Monday 27 August 2012

X100 Fujifilm: A review




 My boyfriend bought me the X100 Fujifilm for my Birthday. I was sooo excited, it was a better camera than I ever thought I'd have. If you're thinking of getting an X100, here is my review to help potential buyers, written from a layman's point of view. I use my camera for blog photographing, so I won't be looking at it from a professional perspective. I will do another review when I have more understanding of the camera and what it can do, but I thought it might be interesting to have a review from a beginner in order to assess what is realistic for another a beginner to achieve with this camera.

Look


x100 retro camera
There's no doubt about it, it is absolutely gorgeous. I love the retro look so much. It is user friendly and the screen for viewing photos is a brilliant size. You can customise the camera with cases, and soft close buttons, all which add to its appeal. The camera is quite heavy, so not one to pop into a handbag or pocket and forget it is there. It feels sturdy and well made.

Auto settings

If you're not already an avid photographer, you're going to want to use the auto settings until you've figured out what it is you're doing. There are a lot of settings including exposure time, focus and different manual settings. It's hard to get these right, particularly if you want to take one photo after another in different lighting so the auto settings help with this. You can actually feel the lens moving whilst you're holding the camera as it adjusts to different lighting conditions.


No zoom

As the camera is a fixed lens, this camera does not have a zoom. At first I worried that would really affect taking photographs, and I can't say I haven't noticed, but the picture quality makes up for this. I quite like the challenge of having to move to create a good photo. It does make it difficult to take sneaky shots of people, I would like to have been able to zoom in on a person sitting on a bench, or a child playing without having to run up and take a photo, I'm not sure their parents would like that.  These issues could be overcome by taking a wide shot and using a photo editor tool. I am yet to find one that I really like, but the camera comes with software which is useable.


photograph bike
Manual focus

I love using the manual focus to change the point of focus in a photo. The best photos I have taken have been focused on an object and the background becoming slightly blurry. They really do come out beautifully. This camera really comes into it's own when you start taking control of focus, but it also takes longer and requires more knowledge of photography. However, if I can do it, so can anyone. 

x100 fujifilm review

Colour

I have noticed this camera really shows well the array of colours being captured. In some ways they look even better than in real life. There are settings to adjust the way the camera captures colour which a more experience photographer would expect, but I have found the photographs are very vivid. This really does show the difference from cheaper cameras I have where colours have been washed out or grainy.


Night time

So far the most difficult photos I have found to get good quality snaps is when there is poor lighting. This doesn't mean it isn't achievable, but as a beginner I have found it hard to work out how. I have adjusted exposure speeds and shutter speed, but without a tripod it is very difficult to take nice photos in poor lighting. This may be the case with all cameras, it certainly is with all the ones I have worked with. I imagine some more training on this will help me and will be something I will ask my friends with more photography experience about.

Some X100 photos

I'll leave you with some photos I have taken using the X100. Remember, I am a beginner to photography, so you should take that into account when deciding if this is the camera for you. I think the photos are lovely  but I will be taking a short photography course at some point in order to get the most out of this camera.

fountain barcelona

la rambla market

orford suffolk

crabbing orford

crabbing orford

pheasant farm

orford harbour


tea and cake leicester

2 comments:

Maestro K said...

Some quality shots with the camera, any idea as to how much it may have cost?

Unknown said...

I don't know because it was a present. I asked the boyfriend and he said "too much."