FUJIFILM X-Pro1 On Trial

I was recently loaned a Fuji X-Pro1 with a 35mm f1.4 lens (equivalent to 50mm field of view) for a week to try out. I shot lots of photos of my baby girl and brought the camera out for a trial on two mornings.

The X-Pro1 is about the size of a Leica M as can be seen from the 2 photos below. It does not feel as solid as the Leica M but is heavy enough to not feel like a toy camera.

Leica M camera vs X-Pro 1

Leica M camera vs X-Pro 1

Like the earlier Fuji X100, I really enjoyed using the hybrid optical viewfinder and found the quality of the images from the camera (even at higher ISOs) excellent. I have done a couple of large prints (18×12″ and 11.5×7.7″) from the camera and am very pleased with the results. The autofocus of the X-Pro1 is not very fast as mentioned by the many reviews available. There definitely is a noticeable lag from when I depress the shutter button to the time the camera obtains a focus lock. That said, I found the autofocus to be very accurate in that it manages to lock onto the area I focus on even in extremely dark environments.

The following is a selection of photos from my walkabouts. For the X-Pro1, I did not use aperture or shutter priority. Shutter speeds of 1/125s to 1/500s and apertures of f1.4 to f4 were manually set while shooting, depending on what was being shot. ISO was set to Auto ISO 1600 or 3200; so the camera was still determining the correct exposure by adjusting the ISO on the fly. The RAW files were post processed according to my personal preferences in Lightroom 4.1 and Photoshop (B&W conversion, adding in some grain/noise to some photos and downsizing for the web). Most of the indoor photographs were shot wide open at ISO 1600 to 3200.

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I found the X-Pro1 quite fun for street photography. Like a Leica M, the optical viewfinder allowed me to look outside the image capture area to see and anticipate what was entering the frame. The autofocus seemed alright for subjects that were from 1.5 to 2 metres onwards but struggled a bit to lock focus with closer subjects (especially if the subject was not static). With a bit of anticipation, I found that even with the focus lag, there was enough time to focus, recompose, fully depress the shutter button and still capture the moment.

Test Printing with the X-Pro1

Test Printing with the X-Pro1