingly retro function (not just the looks). The things that followed and confirmed it for me were the dials for shutter speed and aperture, thus eliminating the need for a dial to let you use those if you needed to, the APS sensor, and its compactness. When I first went hands on with it, albeit in a limited way, at PMA, I was convinced, and the main thing that's made me stall since then is the lack of IS (but using the Ricoh has shown me I can do it if I concentrate, plus using the VF gives a bit more stability) and lack of funds. That final block was lifted with the advent of a tax return I will never see the like of again. So it was now or never.

For me, it will be a keeper. It may even take the place of my K-5 because its focal length is the one I have been preferring in the recent past, when using my primes.
 
It's not perfect, but for me the X100 is a keeper! All week long the combination of lens and sensor are making me happy, giving me images that really speak to my eye. The clarity, the color, the dynamic range, even the dials, the O/EVF and the sheer retro beauty of the beast have all conspired to win me over heart and soul. What a great camera :D
 
Andrewteee said:
It's not perfect, but for me the X100 is a keeper! All week long the combination of lens and sensor are making me happy, giving me images that really speak to my eye. The clarity, the color, the dynamic range, even the dials, the O/EVF and the sheer retro beauty of the beast have all conspired to win me over heart and soul. What a great camera :D
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Great news Andrew. See being a misfit aint all that bad once you steel yourself to the social stigma is it? This support group sort of helps too....sort of feel like we're all poised together in Diane Arbus' viewfinder :grouphug:
 
stillshunter said:
Great news Andrew. See being a misfit aint all that bad once you steel yourself to the social stigma is it? This support group sort of helps too....sort of feel like we're all poised together in Diane Arbus' viewfinder :grouphug:
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You could call it a support group or you could call it a bunch of enablers... :cool:

I can almost guarantee that if it wasn't for the constant praise of folks around here, I'd have never bought an X100. I blame you all!!!

Then again, I was among the first, so I probably did more than a little bit of enabling myself...

-Ray
 

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