Is it possible to judge (review) a camera anymore? Don't constant improvements to firmware make each review only a snapshot into one slice of a camera's life?

Fujifilm's Professional APS-C Camera.

Now effectively sidelined by its early reviews. 

There is a tendency among camera makers now to emulate the questionable habits of (software) operating system makers, app designers and other kinds of electronics manufacturers. That tendency is to create a product and get it to market while it is only 80-90% completed and then to depend on a long and sometimes complex series of software/firmware fixes to bring the product up to its true potential. 

A case in point, from my vantage point as a late adopter, is the Fujifilm XH-1 which I find to be an exhilarating camera with many commendable features and beautiful looking files. But apparently the XH-1s that I am handling are almost a completely different camera than the ones that came into the market nearly a year ago.

The first generation of firmware in this camera disappointed a lot of people and led early reviewers of the camera to steer people to make other choices. 

I can overlook any of the negative responses Fujifilm got from potential buyers when it came to the overall size of the XH-1; its heft and girth. Many see the only reason for mirrorless camera's existence to be that they are the "small size and weight" option in interchangeable lens photography. That's never been my perspective here at the blog and I'll always welcome size as a compromise if it means a camera is easier/more comfortable to hold, if it means the engineers needed the extra space in which to lovingly place features like near perfect in-body image stabilization, if it means that the camera is more robust and better able to wick away heat from mission critical components. 

Things that are harder to overlook in newly launched cameras are features and specifications that don't delivery what they promise. While Fuji flogged their marketing hard to make the XH-1 into an acceptable answer to hybrid shooters who craved good video they fell short by having the initial camera limited to 6, 10, or 15 minutes of continuous 4K shooting (apparently the single battery got too hot under the various loads). They failed to initially deliver image stabilization that was artifact free when panning in video (although this has also plagued many competing cameras as well) which led to many reviewers posting YouTube videos with jerky stops and starts in video files, weird corner motion distortions when panning, and other symptoms of I.S. distress. 

Another misstep was the decision by Fuji to only supply a headphone jack for videographers using the XH1 if they also purchased a $325 battery grip (which, in its defense, eventually led to the camera being able to provide 29.99 minutes of continuous video, finally) which drove the price of the new camera + grip to about $2225 and put the product firmly into the pricing arena of full frame cameras; which the public seems to steadfastly believe are superior to any smaller sensor camera.....

There was more. The camera had some early glitches that caused unexpected shutdowns that could only be remedied by removing the battery or batteries. In order to take advantage of the in body image stabilization the existing lenses required a seemingly unending series of their own firmware updates which could only be done on a body which also had the latest firmware. 

Is it any wonder that, confronted with so many black marks against a camera so widely and breathlessly awaited, the bulk of buyers read or watched the painful reviews and chose to take a different path to hybrid happiness? 

I'll confess that I didn't keep up with anything related to Fuji cameras since selling my last S5 in 2007 or 2008. They just fell off the radar for me. I did take a cursory look at the Pro-1 when it first came out but things like the lack of an adjustable diopter steered me away in short order. 

Over the last few years friends and blog readers would mention the cameras or lenses to me and I would nod and move on to the next thought with no stickiness for the Fuji brand. It was only in late October or early November of last year that I started paying attention as so many of my friends seemed enthralled by the Fuji XT3. I became interested and, impulsively, traded one of my Nikon cameras for a new XT3 and a lens I'd heard much good press about; the 18-55mm f2.8 - f4.0 "kit" lens. 

At this point I'd read nothing about the XH1 and was thoroughly convinced that I'd always be shooting hybrid or video projects with the cheap videographer's "industry standard" Panasonic GH5 or GH5S. Cameras that had never let me down. Since I wasn't in the market and don't review cameras I don't use for a living the Fuji flagship still stayed off my radar....

The XT3 was a nice introduction to the system and I liked shooting it for portraits. I found a few great video projects people had done and posted to the web also using the XT3 as a 4K cinema camera and I started experimenting with mine as well. I liked the video (don't like the pixie sized HDMI port, wish it had an audio interface....) and I started using my camera as an alternative to my Panasonic cameras for casual, personal projects. 

So, it was probably just a month ago that I was out at Precision-Camera.com buying something droll, like seamless background paper, when I came across a tricked out Fuji XH-1, with a battery grip with its two extra batteries, sitting in the used case, looking brand new and priced at something like $899 for the entire package (three batteries+body+grip+chargers). I'd read a few things about the whole Fuji product line after buying the XT3 and I'd read the sale brochure online.  I had my sales guy pull the camera out of the case and I played with it for all of five minutes before actually writing out a paper check to purchase the item. (Always fun to proffer a traditional check as most electronics stores actually no longer accept them). 

Since buying my first XH-1 I've been doing a deep dive into that camera to try and figure out exactly what Fuji was trying to do with the creation of that camera and to understand more about some of the features that didn't get the right kind of press but which might lead an eccentric camera buyer/user like me to appreciate it a bit more. 

While I wasn't really paying attention at launch time there are several mechanical attributes that appeal to people like me who can be hard on cameras and who demand reliability. First is the strengthening of the actual lens mount to make it more reliable and more resistant to deviating from true plano-parallelism with the sensor imaging plane. The mount is sturdier and the anchor screws longer, wider and stronger. This attention to mechanical engineering carries through to the body itself with an alloy substructure that is 25% thicker and has more cross supports than any other camera in the line up. The body cladding is also thicker and more resistant to damage. Even the paint is a harder and more abrasion resistant type than on the other cameras in the mix. This is probably one reason why the camera is only available in black....

The shutter was reworked, in conjunction with the image stabilization system, to have a much higher MTBF and the body's interior was re-engineered (by comparison with the smaller XT bodies) to have much greater heat dissipation capability. All of these things add up to a camera that is more physically robust, can operate with lower internal thermal stresses, and which has operational abilities that the other Fuji cameras do not. The only issue that seemed to cause the camera's first introductions to stumble were unfinished software/firmware. I'm assuming Fuji was giving the market credit for more patience in their roll out of improvements than they really deserved. 

Having not emphasized the engineering of the XH1 and having over-emphasized the video nature of the camera, it was an additional blow to their ability to market the XH-1 at a premium price when they were also marketing their brand new XT3 which boasted a "better" sensor and a deeper collection of 4K video features. That camera also came with the magic specs, such as BSI Sensor, more megapixels, faster processors, etc. All things that divided and confused the potential market for the camera that should have been the flagship model of the system and Fuji's first truly professional APS-C camera. 

With the acquisition of that first, used, Fuji XH-1 camera my Fujicron lenses (23, 35 and 50mm f2.0s) camera into their own with the addition of the image stabilization. In short order Fuji launched their firmware 2.0 which fixed so many of the initial problems with the early launch version of the camera. The I.S. got better and steadier. The video (with battery grip) was good to go for up to nearly 30 minutes at a go. The shutdowns were eradicated. Essentially, what users got was a brand new camera. 

When I experienced the camera with the revised firmware I was very happy with both it's imaging capabilities but also with its video quality and most importantly (for me) the handling. The viewfinder is superb and the grip makes the camera pretty wonderful. The boost mode on the grip also delivers a performance bump that can be most welcome to power users. 

After I started really using and appreciating the camera I mulled over the idea of getting a second one for the shoots I do at the theater. The XH-1 is a far better camera than the XT3 for shooting live theater in one regard; the mechanical shutter of the XH-1 is far, far quieter. I can hear it now; a host of people who don't shoot theater rushing to tell me that I should "just shoot with the electronic shutter you moron."  But, of course, these are people who don't shoot modern theater and don't know that of which they speak. Most of the theaters that I work in these days use high powered LEDs that, unlike the LEDs designed for film production, have high flicker rates with cameras using electronic shutters. Think Venetian blinds across the whole stage.....

In some productions using the mechanical shutter is a must and the XH-1 has the quietest shutter I have ever experienced. It makes the sound of a Leica M3 rangefinder shutter sound like a drunk man banging metal trash cans lids together in a resonating alleyway....or something like that. 

The XT3 shutter is more than twice as loud. 

All of this is to say that buried under all that thick metal there is much more to the XH-1 than there was even six months ago. And more to come based on the frequency of the firmware updates. And that leads us to the psychotic pricing strategy I've been encountering. 

When I first started to look at getting a second XH-1 for theater work the price on B&H and Amazon, for a body only package, was $1999. The price of the battery grip (sans batteries) was $329. The batteries were $60 each. I stopped looking. For a while. Then, a few weeks later I looked again and B&H and Amazon both were selling the whole grip kit (body, grip and extra batteries) brand new with USA warranties for a whopping $1299.  Roughly a thousand dollars off the recent price. I was certain it was a mistake but I went ahead and ordered one from B&H because I'd already decided that this was the body I wanted for theater work. When the transaction went through and the camera got delivered I was thrilled. It was, of course, as advertised: brand new and beautiful 

I put the two cameras through their paces at the theater, at an event and in several long portrait shoots and came away thinking that this may be the best work camera I've used since the film days. The files are big and detailed, with all the resolution I need. The video is great and, when body and lens both have I.S. and work together the camera moves are jitter free. After using the two cameras for nearly a month I took the plunge and upgraded my lens inventory. Now I have the two lenses I think I'll get the most mileage out of for theatrical work; the 16-55mm f2.8 and the 50-140mm f2.8. I've also added lenses that I know I'll get a lot of use out of in pursuing portraiture, the 60mm f2.4 macro and the 90mm f2.0. 

And all of this brings me to my question. How can we review cameras that grow and evolve over time as people improve and roll out new "brain tissue" for the camera bodies? The XH-1 is now nothing like the camera that debuted a year ago. Not even close. The new camera is stable, has great I.S., has wonderful image quality and no propensity to shut down at crunch time. But is there any method that would allow people to access constantly updated reviews? I don't know of any. I think at this point that Fuji understands two different things: First, they know they've built perhaps the best and most solid APS-C professional imaging tool ever put on the market of digital cameras. And second, they know that their too early launch and subsequent ineffectual marketing efforts to rehabilitate the camera's image with the buying public was too little too late. 

So here we are, finally, with the product that most of us have clamored for in the past (if we are in the Fuji camp). It's finally working as it should; as it was promised, and yet, it will fail utterly because the reviews that will always come up first on Google will be the earliest ones when people were stumbling through errors and promises not yet met. There is also the misguided marketing that, in this product range, forgot to emphasize the professional build and finish to the product which were huge positives that could have been leveraged to sustain a marketing momentum while coding in the product evolved. 

This could be the product I wanted but would never have found without happenstance and my own curiosity. Some marketer at some agency in the USA was too intent on the consumer features and not nearly invested enough in selling the actual engineering. The mechanicals. The stronger mount, the better body armor. In the end the consumer misses out because they miss out on another choice. One that might have been superior to the ones that made it through the popular feature filter. Sad, to me, that somewhere in the marketing mix panoramic HDR was more appetizing that rock solid camera stability and resilience. 

I know many of you question my sanity but I hope I'm able to buy one more before either the price goes back up or Fuji pulls the camera off the market to cauterize the bleeding. We can only hope that they hire some smarter marketing people when they get ready to launch the XH-2. I'll be sitting right here waiting for their calls.... The saddest outcome would be for Fuji to stop aspiring toward making professional cameras.

Read the latest reviews for the cameras you are considering. Go to the camera maker's site and look at the firmware history for ALL the cameras you are considering. See if the "issues" you read about in the initial review from a year ago have all been handled over the ensuing year with better firmware. You might find a diamond that was "in the rough" but which is now very well polished and ready to impress. 

Okay Fuji Shooters, where do you stand on the 50-140mm f2.8 zoom lens. I know it's heavy but is it good?

Let me know if you've used it and what you think. The 50-140mm f2.8 is on sale right now and I'm trying to help bolster the global economy. What's your take?

Gloria, photo taken with the Samsung Galaxy NX camera and the 50mm f2.8 macro. 

I always thought the best portraits came from situations where the photographer and talent had a quiet, private space. Gloria proved me wrong.

In 2013 I was invited to help launch the Samsung Galaxy NX camera at the NYC Photo Expo show. I asked for a bunch of space and a sophisticated lighting set up but what I ended up with was an "open air" 12x10 foot space tacked on to the bigger Samsung booth on the trade show floor at the Javits Center. Provided was a 24 by 36 inch soft box and a smaller, 16x20 soft box. My models were about six feet from the background and I was shooting tethered so the crowd at the booth could see the working (non-post processed/straight out of camera) Jpegs on a couple of 60 inch 4K Samsung TVs. 

As I worked with Gloria I had my back to dozens of photographers at any one time who were attending the Expo and huddling at the booth. They could watch me work, ask me about my settings and see exactly how I interacted with my subject and how goofy I looked while photographing. The trade show floor was noisy and chaotic but we were able to block that out and work just as I would normally work in the studio. 

I even had a headset on so I could narrate as I shot. I've never done that before or since. It was kind of stressful because even the best photographers screw up and make lousy images as they zero in on their settings. Most of us work by shooting and evaluating > changing settings > and then shooting again to see if anything really improved. 

I may be taking too much credit though because Gloria was a cool and calm professional model who was used to big production shoots in The City with lots of crew around her. She helped me to be a better photographer through the two days I spent being a booth novelty. 

It's my contention that the Galaxy NX was the camera that killed Samsung's passion to be in the market. The response, worldwide, to the totally (excessively) connected, big screen camera was so underwhelming that you could probably have heard pin drops in Samsung's marketing meeting around the world. The final Samsung camera, the NX1 was a great camera. Had they waited until the launch of this camera instead of putting a flawed concept camera into the market they'd probably be one of the big three competitors for professional camera sales in the market today. 

The NX1 had a great 28 megapixel sensor, killer 4K video, and was, by all accounts a solid camera. Where the company really shined was in lens development. I shot in the NYC demo with the 85mm f1.4 and the 60mm f2.0 macro and those two lenses were fanstastic; easily the equal to current Fuji, Canon, Nikon or Sony lenses and maybe a few clicks better. 

One thing I did learn in this Expo event was that we could make decent portraits in spite of the cramped space, the sparse lighting gear and a full, noisy audience looking over my shoulder. A fun challenge if you haven't tried it yet.....

Just playing with lenses. Wanted to see if I really liked the Fuji 60mm f2.4. I do.

Ben. In Studio. 

New acquisition as a result of all the photography equipment I want being on sale... Hello new lens and memory cards.

Fujifilm 16-55mm f2.8. Big, heavy, pricey. But cheaper right now.

Just to put things in perspective, I have two different mid-range zoom lenses for my Panasonic cameras. I vacillate between using the Panasonic/Leica 12-60mm f2.8-4.0 and the (amazing!) Olympus 12-100mm f4.0 Pro lenses. They are each good at what they do and I just can't decide which one needs to stay and which one should go. 

Now I have two standard zoom lenses for the Fuji cameras as well. One is the well regarded "kit" lens and the other is the much vaunted, constant aperture f2.8, 16-55mm version (with a bit more reach on the wide side...). I started out with the 18-55mm f2.8-4.0 lens because it's competent, popular and, when purchased with a camera, well discounted. It's smaller and lighter (obviously) that its faster sibling and it also is equipped with OIS (Fuji's abbreviation for image stabilization). The 16-55mm f2.8, which I bought yesterday, is much bigger, much heavier and.....if you believe the "press" on the web....much sharper and contrastier at most points throughout its range. And, well, it's a constant aperture f2.8. Sadly though, no OIS.

Which to keep and which to send away is a bit more difficult here since two of my four Fuji cameras are bereft of in-body image stabilization and will need to be used lenses that have OIS if I want that feature available on an assignment. In the Panasonic system (GH5, G9s, GH5S) both the Olympus and the Panasonic/Leica lens will provide good image stabilization. On the first three Panasonic cameras the P/L lens will also provide dual image stabilization, using the stabilization methods from both the lens and the body. It's damn good stabilization too. 

With the Fuji XT3 and the Fuji XE3 I need the lenses to provide I.S.. if I require it. 

I'm just getting started with the new 16-55mm for the Fuji and am shooting my first portraits with it in about ten minutes. The casual shooting I've done with it looks great so far. I've been interested in this lens since I first started playing with the Fuji cameras but I was hesitant to drop the cash for one since it is normally priced at about $1200. A lot of Fuji product is on sale this month and the asking price at my favorite retailer was $899 (retail translation = about $900). Since the year has gotten off to a good start I thought I'd let my curiosity dictate my purchasing decision. Curiosity beat caution and here we are.

The 16-55mm is roughly equal (in angles of view) to a 24-85mm lens in the 35mm format. It has a big, fat body and a 77mm front filter size. The construction is something like 17 elements in 11 groups and a good number of the elements are aspherical while another generous portion are ED glass. When you look closely at the lens you'll see that it's beautifully built and a pleasure to use. Build quality, in my opinion, exceeds that of the similar lenses from Nikon, Canon and Sony by a good margin. 

Interlude

I was away from the keyboard for the last hour or so making a nice portrait of a guy named, Kevin, who arrived promptly, was well prepared and very engaging to converse with. Turns out we had a few things in common; his brother is a photographer and Kevin visited Iceland last year. But if you are ever at a loss for conversation with an Austinite you need only mention "traffic on Mopac" and you'll get some sort of response.... Anyway, I'm back and have now used the 16/55mm for a portrait session in the studio. 

On the XH1 camera it did a good job consistently locking focus when using the face/eye detect AF setting. The rest of its performance was just the same as all the other Fuji lenses I've shot with: sharp, contrasty and nicely detailed. I'll try some more engaging scenarios and have a full review of the lens in a while. It sure is big.....and heavy......and very professional looking. The red badge on the lens body is cute. 

They might have been able to do a better job with the lens hood. It's a bit...thin.

So, while I was out at Precision Camera happily hemorrhaging money I also came across some new memory cards; ones I had not yet seen from Delkin. These are called the Delkin "Black" cards. They are UHS-II, V60 SD cards with a write speed of up to 300 MB/s. They are advertised as being "unbreakable", "waterproof and dustproof", "three times stronger than regular SD cards", they have a lifetime warranty with a 48 hour replacement policy, and (ta da!) they have their own, unique serial numbers. 

I'm guessing the call them "black" to riff off the black American Express card which is seen as a status symbol in some circles but I'm also guessing that they made the cards black so we will never find them when they disappear into our black interiors of our camera bags and so they can dodge the liability of having to replace them. 

The last set of 128 GB UHS II V60 cards I bought (about a year and a quarter ago) cost me right at $225 each but these are now $124.99 each. I bought two because I like to use identical SD cards in the cameras that feature two card slots. I imagine it's because I think they'll be better matched and for that reason more reliable. I have no science to back up my conjecture. 

I'm not sure if $124.99 is a sale price or an everyday price but since they are almost half as much money for more features than the cards I bought from them last year I am definitely considering them to be virtually on sale. The XH1 camera likes these cards. The camera smiled and winked at me when I loaded them in and formatted them. Nice. 

I now have six 128 GB SDXC UHSII cards and I think, for the time being, that will keep me well situated even for the longer video assignments. tip: Never format a camera memory card in your computer or allow your computer to erase all the files on a card after downloading. Always format your cards in camera and you will be almost painfully happy with your lack of technical card issues. Follow this advice to the letter and you may even find that you can use cameras with only a single card slot....really!

Someone asked me if the fast UHSII cards are worth it. First, if you are shooting 4K video with high data rates you'll need them to prevent shooting issues. Second, if you are using them in cameras that are UHSII compliant you'll notice much faster buffer clearing. Third, if you are using a UHSII, USB 3.01 card reader you'll marvel at how quickly your files download into your computer. Three good reasons to make sure you are buying modern, decent cards. 

A few more photography notes; especially for Fuji camera users: Fuji now has a firmware update available for the XH-1. It prevents some occurrences where the camera exposures become unexpectedly brighter. I haven't seen this effect but am happy to prevent it, proactively. It's a recommended update. 

Fuji also has a firmware update for the XT3 cameras. The update is similar to one made for the XH1 back in January. It allows the camera to right continuous video files to SD cards 64 GB or larger. Previously the cameras wrote video files in 4 GB chunks which didn't affect the final products but required shooters to speed more time in video post production to string all the needed files together on longer projects. The update also fixes some unspecified, general camera bugs. Joy. 

I've updated two XH1 cameras and one XT3 cameras and all are working well. No update glitches I've discovered. 

Finally, and apropos of nothing important, I got some push back on my advice that everyone exercise as much and as vigorously as is safe and possible. Several people told me that they didn't have any time in which to exercise. None at all. I asked each person why. Some said their workday was too long. I suggested they quit their jobs and just walk full time until they were in perfect shape. I also suggested that they disconnect their cable TV (never had it, never will) and walk away from their programming addiction. I also suggested to one person, after learning that he "LOVES" to watch sports on TV that he substitute long runs in the place of broadcast football, basketball, baseball, snooker etc. programming. 

He was appalled. In one fell swoop I seem to have lost four or five VSL readers..... 

( I felt embarrassed for them and did not post their comments). 

I felt so badly about this that I headed to swim practice a bit early today so I could get in some extra yards. It was another freezing cold day but we had a full pool of mostly the same faces I see the majority of mornings at 7:00am. All in great shape, all dedicated to the 1.5 hour Saturday swim and all able keep their desire for watching golf and bowling on TV in check. (That last bit about golf and bowling was meant to be a joke. If people are actually spending time watching that instead of doing their own exercise then we just are on such different wavelengths that perhaps nothing I write here would make sense to them. Nothing). After swim practice a small group met for coffee. We talked about training theories and stroke efficiency. It was sublime. 

Dammit. I forgot the ads and links again. Oh well...

This afternoon's swim. Also, the commitment to staying in good health via exercise is not a "new year's" resolution but should be a decade by decade promise to oneself.

Warm ups at the master's nationals indoor swim meet at

the Jake Jamail Swim Center at UT Austin.

Ahhh, the luxury of an indoor pool.

I can't shake the image of a bunch of fifty and sixty year old men moving from debating about various cameras to debating the relative "charms" of an exercise treadmill. I think a whole bunch of people either spent too much of their lives chained to desks or they were too easy on themselves, underestimating how much good work a body can do and how invigorating and renewing (physically and spiritully) pushing one's fitness boundaries can be. I'm not suggesting that anyone who has been relatively dormant for decades at a time rush over to a pool and pound out a quick couple of miles in the next hour but I'm very much in favor of people pushing themselves enough to get out of their comfort zones for an hour a day. 

It was cold in Austin today. We woke up to temperatures under the freezing mark and scattered sleet showers. The wind gusted from time to time and the wetness of the day made it feel chillier than the mercury might suggest. A good day to make a cup of tea and hew to the easy chair to leaf through some books about landscape photography from the 1950's? Not on your life.

I worked in the studio until about 11:30 am. The place was in desperate need of a cleaning and with people coming in tomorrow for portraits I had already pushed my self-imposed deadline. With the last bit of vacuuming done I hopped in the new Subaru and headed out to the pool. I left a bit early so I could drop a check by my bank and then some letters to the post office. I got to the (outdoor) pool at ten minutes till noon and changed in the locker room. 

When I left the locker room the sleet was coming down hard and pelting me in the face. The sleet was also starting to stick to the cold ground. I looked ahead and thought I could see the first little icicles forming on the horizontal bars of the lifeguard's chair. When you are wearing a swim cap, a swim suit and a pair of goggles a sub-freezing temperature and biting windchill factor is ........ bracing. I didn't stop on the deck to chat with my fellow swimmers; we just jumped right into our respective lanes, did a quick couple of hundred yards to get warm and then read the workout that was written on the white board at the end of the pool. 

There was a thousand yard warm up followed by 12x100 yard swims on 1:30, alternating I.M.'s (individual medley = fly, back, breast, free) and fast freestyle. After that was a set of 12x75 yard swims alternating between one's best (or favorite) stroke and freestyle. After the two sets we had the option to warm down with a two or three hundred yard swim. So, about 3300 yards. 

During the middle of the workout the sleet storm went bonkers and ice pellets started piling up on the roof of the main building and all over the grounds. The swimmers laughed, plunged under the surface of the 80 degree water and then popped up and kept swimming. A little sleet is hardly anything to worry about. Now hail would be a completely different story. 

By one we'd finished with our midday swim and were heading to the locker room to change back into our street clothes. But I can still see the little drops that popped up an inch or so above the steaming surface of the pool each time a piece of sleet struck the surface. It was fun and kinetic magic. 

We swam a hard enough set and got in nearly two miles of swimming over the lunch hour. But this wasn't a "new years resolution" swim for any of us. It was another swim on a massive foundation of previous swims. An almost daily routine for the past 56 years (I started swimming in a year round club at six). It helps keep me right at 158 pounds, keeps my blood pressure and heart rate slow, keeps my joints and muscles happy and improves my general attitude by 1,000 %. It seems like a tremendous advantage to me. Not something I have to sell to myself. 

In a small business, as in staying in good physical shape, the key ingredient is the discipline to show up and do the work. If you do that everything else falls into place. 

So, what's the real cost of swimming in a six days a week, masters swim program? About $50 bucks for a Speedo Jammer Endurance swim suit and a pair of goggles. If you're good to yourself you'll refresh those basics every year. Then there's the $90 per month dues. That's a total of $1,170. per year. 

We have workouts that fit most people's schedules: 7-8:15 am, 8:15-9:30 and Noon to 1pm on weekdays and then 7:30 am - 8:30 and 8:30 - 10:00 on Saturdays and Sundays. You can choose one per day or come to all of them, the financial cost is the same. 

But focusing on one exercise exclusively is not the most productive way to go. I also try to run a five mile trail course a couple times a week and then walk through our downtown area with cameras two days a week. My idea of hell? Sitting at a desk and staring at my computer for eight to ten hours a day. 

63 is the new 25. You just have to reset your brain to accommodate for the bad habits of the past. Just about any medical problem you want to bore me with (bad backs, sore necks, insomnia, anxiety) might just be curable with enough exercise. But it starts with commitment. You have to want to make your life better. And who wouldn't?

How good is the Eterna Profile in the Fuji XT3? I thought I'd try it out and see.

There's a profile in the Fuji XT3 that's called Eterna. It's intended for use as a "straight-out-of-camera" solution for video shooters who don't have the luxury of shooting in a flatter, Log profile and then spending time in post production to color grade the resulting files. It's a flat profile but not in an unattractive way. I decided to see if it was a useable solution for two different shooting situations I encounter; shooting high contrast interiors (usually in a commercial facility) and also making portraits on bright locations. The test shot I am looking at today is from a quick, handheld interior test.

I was in the JW Marriott Hotel on Congress Ave. with my Fuji XT3 and the XF 14mm f2.8 lens and I walked into a room that had floor to ceiling windows on one side which gave me a view of several downtown office buildings; two in full sun and one (on the right side of the frame) that was in full shade.

The interior was unlit as the room was not being used. To add to the wide dynamic range of the scene the window supports were brushed aluminum with bright highlights. I switched the camera profile to Eterna and, with the camera set on "fine, jpeg" I proceeded to do a three stop bracket. When I got back to the office I opened the file I thought had the best histogram and took a look.

My take was that this profile did a good job maintaining color saturation while giving me a more expansive range of shadow detail (see the shadows of the chair on the table in the foreground or the carpet detail in the far corner) while preserving the highlights in the uprights between the window glass.  Given the correct, full daylight exposure on the building mid-frame I think this is a very good result.

I would not hesitate to use the Eterna profile in any overly contrasty situation. With a few tweaks to the midrange contrast I get images that seem well balanced and keep me from having to resort to less elegant "tricks" like in-camera HDR.

Next time around I'll show you how well it works in portrait settings.

Reconsidering the Fuji XE-3. Bought as an emergency back up camera but winning me over as a general "walk around" tool.

I think my writing will be conceptually blurry today because I spent the first five waking hours at jury duty. No big murder case. No industrial treachery. Just a couple of people in civil court with their respective attorneys trying to convince the six person jury whether or not the plaintiff should have her (very inexpensive) medical expenses and lost work time paid for by the defendant.

It's interesting to come out of my comfortable cocoon to see what the real world feels like. It's not nearly as glamorous out there as I wish it was... I can't believe the jury worked for nearly five hours with nary an offer of a cappuccino or some fresh croissant. Call me spoiled but when the attorneys are getting paid, as are the judge and his staff, I think it's a bit much to ask taxpaying citizens to drop everything, rush to the courts and decide the futures of our fellow persons in exchange for nothing more than $10 from the state of Texas. Really? Would it take much effort for them to at least buy a nice coffee making apparatus for the jury? I don't think so...

But, as some bitchy reader out in the webspace instructed me to stop talking about anything not directly related to photography I guess we won't go into any more detail about the care and feeding of the people ensnared in the production and delivery of justice.  To the reader who "suggested" that I get back to writing just about photography I say, "Have A Nice Day."  

Housekeeping. See below for our standard policy on you directing my writing. It comes from the footer of the comments section:

Comments. If you disagree do so civilly. Be nice or see your comments fly into the void. Anonymous posters are not given special privileges or dispensation. If technology alone requires you to be anonymous your comments will likely pass through moderation if you "sign" them. A new note: Don't tell me how to write or how to blog!

Now, on to the topic of the day; that cute little APS-C camera from Fuji; the XE-3. 

Last fall I made the "mistake" of buying a Fuji XT-3. I say mistake because I liked the files I got from that camera and wanted to bring it along and incorporate it into a project that was already in progress. But I have a and hard and fast rule about not going on assignment without a back up camera that will take the same lenses. Even better, the same accessories and batteries. 

I trudged back to the camera store to spend more money that I really didn't want to spend and opted for what I thought would be only a dire emergency back-up camera, the XE-3. It had a very similar menu, the same battery and everything else that would make it a functional reserve camera so all the boxes were checked and it rode up mountain roads and into rough weather with us, unused until the end of the year. During the holidays I was looking for a camera that was small and light and unobtrusive enough to take everywhere and I rediscovered this one in the side pocket of one of the camera bags.

So, what is it? The XE-3 is a small, light, rangefinder-styled APS-C camera that trades a bit of functionality for a diminutive overall package. The camera uses the same 24 megapixel sensor you'll find in Fuji's XT-2 or the X-Pro-2. From what I can get in my research it also has the same imaging hardware as the bigger cameras in the Fuji family. You still get the exterior dials for shutter speeds and exposure compensation and you still get to control aperture via the ring around the front of the lens. You just get to do this with a camera that has a fixed rear LCD (the anti-blogger-cam) and a usable but fairly pedestrian EVF. That's pretty much it. 

If you are truly a minimalist and looking for the highest imaging performance in the smallest and simplest package (and one that's not too menu driven) then this camera, or one like it should be on your list of camera to evaluate. While it's a bit small for a heavy duty user camera (and I say this only because a camera this small is harder to hold at times) it absolutely disappears at the end of the camera strap; in a good way. 

There are a few indications that this is not meant to be your "flagship" camera, such as the top manually settable shutter speed is 1/4000th of a second, and the top flash sync speed of 1/180th of a second. The EVF is also a bit small and allows too much ambient light to interfere with comfortable viewing on bright days. The flip side is that, when used with the best Fuji lenses, the image quality is just as good as all the current higher end cameras. Well, maybe the XT3 is a bit better but if it is it's not by much. 

I started taking this camera out for walks in late December and have paired it with a number of different lenses. My favorite Fuji lens on this one is the Fuji XF 23mm f2.0. It gives me all the automation  needed and matches the camera for size and low weight. But the most fun for me is pairing the camera with the new generation of inexpensive but ridiculously fast-apertured, manual focus lenses that mostly come to us from China and Korea.

In the image above the camera is sporting the 7Artisans 35mm f1.2 lens and it makes for a nimble package. Since there is no in body image stabilization in the camera (or lens) there's no reason to set things like a focal length in the menu. I turn on the focus peaking and, when I really care if something is OCD sharp I use the back dial up near the top right of the camera to punch in to maximum magnification. In that mode it's pretty obvious when you get focusing just right. 

Another favorite is the 7Artisans 55mm f1.4. It's actually a good performer once we leave the maximum aperture and venture into the more useful ranges. But please note, while I have weird and cheap 25mm, 35mm, 50mm (Kamlan) and 55mm lenses that remind me of my misspent youth with Leica rangefinder lenses I am rational enough to have the Fuji XF AF 23mm, 35mm, 50mm and longer auto focus, auto everything lenses for those times when it's time to stop experimenting, and playing around, and I have to actually deliver results of which I know clients will approve. 

It's nice for all of us artistes to pooh-pooh sharpness with a Cartier-Bressonian dismissal when we notice that the corners of the images we're taking with the cheap, junk lenses aren't as sharp as we thought they'd be but when the petite bourgeoise are actually the ones writing the checks then corner sharpness may become much more valuable than manifesto.

The camera is small and light. Purists will hate that the SD card lives in with the battery. Fuji users will love that they camera's battery is the same as the battery in most of the rest of Fuji's serious cameras. Impatient users like myself will grouse about the start movie function being rudely hidden in the drive menu. Fuji lovers will continue to love the color and tonality of the files. 

If you want to join the ranks of indecisive camera owners with your own Leica M4 substitute you can pick up a new body at one of the usual camera stores for around $700. If previous gens are any indication then this is a body style that depreciates like all hell so if you're a cheap bastard just wait until the XE5 comes out and go to town in the used market. No predictions on how long you'll have to wait for that one. 

One more vital point: the camera fits with much room to spare in the center console of my new Forester automobile. And.....Subaru and Fujifilm are both owned by the same corporate conglomerate. Isn't that weird coincidence? 

So, how are those Fuji XH1's working out for event photography? Eh?

I was sitting here waiting for big raw files to become manageable Jpeg files (There's 987 of them) and it dawned on me that instead of staring blankly at my screen or watching the rantings of one of my favorite YouTube photo-celebrities I could just crank up the steam powered keyboard and tell you about my event photography experiences while they are fresh in my mind. I did the shoot last evening and just finished processing the files after my noon swim...

The project was pretty low key; I was hired by an Episcopalian Seminary to come over to their place to make photographs of: a lecture, a series of "goodbye, happy retirement" speeches for one of their retiring bishops, and then to photograph the usual group shots and earnest interaction shots between attendees and honoree's that are the bulk of most event that are nice enough to have a "wines, champagnes and heavy hors de oeuvres+dessert" sort of reception. 

At the last minute the client e-mailed to ask if I could also make three exterior, outdoor portraits before the event began and, since I practiced doing that all last quarter, I was happy to oblige. 

I brought two cameras and four lenses. I intended to use three of the four lenses and bring the fourth as a general back up. Both cameras were Fuji XH1s with battery grips attached. The lenses were: the 18-55mm f2.8-4.0, the 55-200mm f3.5-4.8, the (OMG delicious) 90mm f2.0, and, along for the ride, the 35mm f2.0. I also brought a Godox flash that's dedicated to Fuji cameras. 

I brought along a big light stand, a soft box and a second, manual Godox speed light with one of those insanely good dedicated lithium ion batteries. This gear was specifically for the three pre-event portraits. It all went back to the car before I ventured over to the auditorium and reception hall. 

I won't bore you with all the details about the outdoor portrait sessions except to say that I've gotten proficient at this kind of work and can do it quickly and painlessly. Painless for both the subject and for me.  The lens I used for this was the 90mm f2.0, used at f2.8+2/3 stops. I handheld the camera at 1/125th of a second and worked at ISO 200. It was dusk and I was trying to get everything balanced and working correctly with the goal of: Sharp Portrait. Soft background. It worked well. 

After the portraits I broke down the soft box and the portrait specific gear and put it back into the new car. I didn't want to carry around a second flash and I didn't want to keep track of extraneous gear while I was creating high art at the event...

I'm using a Fuji Adaption of Back Button Focusing when using telephoto lenses to photograph speakers at podiums in auditoriums, convention ballrooms, etc. Here's how it works: there is an "AF-on" button on the back of the camera. If you use the camera control on the front to switch from S-AF or C-AF to manual the lens won't focus when you push the shutter button halfway down. But if the camera is set to manual focus and you hit the AF-on button the camera and lens will autofocus on your chosen subject. Now, if you don't change camera-to-subject distance you can keep shooting happily until such a time that this is no longer the case. Push button---get green square---release button---shoot. I guess that's pretty much how everyone's back focus button works, right?

The first order of business when shooting the speaker shots was to assess the main color temperature in the auditorium (theater style seating). The speaker's podium sat in a nice wash of all tungsten balanced light. Easy-peasy, the cameras get set to tungsten; or, the little lightbulb icon. Works pretty well. 

Second priority is to figure out the exposure on the speaker, and that probably won't change much either. I had the facility's lighting guy show me the light cue they'd be using for the speakers and used the palm of my hand (plus 2/3rds of a stop) to get a faux incident light meter reading and then found a good compromise between shutter speed (1/160th), aperture (almost always f4.8 on the longer zoom) and ISO (usually 1600-2000).  

The final pre-production priority is to find a restroom and pee 15 minutes out from show time. Hate to forget this because cameras don't get any more stable if you are hopping from one foot to another...

The way the room was set up (and the way the audience distributed themselves) There were three good angles in the room from which to get good speaker shots. One was a high shot from the top of the room at the opposite corner from the podium. This allowed me (when zoomed in tight) to get a nice shot of the speaker head-on and, with a little less cropping in camera, to get a nice shot of the speaker with the facility's logo showing on the front of the podium. I would get lots of speaker shots from this angle for each of the five (six?) speakers. I practiced my handholding techniques with this camera and lens and can generally get down to 1/30th or (worst case scenario) 1/60th using the 55-200mm lens on the XH1. Since subject movement becomes problematic at shutters speeds under 1/125th I didn't press my luck. 

So far the Fuji XH1 has the screen that gives me the closest approximation of what I'll see on my monitor back in the studio. This takes a lot of the apprehension out of the mix. You pretty much know that if you see something looking good on your camera's rear screen or EVF chances are pretty good that you'll be well inside the bounds of what you expected to end up with. 

The second shot was from a position down near the front of the auditorium but on the opposite side of the room from the podium/speaker. The third shot was on the side aisle on the speaker/podium side of the room; as close to the speaker as I felt I could get without calling too much attention to myself.

The camera helps to make me less obvious. Even just using the mechanical shutter the camera is quieter than just about any camera ever made. You'd have to be sitting right next to me to hear it. If you do find yourself right in the middle of the audience the silent, electronic shutter mode is absolutely silent. 

When the program starts that's when the fun (and challenges) start. You'll want images that show people making good eye contact with the crowd; not looking down at their notes. You'll want to show the subject's lips parted so that in each image it seems as though he is speaking. Extra points if you also get good hand gestures to go along with the look of speech. 

Before the audience gets into the room you should do a quick sweep for clutter than might work its way into the frames if not dealt with ahead of time. I moved some cardboard boxes and a couple of mic stands out of the room in advance. Light switches? We'll have to get those in post production. 

I worked the speeches with two cameras. One camera functions as described above but I think of the second camera as a photographic b-roll camera. I used the wide-to-not so wide zoom on the second body and got crowd shots, reaction shots, room shots with that rig. In this case there was some fiddling that needed to be done re: exposure. The EVF made that pretty easy. 

The 55-200mm f3.5-4.8 did a really good job nailing the needed images and also stabilizing everything well. I shot the lens mostly at wide open apertures. It's plenty sharp there all the way out to the longest focal length.

The most stable shots came when I sat on the side steps to the auditorium and pressed my back against the side wall. I think I could have disabled the I.S. and still had good shots. 

My overall strategy was to provide coverage of each speaker from three different angles, and, if I had time, to make images that were tight, a bit looser and also wide (think: head and shoulders, full length with podium an wide enough to show some audience in the foreground) from each angle. The client suggested before the event began that he would like to have shots in a vertical orientation as well as horizontals. The organization puts out a magazine (printed!!!) and he wanted to make sure we'd have images shot to fit on a vertical magazine cover. I over shot this part of the assignment but I'd rather overshoot by hundreds of frames than to walk away from a venue with one shot too few...

The last part of the job was to photograph the post speeches reception. The caterers did a great job with both decor and the food and one of the first things I did when we moved from auditorium to lobby was to shoot the food set up and the table decor.

With everyone moving around in a mostly dark meeting room accented with blue and magenta lights it was pretty much a foregone conclusion that I would need to use flash to clean up the light on faces. I used a Good/Fuji dedicated flash in the hot shoe of the camera and covered the front of the flash with an orange filter which converts the daylight output of the flash to a tungsten color temperature. This allows the light from the flash to mix almost seamlessly with the ambient light in the space, which was predominantly also tungsten. You just need to set your white balance to tungsten as well and then you are set to go. I love spaces with white ceilings and I took advantage of the ceiling by bouncing the flash off it. This gave me a soft overall wash of light. I also used a tiny bit of white card (maybe and inch and a half square) rubber banded to the rear of the flash head opening so it worked as a forward bounce card to get enough front fill to make everything look a bit more natural. 

If you have a white ceiling and a camera that's good with high ISO noise reduction I recommend ramping up your ISO to something like 3200 and you'll get a better mix of ambient and flash while reducing the amount of power your flash kicks out each time. That means a lot longer battery life and quicker recycling. 

Parts of the room were lit better than others and I started to have difficulties getting the camera to lock focus on people when I wanted it to. I did something I rarely have done before and enabled the AF illuminator to assist me. That worked in many lighting situations but was not foolproof. I finally defaulted to using manual focus and it worked much better than I thought it might. When I grabbed the focusing ring on the 18-55mm lens the camera was set to automatically zoom in an allow for magnified focusing image combined with focus peaking. That's going to be my preferred method in the future for this kind of work.... I've never had good luck with autofocus or automated flash under these conditions but that a blog post for another day.

The XH1 was a great performer. The longer zoom was perfect for capturing speakers in front of an audience while the 18-55mm is pretty much a perfect party lens. 

I enjoy this kind of work. I get to play with my cameras, hear interesting lectures, eat fun food and occasionally have a glass of good Champagne. Working with two matching cameras is heavenly as they are so easy to go back and forth with. No confusion about settings or controls. And, bonus! I think I've pretty much memorized the menus.