Fuji X100s first thoughts.

[I @ M]

After a quick play with the camera, my first thoughts are that it is my ideal travel camera due to the size, totally silent operation, image quality and extremely easy to use controls.
I haven't even given raw images any thought yet as the out of the camera jpegs are extremely good.




Velvia film simulation certainly is vibrant!!!!



With a 35mm field of view in 35mm format it is wide enough for the odd landscape shot and distortion is negligible ( image below ) and easily corrected in software.



A mixture of sunlight and incandescent bulbs with our wooden walls that always introduce colour casts doesn't really phase it wide open at 6400 iso,

[swifty]

Congrats Andrew. I won't double post but I wrote some comments about my positive first impressions with the X100s whilst in a store yesterday, in Kaiser's on-going review.
Cheers

[Rattus79]

I haven't' used an X100, so I won't say much more then that the photograph on your wall is vaguely familiar from somewere ...

[welly]

How do you find the split focusing affair? It sounds awesome, if it works as described.

[I @ M]

Congrats Andrew. I won't double post but I wrote some comments about my positive first impressions with the X100s whilst in a store yesterday, in Kaiser's on-going review.
Cheers

Swifty, the review that Matt has started is more comprehensive than my limited play time so far with the camera but at the moment my feelings echo his closely. It really is a joy to use and in reality is exactly what the Coolpix A should have been to keep Nikon owners happy ----

I haven't' used an X100, so I won't say much more then that the photograph on your wall is vaguely familiar from somewere ...

It's a good job I posted a photo of that wall then, the other walls would have not have been allowed to be shown on AP.

How do you find the split focusing affair? It sounds awesome, if it works as described.

I haven't started to explore the manual focus options yet welly apart from the focus ring falls naturally to hand has a well damped smooth feel to it.
I will have a look at it soon when time permits and write a few more words on the subject.

AP member Matt has a really good ongoing review on his pages here and here.

[I @ M]

How do you find the split focusing affair? It sounds awesome, if it works as described.

I have tried the manual focus a few times now, the split system with the EVF works very very well, it might be my eyes but to me it is only useful for close subjects with plenty of detail to see the benefits of the system in full.

One thing I am beginning to like is the lack of processing needed with out of the camera jpegs particularly with the black and white settings. I dedicated an hour or so today to seeing how the different B&W settings worked.
This image has had the midtones lifted slightly in software and the horizon levelled by 1/2 degree other than that it is as the camera decides a jpeg should be, no blown highlights, only minimal lost shadow detail where you would expect pitch black and the toning suits the original colours. The car in this shot is a bronze sort of colour and the guys clothing was a black jacket and very dark blue pants.

[I @ M]

After a bit more experimentation following suggested settings for jpegs from other posters on the www, a pretty fair jpeg from the camera can be had at iso 800, dynamic range 400 % and depending on the conditions, clicking in the built in ND filter via the function button.

A well lit scene, exif is attached and for the pixel peepers the 8 mb jpeg can be downloaded from https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/...620_154646.jpg



On the jetty and back into the sun, stop down to f/16, engage the built in ND filter and there is flair about where you would expect to see it but with such minimal adjustments the camera is extremely capable.

[I @ M]

Further thoughts ----

After more experimentation and reading about the focus system I have concluded that overall it is brilliant!!!

As an example, whilst at the digital show in Melbourne last weekend I started talking to a gentleman who was having a play with a demo unit at the Fuji stand and he asked me if the internet chatter about slow and inaccurate focus was to be believed.
As they say, a picture is worth a thousand words so it is posted below, I asked him to just stand there and I turned about 90 degrees away from him, focussed at infinity and then turned back and framed him, pushed the shutter and lowered the camera. It was all done as pretty much one movement, as soon as he was framed in the viewfinder the shutter was pushed without waiting for focus confirmation. I think that he didn't believe that I had taken a picture until I showed him the screen. I then repeated the shot on another close by subject to show him that it is entirely repeatable. He went back to examining the cameras and saying how it would make an excellent addition to his Canon gear.

1/60 F/2

[I @ M]

Thoughts on raw files ----

I have downloaded Photo Ninja 1.2.1 and experimented with it as purely a raw converter. At this stage I don't have a trial license key to allow saving of converted RAF files but on screen the results are extremely impressive.
The Fuji bundled program and the retail versions of sillypix left me cold due to the user unfriendliness of them and the glacial pace at which they operated, every report about the a$obe products indicate that they are not a satisfactory option at this stage with the x trans sensors ( besides, I don't want to buy rent any of their products )and the free lightzone converter seems to be having lots of installation issues at the moment.

The Photo Ninja program has an excellent white balance adjustment tool, very responsive exposure + shadow and highlight recovery sliders and what seems to be a very accurate colour adjustment interface.
I think it will be time to get the plastic out soon and order a license key which can be had for around $60.00 with educational connections.

[I @ M]

Further thoughts on raw files ----

I emailed Photo Ninja for a trial key at 11:31 am AEDT today and received the key by email at 1:04 pm AEDT today.

A trial conversion on a deliberate chosen subject has impressed me. The file renders extremly quickly as a 16 bit TIFF and then seamlessly opens in my preferred editing program for finishing touches.



and a 100% screen crop



The one thing that has bugged me with the Fuji x trans files has been smearing of detail in fabrics and areas with repeating patterns so I will venture forth to see what can be done with raw files and Photo Ninja.

- - - Updated - - -

I now fail to see any smearing in fabrics using the Photo Ninja software.

[Wretched]

Been loving my X100s so far. Fun little camera to use, but offers top-quality results. No qualms at all, yet.

[I @ M]

Fun little camera to use, but offers top-quality results.

It does put fun into taking photos and is still surprising with the quality. Different to many, better than some, worse than others but still an excellent package.

[pfeds]

Thought I'd add my 2 cents...

My first proper camera was a Canon 450D, along with some expensive lenses which after a few months became to cumbersome to bother with. I travel a lot so decided to get the best point-and-shoot I could, so ended up with a Sony RX100. Then, after a while I wanted something "in the middle" so bought an X100S. That was 6 months ago, and I've never been so fond of a camera.

I love the retro look, silent mode, and the B&W shots are great (B&W + Yellow filter is cool, and the Red filter can give a great film noir feel). It's very unimposing and great for street photography. It helped me with composition being a fixed lens - I really had to think about the scene and move around more.

I love the convenience, and I only bother with jpeg these days. I'm more than happy with the quality, and was pretty chuffed to print this out at 1.5m x 1m and have it crystal clear (ok, well the photo of the photo is iphone quality):