I’m loving the Fujifilm X100 for image making. It has a great sized sensor in a beautifully well made, retro-styled body.
It does have its issues though. It is sluggish when taking multiple raw photos and its manual focusing is fiddly. They are not really issues that concern my use though, and I feel most of the niggles so far reported can be fixed with a firmware update. For me its good points far outweigh the bad. Great image quality, a hybrid viewfinder, a lovely fast lens and near silent operation to name a few.
That said, for the X100 to be my every day workhorse, the camera I always have by my side, it also to be useable for video blogging. This is my first real test shooting video and although the lens delivers a great quality image, even in low light, a couple of clips appeared to have a buzzing on the audio and then for no reason.. it went. I didn’t do anything to make it go and can’t seem to get it to happen again. Nevertheless, it was weird and I can see myself doing a few more tests before trusting the camera to deliver both stunning video and acceptable audio. Even if just for video blogging.
(I recorded my initial impression of the camera here on audioboo should you want to hear more.)
This is interesting, but your writing reads as rather unpolished and unprofessional – you need to learn the difference between its and it’s…
Ralph, if you are from the grammar police please don’t read any further into this blog as you will probably implode with the amount of spelling errors and inaccuracies.
Unpolished and unprofessional is what i do. In fact I get paid to be unpolished and unprofessional.. So that makes me professional at it. I guess.
I hope you can forgive me.
Ralph,
its, it’s or should I say It Is 2011, grammar in social media is like pork in a jewish butchers shop! it doesn’t exist. from an admirer of the unpolished in the polished world that is the internet, those who are professional at not being professional tend to succeed further in the “new world”, so much so that a mans best friend and his Bongo can exist side by side on the same pedestal in the social media Olympics! , Well done to @documentally on winning gold in your chosen sport!
Ralph,
It’s a blog post. Get over yourself. As I try to write this on my iPad, it consistently autocorrects its to it’s. What else in this post reads as unpolished and unprofessional? What else have you read of Christian’s work? You finish your comment with an ellipsis. Why? Seems to me that you need to learn the difference between clever and stupid. Its such a fine line.
Great post, Christian – been a long time since I thought about Fuji – thanks for the tip 🙂
Hi Ralph (Hylonder), my full name is usually never hidden either. It’s a sign of respect, in the sense you mean no harm. Otherwise, you wouldn’t be so genuine or frank, which your post shows. I love grammar, but police are more a sign that peace is lacking, rather than peace is being kept. I felt a need to write this post, because I felt it would help. I think this is the second comment I’ve ever posted on the internet, since I began using it. The first was last week and that was to thank a commenter for teaching me a new word. Mistakes are good, but learning and teaching are much better. So, hopefully you know my position before I point out a mistake, which, by the way, isn’t Christian’s. Christian’s uses of it and its, in the above blog, are grammatically correct. I triple proofread the blog and then checked my GMofStyle, which confirmed my belief. Normally, singular nouns using a possessive apostrophe, place the apostrophe before the S. But, because the noun in this case is substituted by the word IT, and it (the noun), is possessive, there is no apostrophe used before the S. It’s just a quirk of english grammar, but it is logical. How else can the reader distinguish between a contracted, non-possessive IT IS, IT HAS; and ITS, without stalling the flow of reading? Anyhoo, I hope that helped everyone. I have three GCSEs and reading is problematic for me. When not doing something makes me unhappy, I figure doing it is the only option. That’s why I’ve been learning from my mistakes (very slowly), for my friends, family and brothers and sisters. This has included writing and grammar. Misunderstanding and miscommunication, I’ve learned, just isn’t helpful. Best do something about it I thought… Maxxx
Hi Maxxx, I feel i have to defend Ralph by saying i nipped in and corrected an it’s or two. Once it was mentioned I re-read the post and could not ignore them. I too have difficulty with words. Mostly I get corrected on twitter (@Documentally), and normally in jest as people who know me have come to put up with it by now. 🙂
Thanks for your comment.
I wonder if I will get any comments relevant to the camera soon. 😉
Hey Christian, that last line has me prepped for surgery. Very observant and equally hilarious. Thanks. I usually get your links from Twitter, but I originally found you on Posterous. I joined a while back (about two-ish months), just to secure my username with them. I had no idea you mostly worked with ‘tech’, because that first post was about your travels and shepherding. Anyway, I just really like the tone of your writing, whether professional or personal. It’s quite soothing. Except when it requires that I find medical treatment 😉 (@orbitalsun) Ps apologies to all, if offence was taken… Maxxx
Cheers Maxxx,
Appreciate the comments and I’m feeling I have to ultimately thank Ralph for taking us down this rabbit hole. I may stop blogging tech all together and just blog about blogging. I now see why so many people do. 🙂
I’m eagerly anticipating using this camera. I have a Canon SD790 that’s been my workhorse for a few years, and the X100 is a strong contender to replace it. I would love to see the video you shot with the camera on autofocus in comparison.
Cheers,
Ellen
Last post Christian, promise. But, I felt I had to support your deliberations about blogging. Not wanting to stop your Golden Eggs from being laid, I’ll refrain from dissecting you 😉 But, there are many blogs being created lately, exponentially it seems. Content curation is going to be very important; therefore, the curator has to have certain ‘qualities’. Otherwise, the quality content in the Haystack will go unnoticed. More importantly, however, without quality curation, this content will also go ‘unappreciated’. A curator who doesn’t just collect or ‘link to’ content, but blogs about it wisely, will be invaluable and very helpful to others in this respect. The best judgements we can trust, before knowing what quality is, are those that are genuine and lacking in pretension. For various reasons, which I wish to avoid mentioning, I believe (quite firmly), that you would be an ideal blogger about blogging. Good luck though, in whatever you do, Christian… Maxxx
Hi Ellen, The clip at the end of this was shot using auto focus.. http://ourmaninside.com/2011/04/24/the-goodyear-blimp/ I will also do some talking to camera so you can see hw it moves with someone talking.
..and Maxxx, Cheers for the kind words.
Hi Ellen, I forgot that the day I got the camera I recorded & posted this clip shot using autofocus.. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a9tbkqOXEX4
Seems the autofocus takes a bit to catch up. Not terrible, and I tend to use the manual settings more often, so this may be a winner. Thanks for the quick response on your part and sorry for the delayed response on mine.
Cheers!
I wouldn’t rely too much on manual focus. In fact at all. it’s pretty naff.. almost unusable.
The buzzing in the audio clip is the noise that is produced when filming with the EVF. In Live View mode it is absent. It’s consoling to hear that it’s a systematic issue and not just isolated to mine, although who really bought this thing for video anyway. I’ve had mine for a couple days and other than that quirk that I can live with it’s an excellent camera.
I am finding the most effective way of shooting is to leave focus on manual and focus with the AFL/AEL button. You can double check your focus for parallax problems by pressing the command control dial which zooms into what’s being actually focused through your view finder.
This camera is so fun to use. I find because of its weight and form factor I take shots using unconventional angles rather than be encouraged to holding it portrait / landscape like a bulky DSLR. Additionally if you want to improve your compositional skill this is the camera to own because: A) The OVF shows what is inside and outside your frame and B) It has a fixed lens.