Well, my Fujifilm FinePix x100 arrived on Tuesday last week! Although I spent plenty of stolen moments just shooting things around my home and studio (bottles of water, the tree outside, the TV! – meaningful stuff) it was a busy week so I really didn’t have a chance to really put it to good use until Friday.
Ceasars in Las Vegas has always been one of my funnest properties to shoot here. So, that’s where I went to check out my new x100. I started shooting as soon as I parked in the garage, and kept on photographing everything until I got back in the car to leave.
Fun!
This is a fun camera to shoot with. Here are some things that I really enjoyed about using it….
Exterior Dials!
The aperture ring on the lens and the shutter speed dial on top of the camera are easy to control without even taking your eye away from the view finder. I’ve also left the function button on the top of the camera in the stock setting which allows you to pull up the iso settings.
I could just look through the view finder to compose my shot and make adjustments to the exposure settings without having to look at the back of the camera. Just kept my eye on the shot.
Silent Shooting!
This camera is virtually silent when you’re taking your shots. Especially when you mix in ambient and crowd noises. It’s hard to explain, but just kind of a cool feeling about that.
Very Non-Intrusive Presence
When you’re taking photographs in a casino/hotel/resort, if you’re carrying around a big DSLR with an impressive lens you can draw a lot of attention to yourself. Sometimes it can be fun, but often you are causing bystanders to be a little concerned that you’re taking photos with them in it, not to mention you’ll probably meet a curious security guard or two during your outings.
The x100 is small and has a very cool, but unassuming look. It’s been referred to as a baby Leica, or a Leica for the rest of us. I practically felt invisible as I moved through the property, taking shots of everything without raising a single eyebrow. Kind of a fun and cool feeling.
Back in the Shop
Okay, I was really excited and had a lot of fun shooting with the camera. The images looked clear and sharp on the LCD. However, when I got back to the studio and started going through the images in Aperture I wasn’t quite as excited at the first viewing.
The clarity, contrast and overall tones weren’t really what I was hoping to see. Now, it really isn’t fair to compare these images to what I was used to seeing from my 5D Mark II. So I think that’s a lot of what I was experiencing. Also, I’ll take responsibility for the images. Could easily be that I just need to get used to the difference of shooting with this camera.
Luckily, when I took another look through the images the next day I was happier with what I saw and felt a little better. Sometimes it just takes a day.
Overall
I’m looking forward to spending more time with the camera. I think the more I get used to it, the better results I’ll come up with.
It really is a joy to shoot with, but then again, as a good friend of mine, Garrett Winslow pointed out to me, “Every camera is fun to shoot with!” True.
Take a Look
Here are some of the shots I got that day. Most were shot around f2.0, but some go up as high as f16. A lot were shot at high ISO, from 1600 – 3200! But many were also shot at 200. Anyway, I was all over the place with exposure settings to really check things out.
Click on an image to view a larger, full version.
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Do You Have a Fuji X100? What’s Your Experience?
I’ll write more as I get more time with the camera, but for now I would love to hear from other x100 owners, or anyone who has something to say about this camera! Questions, comments experiences…
