Fujifilm X-Pro 1 16MP Digital Camera with APS-C X-Trans CMOS Sensor (Body Only)

Fujifilm X-Pro 1 16MP Digital Camera with APS-C X-Trans CMOS Sensor (Body Only)

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• 16.3MP APS-C \"X-Trans\" CMOS sensor
• 6 frames per second continuous shooting, not suggested for moving objects
• 49-area contrast detection AF system
• ISO 200-6400, expandable up to 25,600,1080 HD video
• 3.0 inch LCD with 1,230,000 dots, Hybrid optical/electronic viewfinder, Raw and Raw + JPEG shooting .Flash hotshoe, SD/SDHC/SDXC card slot

Buy Now : Fujifilm X-Pro 1 16MP Digital Camera with APS-C X-Trans CMOS Sensor (Body Only)

Brand : Fujifilm
Category : Electronics,Camera & Photo,Digital Cameras,Mirrorless Cameras
Rating : 4.2
Review Count : 126

Fujifilm X-Pro 1 16MP Digital Camera with APS-C X-Trans CMOS Sensor (Body Only)

• To start off, I would like to say that I sold a Panasonic GH2 + 14mm f/2.5 and a Nikon 55-200mm DX lens before purchasing the X-Pro1 + 35mm. I kept the Nikon 50mm f/1.4 that I was using on the GH2 because it\'s a great lens and used on the X-Pro1, gives me 75mm equivalent, close enough to 85mm full frame macro for my use. While I loved the GH2 (especially for its video), I decided to sell it for the X-Pro1 because I want to focus primarily on stills now. In short, during the 1 month that I\'ve had the camera, I think the camera is amazing. It shoots AMAZING pictures. Seriously, I\'m repeatedly amazed at how sharp and vivid the pictures are (when you grab the right focus, hehe) and how little post-processing I need to do. To make sure this review stays objective and that I don\'t get flack for being a fanboy, I\'d like to address the drawbacks to this camera first:-Slow autofocus & lens chatter (though the chatter has primarily been fixed by the new firmware)-Unless you\'re using zone focusing (which I\'ve now grown accustomed to using), it\'s hard to get shots in focus in time for proper street photography-The throw for the focus ring is too long. It takes wayy too many turns to change the focus from zero to infinity!-Autofocus is limited to only one location on the screen, instead of automatically adjusting to where the camera believes it should be focused (e.g. a face). In AF-S or AF-C mode, you can manually change where you want the focus point/area to be, but that takes too long for real-life shooting unless you are shooting landscapes/very still objects.So I\'m sure you\'re wondering why I like the camera so much despite the above limitations! It really boils down to one concept: while the above limitations are frustrating, IT\'S POSSIBLE TO COMPENSATE FOR THEM if you know what you are doing. Here are my own personal methods of working around each of the above bullet points:-I lied. You can\'t really increase the autofocus speed without changes in firmware, etc. But one workaround is to shoot in higher f-stops (primarily f/5.6 or f/8+) so even if you miss the precise focus point you were looking for, that area will still be *mostly* in focus. If you really like shooting as wide as possible, then I recommend one of three things: 1) Don\'t half-press the shutter button. Imagine that the camera is a point-and-shoot and just fire the shutter button without waiting for the focus confirmation from the half-press. It gives you just a bit more speed to get that split second you need to get the shot off before the scene changes. 2) Use the drive mode! This camera can shoot 6 fps. Use it to your advantage! If you\'re worried or frustrated that you\'re not getting the right shot because it\'s taking too long for you get the right exposure, then just fire off 6 frames per second with the exposure bracketing! If you have the right exposure already and are just worried about focus, then just fire the camera and you\'re bound to get at least one great picture out of 12 or so duds. 3) Even if that doesn\'t work for you, then start figuring out how far away your subjects are. This is actually what I do most of the time, which sounds REALLY HARD (and believe me, it was REALLY HARD when I first started doing this), but with a lot of practice, you eventually can get good approximations of how far away something is, and as long as you\'re not using too wide of an aperture (I only use f/1.4 on rare occasions, and prefer the look of f/2 or f/2.8), you can just manually adjust the focus really quickly to a designated distance, quickly press the DOF preview button (I manually programmed it to the Fn button on the top) to confirm focus, and then fire the shutter. It sounds like a lot of work, but this is actually one of the reasons I like the camera - IT FORCES ME TO GET BETTER. I\'ve never had to think more about my exposure and how I\'m going to shoot it properly than with this camera. It makes me understand more and try more advanced techniques, which in the end makes me a better photographer. Too many cameras these days do too much of the work for you (which I understand appeals to most of the general population), but I like the fact that this camera makes me work for my shot; it makes it that much more satisfying when I\'m looking in the LCD after firing the shutter and I see a perfect shot.-As for the note about street photography, it is indeed tough with the Fuji lens because the throw of the focus ring is so long. It takes too long to adjust your focus for a person walking in front of you. My suggestions: 1) Get an M adapter and an M lens. The manual focusing on those lenses is much superior and you even have dials that calculate your hyperfocal distance ranges for a given aperture, which is HUGE for street photography. That being said, I don\'t have the money for M lenses, so I resort to 2) Zone Focusing. I had to brush up on this technique (and even estimate the circle of confusion for the Fuji 35mm) but once I estimated the hyperfocal distance to be around 3.8 meters away, I just set my aperture to f/8-16 based on available sunlight and started firing away. It\'s great because it\'s so much easier to shoot from the hip with this method. People in the city (I live in Chicago) still fear a camera being pointed at them, so being able to do it discreetly without you having to look at them through the viewfinder is great. All you do is look at the LCD to confirm your shot and fire away!-There are two workarounds to the focus ring throw problem and they\'ve both been mentioned already. You can: 1) start estimating distances of your subjects to pre-focus your shot or 2) buy M-mount lenses. I guess you could buy old Canon FD and Nikon F lenses with mechanical focus rings too..-Having the autofocus point fixed to one place at all times is a bit annoying, but there\'s a simple way to get around this. What I do is fix the autofocus to the middle of the frame at all times, put the camera in AF-C mode (it\'s a bit faster than AF-S, I\'ve found), half-press the shutter with your subject in the middle of your frame, recompose the image by moving the camera around until your subject is in your desired location in the frame, and then fire the shutter. It won\'t be 100% accurate (especially with objects very close to you) because the DOF (the area in front of you that\'s in focus) changes slightly when you move the camera around, but it\'s about 95-98% accurate, which is more than good enough for my purposes.Now with those suggested workarounds in place, now I\'d like to tell everybody the MAJOR reasons why I love this camera and why it makes my life way easier! Here are the key ones:-The handling. I had a GH2 and it was actually too small for me. I don\'t have large hands (about 7.5 or 8 inches from bottom of palm to the end of my middle finger), but when I was using the GH2, I found that I was getting a lot of camera shake because the camera was too small to fit snugly in my right hand and was too light for me to keep it sturdy out in a windy day or cold day. I mention a cold day because shivering kills a shot when the camera is too light to keep sturdy. I feel the X-Pro1 is a perfect size. Many professional photographers actually prefer larger bodies because they are typically sturdier, more durable, and more ergonomic, and while I don\'t consider myself in that group (I\'m not a professional and I have small hands so I still prefer smaller cameras), I feel the X-Pro1 is almost the perfect size. It\'s not too large for you to have trouble hitting the important buttons while composing in the viewfinder, and it\'s not too small for you to have camera shake problems. Moreover, the weight of the camera is phenomenal - I can carry it around for an entire day with no arm/shoulder soreness at all! IT IS too large for you to put in most jacket pockets and will never fit in one of my jeans pockets unless I start wearing huge baggy jeans, but it\'s more than small enough for me to fit 3-4 prime lenses with it in my Crumpler 5 Million Dollar camera bag (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001TIQW4K/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i01).-The hybrid viewfinder. This thing is wicked versatile and useful as h*ll. When you\'re shooting low-light, use the optical viewfinder so you can actually see in front of you! When you\'re shooting a landscape and you want to confirm your frame lines, use the electronic one! Then, when you\'re using the optical viewfinder to wait for a dog, a car, or a raging alcoholic to come into your frame, quickly flip to the electronic viewfinder (with the DOF preview button or the flip switch on the front of the camera) to confirm focus!-The image quality. Holy mother of God. This thing spits out incredible pictures. I\'ve never had so much fun with a camera because THE IMAGES ARE SO FRICKIN GOOD. Even when something looks bad or bland on the LCD, it can look amazing on a 27\" monitor or a large print. Simply put, I\'ve never had to do so little post-processing in my life.-The High-ISO capabilities. Just put this thing on Auto ISO 3200, and start shooting. If it allowed you to go as high as Auto ISO 6400, I\'d use that instead. ISO 6400 has the right amount of grain to make the picture look like slightly like film, so even that\'s usable. But don\'t ever go above 6400, you\'ll regret it. Either way, having nearly noise-free images at ISO 3200 is a technological marvel (and no full-frame w/ 16MP jammed inside, mind you!) that you wouldn\'t have gotten 4 years ago unless you were shelling over $3000 for a D700 (which is full frame AND only has 12MP, so the sensor dots/pixels are larger and produce less noise!)-This is usually overlooked, but I\'d like to mention how good Fuji\'s in-camera white balance and JPEG processing is. THIS SAVES SO MUCH TIME. The auto-white balance on the X-Pro1 is pretty much spot on in all but the most extreme conditions, so I pretty much NEVER adjust the white balance/temperature of the photo in Lightroom/Photoshop! Moreover, they coupled it with an amazing in-camera JPEG processor (as good as Olympus\', IMO), so if you\'re shooting JPEGs you can just avoid post-processing all-together! So many people talk about how they shoot RAW, how RAW is better, how a real photographer knows how to post-process, but screw them! Why not just get the picture right the first time and then go straight to printing/publishing??? This is a hugely underrated aspect of this camera, and it\'s perhaps the greatest thing about the camera because IT ALLOWS YOU TO JUST TAKE PICTURES ALL THE TIME. Never has photography been so simple for me. I never worry about getting the tones of the colors right anymore and I never worry about spending too much time in post-processing anymore. The last album I published to Flickr had 17 photos in it. The pictures were taken from a BBQ I had hosted where I took 19 shots total. All 17 photos published to my Flickr were OUT OF CAMERA JPEGS. I did absolutely no post-processing. I thought about cropping one photo, but eventually decided against it. The two photos I left out of the album were because the subjects in those photos didn\'t look too attractive (I was publishing to Facebook too, and you know how women are when you post unattractive pictures of them online..) as I was shooting candidly and just caught them in an unattractive pose.-The manual controls. (FYI I shoot about 50% aperture priority, 40% manual, and 10% shutter priority) Do you know how refreshing it is to have a mechanical, and not electronic, shutter dial on my camera again? Do you know how refreshing it is to have an aperture dial again on my lens? Do you know how great it is for that aperture dial to have 1/3 stop increments? Do you know how refreshing it is to have a manual exposure comp dial again instead of having to dig for it through menus? Well, imagine having all of that back in one camera. Yes, it\'s the Olympus OM-D EM-5...LOL jk. While the EM-5 certainly does have most of those features, it lacks in fast primes and image quality IMO. Plus it\'s MFT..you\'re not going to get that glorious bokeh you want on an EM-5 because you\'re limited by the sensor size. Full frame > APS-C > MFT, period (if you\'re talking about bokeh =D). Anyways, you get the picture here..the X-Pro1 has all of the aforementioned manual controls and they\'re bokehlicious.-The preset color modes/filters. The simulated Velvia mode is great for landscapes, and the Black & White Yellow filter is great for street photography. One more thing that slims post-processing time.As a final note, I\'d like to mention that this camera is not for beginners. You really need to know what you\'re doing and you really need to understand photographic concepts to be able to think around problems, because the camera is quirky. If you\'re a beginner, you\'re going to have a hard time working around the camera\'s limitations. That being said, a beginner can totally pick up some photography books like Bryan Peterson\'s Understanding Exposure and figure out all the kinks and idiosyncrasies of the X-Pro1 for his/her own benefit. But it will be challenging, IMO. If you\'re an intermediate/enthusiast, I think you\'ll enjoy the challenges the camera poses to you that will force you to become a better photographer. If you\'re an expert, well..you\'re an expert so you shouldn\'t have a problem with the camera.All in all, the final rating I\'m giving this camera represents one thing: how good the images are and how well it facilitates you taking good images. I believe camera reviews should focus on that instead of high-ISO pixel peeping tests and megapizel/DXOmark sensor comparisons. All I care about is the end result and how easy it was to get that end result. While the camera has its nuances and limitations, I have to give it 5 stars because, like I mentioned before, the image quality is just PHENOMENAL, and the in-camera auto-white balance, color modes/filters, and JPEG processing just makes it SO EASY to take pictures and go straight to publishing. Other cameras may shoot more frames per second, may have a faster buffer, may have more megapixels, and may have faster autofocus ALONG WITH image stabilization and weather sealing. But NO OTHER CAMERA (outside of a Leica) makes photography so fun again and optimizes your time outside in the field actually SHOOTING (rather than in front of a computer screen).Yes, the focusing is a bit slow. Yes, the camera is expensive. Yes, I wish there were wide angle lenses available for this camera. But damn did Fujifilm make a darn good camera this time around.(P.S. credit the bespoke X-Trans CMOS sensor)Edit: One more note. Buy an extra battery or two (you can find them for super cheap on eBay) for this camera and don\'t look back. It\'ll let you get through an entire day of shooting. You won\'t regret it.
• WHY WHAT WHOI chose to write this review because the reviews on Amazon are so polarizing and sometimes downright pushy, so much so that they made me buy this camera to judge it for myself. I have to admit that it has been a long time since I had to defend my spending to myself. I am sure many must have faced the same internal struggle. Let me admit that this camera is a keeper for me. The decision came after a long search for a discrete both in use and appearance camera with a image quality worth taking prints and blowups of. I didn\'t personally own too many of micro four thirds, DSLRS and compacts but have friends who shared fair and clear opinion about the equipment they own(ed).What this camera is? It\'s a collection of wishes in a very ambitious package and just like any other ambitious technology firsts, suffers from lack of polished user interface as well as competition. Some might find it downright offensive but X-Pro1 does not really have a competitor and for those who own M8 and M9s you know that you are eventually going to hit that buy button on your shopping cart sooner or later. You may say what about NEX7 and O-MD? I must say, to me NEX7 seems like a very light and compact laptop running Microsoft XL to take pictures, that is to say extremely flexible, configurable and fast but requires you to dedicate your brain, hands, fingers and eyes behind a thick software interface. Hardly photography for me since it would be so hard to make mistakes both unintentional and deliberate. I haven\'t touched O-MD so can\'t say much about it. And then there is the IQ, yeh well.. Fuji Xs can make any photography lover\'s eye go all watery but X-Ppro1 IQ can really grab on and hold on to a photographer\'s soul, especially when you get it going past its many issues. Although to be fair all issues are under MY limits of acceptable.Who is this for? I understand why the reviews are so heavily opinionated since people have different photographic needs and have certain expectations from a camera especially an expensive one like this. If you:Do landscape photography: You\'d love it.Do portraits: You\'d love it.Do street photography: You\'d love it.Do kids photography: You\'d hate it.Do sports photography: No way, this camera is not so sporty. You\'d hate it.Do low light action photography: You\'d hate it.Do want your camera to do photography for you: You\'d hate it.Want to show off your new toy to friends: You\'d hate it. It would be hard to justify the cost to them in the 10 mins they hold the camera and the red dot owners would think that you don\'t know squat about photography.So why would you go the distance to buy this camera? Just look at the images in flickr. Also it\'s truly an enjoyable experience to shoot with this camera. Here are my reason why I choose to keep this camera:THE VIEWFINDERThe OVF is not complete by itself, it\'s the combination of OVF and EVF on a flick of a switch that makes this camera probably the best tool to compose great images. The bright lines and a little extra of the world that you see around them makes you think in terms of a `photograph\' you are going to take not a `scene\' you are going to capture. If you think that\'s a subtle difference, just try making a frame with your hand in front of your face and see it for yourself how a frame helps you compose when you can also see around it. One suggestion is to enable the parallax adjust focus frames, so that you can avoid about 10 mins of frustration when you think that the camera can\'t focus correctly. The frame lines are a bit tighter than the actual image that comes out but hopefully a fix to it is just a firmware update away. I have a 35 f1.4 and if I need to get a DOF preview, instead of enabling the function button to do that, I find it easier to switch to EVF and half press the shutter button. Needless to say my camera stays with OVF most of the time. One truly amazing thing is that OVF lets you compose your multiple exposure images, which may as well be a gimmick but is never the less very awesome to experience. The manual override to the magnifier is also sometimes useful like when I am taking images for a panoramic image. Yes I don\'t like the in camera panoramic composition, I would rather use a desktop software do it.AUTO FOCUSI think since it is almost fashionable to say that the camera has a slow autofocus, it is possibly the reason, I am almost glad that it\'s not as bad as I thought it would be. In bright situation it\'s just as fast as your run of the mill SLR. It does hunt in the dark and so does MOST of the cameras. It needs high contrast objects to allow it to focus in dim light. Now I am almost encroaching on the domain of Captain Obvious. One thing that I have already mentioned that you need to enable the parallax adjusted focus frames to correctly relate to what the camera is focusing at. I don\'t understand why Fuji didn\'t choose to enable it by default. Some people suggested that you use the continuous autofocus to work around the so called slow autofocus but I found it rather annoying but it\'s just my opinion and I DON\'t think AF is terribly slow on this camera or even slow enough to be even considered a limitation of the camera system although I wouldn\'t mind a firmware fix which can make it faster. Then there is accuracy. I have to admit that I don\'t spend a lot on modern cameras and I still love my MF Film SLRs but the 35mm 1.4 with AF can cause serious burn in issues on my plasma TV if I ever chose to render the images 1:1 on it. No, but really you get, very very accurate focusing and extraordinarily sharp images.SENSOR AND IQDoes it gets rid of moire without an AA filter?, my test says not completely but you won\'t see it on 99% of your images. Are the images sharp? Please check out full size images on Flickr. The noise performance is stellar. Someone mentioned on one of the forums (need to look up the link) that due to the modified sensor design Fujifilm will have to do excessive color NR which would result green or red patches on dark low contrast portions of the image and I was able to find a few of those patches but, I am guessing that can as well be a limitation of the in camera JPEG engine and possibly can be fixed with firmware updates but overall the IQ is just down right fantastic. The patches are not very obvious unless you know what you are looking for.The film simulation modes are really what they say they are. Velvia just takes you back to those Fujifilm colors without the noise of course. As for me I don\'t think I am going to miss the lack of RAW support in Lightroom but on the other hand would LOVE to have it.LOOK AND FEELThe camera looks stunning, even better in real than it ever looked to me in all the images on the internet. People say its not as heavy as the money they have paid for it but I really don\'t intend to use it for self defence like I would if I had Leica M9 in my hand (and I would need its self defence capabilities if I had M9 in my hand). On the less humorous side, I feel the weight is perfect, does not tire me out and I feel that strap is redundant since I can carry it in my hand the whole day. Just get one of those beautiful Gordy\'s straps and you are good to go.I live near NYC on the waterfront in a little infamous place called Jersey City and the boardwalk is very touristy and I often exchange looks of people looking at what camera equipment you are carrying. I noticed that people don\'t even look at my X-Pro1, which is awesome. I am sure the number of camera buffs / intersection is much higher in NYC and I might get caught but I am yet to test my theory.The real dials to adjust aperture and shutter speed is a blessing. The shutter speed dial is a bit stiff but does have an excellent feel to it. The aperture dial feels a little too easy to turn but then you realise that you can change it with a single finger without taking your eye off the viewfinder and you catch yourself saying `damn Fuji\'. Don\'t know if it is luck or its by design but it\'s perfect.7 configurable settings and one Q menu to control them all, brilliant user interface, thank you Fujifilm!The display is really good as long as you are not directly under the sun. Some say its the best in the industry but I wouldn\'t know.I have big hands so even though the camera is big and chunky, I think the grip might help.DEAR FUJIHere is a list of things that I would like the Fuji engineers or anyone who has some influence on them to consider when they start giving firmware updates:1. Get rid of power save mode - this mode only makes users unhappy, instead try to reduce the cost of the spare battery.2. Make the fly by wire manual focus logarithmic, so that I can get to the focusing distance quickly and do the finer adjustments with slower turns of the focusing ring.3. Keep the focus detection algorithm running in manual focus mode and highlight the focus rectangles on the parts of the frame as they get in focus. Kind of like focus peaking in NEX7 but on the OVF as well. My old EOS 20D used to do it for about 30 seconds when you switch from automatic to manual focus. You may choose to run the algorithm only with the half press of shutter to save on battery life.4. Focus confirmation with the magnifier with the loupe only partially covering the frame like in many micro four thirds and point and shoots like S90/95/100 etc.5. When the camera is in completely manual mode, i.e. user set shutter speed, user set aperture, user set focus and user set ISO, DONT think, just take the picture.6. More accurate framing lines on the OVF.7. Histogram on the image preview in EVF.8. Faster autofocus.9. Ultrasonic motor on the future lenses.10. I would like to have more configurability of the buttons on the camera but i am not sure if that would make it another NEX clone.I know that is a big wish list BUT again the camera is still very good and to me its a keeper. More than anything this is the camera that inspires me to take pictures, play with different settings and be creative. At this point I am totally enjoying this camera and I hope things get better or at least stay the same with the future updates from Fujifilm.

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