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Fujifilm X-Pro1 vs Olympus E-M5, an opinion
#1
Hi zoners,

 

After being very enthusiastic about Fujifilm again after this photokina, I thought I'd try a little bit harder than other times before.

It happened before that I got excited so much to see my interest for Fuji blemish very quickly when actually trying the products for just 5 mins. I'd find the build quality lesser than expected, or the user interface would appear to be of another age, or ...

No complains on image quality of course, I'm following and am often amazed on different Flickr groups.

 

But then Fuji started its Kaizen approach and kept on updating its firmwares, apparently meeting user expectations! 

 

This photokina was pretty good in that way : I noticed a lot of things making much more sense and came home excited.

I asked a colleague to lend me his X-Pro1 for the week-end. The X-Pro 1 isn't the best example being quite old but it's getting a fair share of updates.

 

Here are my first findings after two days of moderate shooting, compared to what I use regularly, Olympus E-M5. I have it with firmware 3.xx+ the 18 f/2 & the 35 f/1.4. Nothing else. I'm still looking for a night crawler better than E-M5 + 20mm f/1.7 so I'm not interested in the whole line.

(Just FYI : X-Pro 1 was available from february 2012, E-M5 april 2012.)

 

Fuji lovers, you won't like that :

 

-No direct access to AF selection. You have to press a button to activate the AF zone select (AF button, awful, or down arrow, kinda ok), then select it. One push too much anyways.

 

-The AF motorization of these two lenses are completely awful. Noisy & slow. A big shocker.

Urgently needs a 35mm f/1.4 mkII, one that would be a little less hazy too at full aperture.

Frankly, I don't know what could justify these terrible motors.

 

-The LCD & information layout is ... oldish. Zooming not deep enough, ... very limited feedback I think. Not sure about current ones.

 

-The lack of IBIS is a big deal, actually. Huge deal. Even with these fast lenses. 

 

-The focus peaking Fuji implemented is like "black on black", it's useless.

 

-AF system is kinda poor in speed and accuracy (with mentionned lenses). A lot of hunting. Hopefully not a concern anymore on current fuji's.

 

-No face detection is a big deal too. Not a concern anymore on current fuji's.

 

-The whole X-trans process. Well, I'm a lightroom user. Knowing you get a sub par demozaicing from scratch isn't exciting. A quick test in Capture One confirmed it. Bugger.

 

-The button release to adjust shutter speed. Idiotic. They should consider a clickable model like on the E-M1.

 

But I liked some things :

 

-Direct AF zone size adjust with the thumb wheel.

 

-The OVF. It's nice. No doubt about it.

But somehow, the fact that you don't get the same focusing area as in the EVF is a little disturbing. Also, as the AF system isn't terribly effective, you feel disconnected :"Should I trust that OVF af confirm?". Something to get used to I suppose. Somehow I never had to doubt on my 30D & 40D AF through OVF.

EDIT : which is obvious because it's focusing through the lens...

 

-The limited customization kinda makes it comfortable : you don't have to adjust a million of things to get going.

 

-Good grip, the camera is very comfortable to use. Well balanced.

 

-Details in the files. Very impressive.

 

-Aperture rings with A position. Cool & fast.

 

-Looks very good.

 

So, my goal was to see if I could eventually be happy with a Fuji. Looks like I could, body wise, with what has appeared through new cameras & firmwares. But I'd feel I'd lose a lot of possibilities and fonctionnalities compared to Olympus. I didn't think the gap would feel this wide. But with the proper tradeoffs, it could work. Wonder what a fast lens + OIS & proper lightroom support would do to my opinion.

 

My conclusion is that MFT clearly is here and looking much more "adjusted" than most of its mirrorless competitors. Which is annoying, I'm longing to look elsewhere for a bit :-).

 

So, more waiting... waiting to see an X-Pro II and maybe a few mkII of existing lenses...with OIS?

In the meantime, perhaps will Olympus develop super fast lenses to be in the same DOF control territory. Who knows...
#2
As if someone was listening :

 

http://www.fujirumors.com/fujifilm-paten...us-source/
#3
My impression is that the OVF of the X-pro1 is just a viewfinder with no focusing assistance. So I wonder what is the usefulness of the OVF. As I know most Fuji X lenses just do not have distance scales.
  


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