milandro

never heard of the 14mm being not highly thought of, the 18mm yes, plenty of reservations about it... but if you feel that way I will be glad to dispose of this sub-par lens for you at no charge from my side

is the crispiness of the image due to the -22F ( -30C) temperature?

I am quite sure this lens is way underestimated simply because of its low cost. I have said this often, the relative small aperture is not a real problem in most situations with a mirroless and wouldn’t show in the evf at all (unlike what happens in camera with a mirror). The lens has great OIS and you can shoot in relatively low light without any particular problems or the aid of a mono or tripod.

In Victorian England ( or the equivalent of these times in any other country) much literature was actually written with references to the “ poor relations”, often making fun of those who had richer relatives which often were burdened with some form of support or other for these less than representatives members of their kin. Often times the “ poor relations” were themselves required to “ keep up the appearances” by their rich relations in order not to bring shame on the family as a whole. So they were, for example given old clothes by their rich family members, to be worn at family and public functions and often were asked to accompany their rich relations at their country house and perform some duties of servitude in return for the lodgings which they received. Apparently also the Fuji family of lenses has some relations and, although with some reluctance, some of the Fuji-users might have acquired some of those but won’t admit it in public. I am going to do the unthinkable and admit I own one of these poor relations,the humble, though honorable, XC 50-230mm f 4.5.-6.7. I don’t use the longer lenses of any camera system all that much but there are occasions in which the picture calls for a longer lens that the 60mm. At the time when I bought this lens Fuji didn’t offer much in that department ( and still doesn’t) other than the more expensive and marginally more luminous 55-200mm. Several people had bought this lens in a cheap kit together with the fuji X system other poor relation, the XC 16-50mm f3.5-5.6 and the entry level cameras X-A1 or X-M1 and decided to rid themselves of the longer lens of the two. I managed to acquire one new copy for €200 which is as cheap as inexpensive fried potatoes. 50mm f9 1/450

Apparently each era has a need for unresolvable questions , some of capital importance and some perhaps of a little more than a petty nature. Take Angels for example! For at least 1800 years, people have been debating all sorts of things about them, one of which was their gender which seemed to be a matter of some importance to many and which fueled many vehement discussion and was object of councils of learned men and women too. All of this must have seemed to be very enticing, at least to the participants of such a debate judging by the efforts which they placed into it. So, in this era of secularization of ours, it is pretty possible that such a learned but religious debate would gather less debaters around and that the deeply rooted need for a “ pilpul” of some sort could get fulfilled by a question such as: “ how many lines can a 10-24mm (or any other zoom lens of your choice) resolve at any interval of its zooming range and aperture correspondent to all the “ prime” lenses available? " I have no doubts of the merits of this analysis. However the way I have solved it is a mere practical one. Until now ( with the sensors being what they are and the lenses being optimized for those) Fuji zooms performance has always been rather good, equal or close to equal to the performance of fixed focal length lenses. If one needs more that one of the fixed focal length lenses contained within the range of any given zoom, you spend more money and carry more weight than the zoom itself ( and this is even true of the so called gigantic 10-24mm) by acquiring two or more lenses contained in the range. It might very well be the case that printing a photograph to the maximum of its achievable size I might notice an enhanced performance of a prime over the one of a zoom. But I don’t print all that many of my photographs, let alone print them so big! Should I ever need to do that, tough luck for me and any other zoom owner then! I suppose I will have to learn to live with the shame of such limitation. Or, alternatively, not care too much about this extreme and improbable limits and just do my own thing, which I plan to do for a long time.

Fortunately, I’ve never had too many problems with this predicament and both my wife & I, usually, aren’t too difficult about things like this and generally encourage each other to indulge and buy things that complement our hobbies. I generally also made a point of financing these purchases with money coming from selling things that are also part of my other hobbies. In fact my entering the Fuji X system was largely due to having sold the remainder of whatever analog photographic paraphernalia that I had left. I have often financed at least in the last 10 years the family holidays with money coming from selling my musical instruments. Of course there are people using sneaky ways. I remember the way an acquaintance and colleague of mine solved this “ problem”. He wanted to buy one of the first affordable digital cameras before we went on a business trip to the USA. So he decided to buy it “ for the family”. He justified the expense as gift to all, himself, wife and two kids. Once we went to the USA during a visit to the MOMA he bought a clock there and also declared it a “ family gift” but he got nothing to his kids and wife because he had already bought so many “ family gifts “ (for himself!? ). I’ve lost touch with him but few years after I’ve heard from someone that he had run away with a younger female colleague. That was definitely a gift to himself alone!

I have owned the 60mm for a long time already and I would buy it again especially now that there are lots of them sold by all the people who replaced them, perhaps unwittingly, with the 56mm for portraits use. Only one recommendation. If you buy the 60mm, get yourself a 39mm UV or other filter where you can take (or not) the filter away ( you need the filter in between if you use an adapter directly this will interfere with the autofocus), and then place an adapter ring 39-52mm on the filter, then buy a 52mm lens hood as the cylindrical ones sold for 35mm and put the original enormous lens hood away. The lens hood of the 60mm has to be the single most awkward piece of kit that I own. Once I replaced it using this lens has got that much easier and enjoyable! In my, perhaps not so humble opinion, I would never voluntarily choose to discard the autofocus capabilities of a macro-portrait lens, albeit with some peculiarities which probably will be even more improved by the latest software addition, to favor a lens that was not made specifically to fit a system unless there would be a very good proven ( by a one on one comparative test) reasons for it.

Unfortunately the 60mm gets not too much love, without too many good reasons if you ask me (especially if the new software will improve its performance). Even though I had ordered the 56mm, at the last moment I chose the 60mm over the 56mm because it costed a bit more than half than the 56mm ( and now less and there are lots of them offered secondhand) because I am a cheapskate ( who had just bought a X-T1 and a 10-24mm though! ) and because the close up performance was important to me...rather more than the “ bokeh” of the 56mm ( the spelling checker doesn’t recognize the word! ) would be. I don’t particularly agree that the 56mm would add any particular detrimental distortion, but I have made many portraits by using the 35mm too, so I am biased.. but as always to each his own. If one can live with the limitation of adapted lenses you can find just about any focal length that you would wish to want to use. If you are a “ bokeh” lover... ...you can use adapted lenses at the maximum aperture and do not bother about anything else ( well except for manual focussing )

Well, we don’t know for sure that no update will be released for the X-E2. But, I am sorry to say, but at some point or other they will have to start disappointing buyers of previous Fuji cameras. As far as I know both X-Pro 1 and X-E1 are both still available new in the shops and they too would “ deserve” some attention but when we all bought the cameras there was no contract with a stated obligation to update anything anytime and for how long was it there? I am happy things will be updated for my current camera but one day they won’t be even for my X-T1, and first there will be a new model to replace it and then it will be no longer any update. It is fatal and we all have to deal with it. What I don’t honestly understand is the fact that people who own older cameras seem to react negatively to the fact that new cameras receive more attention than theirs. The camera still works and does exactly what pleased you until yesterday. It will probably make good pictures for many years to come. I wrote it elsewhere here. I have had many Macintosh computers since 1988 with a Macintosh IIx ( if memory serves me right) which costed me and my business partner an arm and a leg and the 21” monitor was a kidney and few more peripherals ( I remember the magneto optical drives and the machine to print of 35mm film plus the first laser printer) were my left eye ( I am right eye dominant ) and few more other bits and bobs! It was discontinued two years later although we used it a while longer. At some point the OS of a computer all fail to be updated ( at that time you bought whatever few updates there were) and you can not even use them anymore as an open system ( but you can use it as a closed system). So I have an old Emac G4 in the attic. I rum playbacks for my saxophone playing on it and I can scan pics with an old but functional Agfa scanner which actually does a decent job until 8” x 10” transparencies too. The other day I tried to go on youtube (I can still just about use the internet on it) and you tube informed me that they no longer support an old but perfectly working computer ( actually is the browser the problem but I cannot install a newer browser, I think, which will work). Maybe you’ll get some form of update, but, sooner or later, maybe later, you will have to accept the fact that they won’t come anymore. Sorry.

I certainly understand that having issues with any type of equipment spoils the fun of using it, although I think that they would replace or repair things within the terms of the guarantee when they are faulty. I have to say I have had minor issues too in the Netherlands ( so it might even be a localized component to these issues) which were always resolved by the shops, if not in a timely way ( sending the camera to Fuji NL might as well be sending it to Fiji (!) because they repair in Germany and takes weeks and weeks to get it back!) at least in a satisfactory way. One thing I am really unhappy about is the fact that Fuji NL doesn’t have a repair service like Nikon or Canon ( I don’t know about Sony). But I suppose that no camera, camera maker, camera importer, camera repair, camera shop is perfect. Wherever there are humans at work there is the potential for things to go wrong. The other day I phoned my credit card company to be helped with validating my new card. First attempt the person on the phone makes me do the things I had done already and patronizes me from beginning to the end. Very disappointing, felt really bitter about being treated that way. Second phone call another lady answers the phone. She asked different questions, saw the problem on her computer and corrected it at her end FOR ME. Which is all I wanted! I couldn’t be happier. The essence of this is that problems do happen all the time. A client doesn’t need another problem, he already has one if something goes wrong! At the other end you don’t need problem makers,you need someone who can offer solutions. Best of luck with your quality issues.

Cheers, Xorcist, ! I too started loving wideangles since the buying of my first one ( it was a screw-mount Pentacon 29mm for my Zenit ). My mantras are : “ there are many ways to skin a cat & to each his own”. So I really respect everyone’s preference for things different than the ones I use. We are all different for complexions, creeds and needs. So its hardly likely that we should all like the same lenses.

the good thing about water resistance is that it is resisting dust too. I am not into the kind of photography which might require water resistance but having a “ sealed” lens has ots perks.

Thanks Kielinski ( why don’t we have a Thanks button? ) It is not Mr. Steve Albini but a portrait of a fellow teacher at the Fotoacademie Amsterdam ( now he is a film producer and a photographer in Spain) Mr. Dan Uneken . It was a polaroid 55 P/N that I’ve shot many years ago (1999?) at one of the many “ open days” which the school did to promote its activities. I taught studio photography then and I shot tons of 4" x 5 " polaroid back then.

there are many preferences which are personal but I find that, in practice, for X photographers, the max aperture makes very little sense ( in terms of ease to follow your subject or focussing) unless you need to use the lens at that aperture to achieve shallow depth of field ( which is unlikely to be a requirement shooting groups of people including children moving about in a room). The thing is that mirrorless are very different from reflex cameras in this respect. The image that you see in the EVF is an electronically created and enhanced one so it doesn’t matter ( within certain limits) whether the max aperture is very high or not. In a reflex camera you are focussing ( or the camera is ) the picture that you observe at the max aperture through the lens. So it matters if the lens is more or less light efficient because the picture will be darker or lighter depending on the max aperture. That is not what happens with an EVF. The EVF shows you a picture created electronically ( light amplified or reduced if needed) looking like it would be shot at the aperture and shutter sped that you select. It is not the physical image of the light going through the lens and reflected by a mirror. In other words the image on the EVF observed with a f1.4 lens and one with a f 4 will appear to be on the EVF pretty much the same! ( in light energy terms) under most normal light circumstances. What you might call “ distortion” ( we might disagree on that term but this is not the object of my comment now) is, in this case, a function of the distance where you are shooting. At such a close quarters and in most situations “ indoors” you will see “ distortion ” with a16mm As for understanding wide angle photography I suppose you could be reading this article which another member Marcelo_Valente recommended a couple of days ago. http://www.kenrockwell.com/tech/how-to-use-ultra-wide-lenses.htm

enjoy it! I hope the lens will please you as it has done and keeps on doing with me. One word of advise. Despite the fact that the original hood is very beautiful I have replaced it with a different type of lens hood, a Chinese made metal 52mm similar the one for the X100 series, the reason is the rubber cap of the original hood, forever falling on the floor . I have tried attaching it with an elastic cord but that bothered me too. So, in the end got myself a different hood. Some people complain about the autofocus noise. I actually don’t mind that. As for the AF quickness, I expect a even better performance when the firmware upgrade will come.

Not a bad idea really, perhaps the forum staff would oblige

they do a lot of such things with cameras and other photographic things they test, a bit like Top Gear, really ,with the difference that the people at DigitalRev TV are young so if they do juvenile things in their reviews they might be forgiven while the top gear triad are just overgrown juveniles.

Thanks, Aswald, compliments appreciated. I am old school because that’s the school where I went to ( literally)!

The X-10 has better software and will be updated in future while the X-E2 won’t be cared for as much. I would trade in the X-E2 as long as they are taking it, soon they will no longer be interested.

I am not so sure what the term “ indoor” would mean in terms of using a lens rather than the other since Indoor covers some pretty wide range of situation and you could actually use both lenses in order to achieve different results. If you want to use a lens simply to get more people on the frame within a normal room of an average house you could get a super wideangle such as the 16 to do the job but that would hardly be kind to the people on the pictures in all sorts of situations but it does matter if we are talking of a family of 5 or a group of 30. On the other hand you may want to place people in a context and then the 16 would definitely help you better. I would say that you really both and that, unless you NEED the ultra light efficient performance of the 23 or the 16, you need a 10-24mm ( which is the lens that I use) to cover all of those bases and more ( next to be way quicker than switching between the two 16 and 23 while “ on the job” ).

Fellow forum users, I would really encourage the sparing use of Acronyms and suggest at the very least, to, at least once in a post, to spell the acronym out. Although some of you are acquainted with them and fully literate in the use of these abbreviations, not all of us, in particular the ones who have been around earth a while know what you are talking about! So, yes, FF, IQ, AF, are rather intuitive but there are some other acronyms which get me thinking: “ What the heck is he going on about?”. Be kind to the rest of us. Thanks!

cheers! Well, I suppose that since I was born in a time when the term “ bokeh” didn’t exist ( come to think of it, the term “ prime” didn’t exist either, we just had lenses, tout court, and zooms lenses ). The use of selective focusing, outside the macro photographers who often used it mostly by necessity rather than choice, was very sparing back then. Few could afford the really ultra luminous lenses of the time. I remember the first lenses which made this aesthetic choice available to more photographers were, for example, the ultra luminous 85mm’s. I was mainly a large format & studio photographer and in the ‘90 started taking portraits by means of wild twists of the front and back of the camera to achieve VERY selective focussing but on the whole what I trained hard to learn was to achieve maximum sharpness everywhere by means of the camera movements. I guess that that has created a “ forma mentis”.

Sorry I meant Canon 11-24 f4 ( not that I really know what I am talking about just happened to watch the review of this HUGE lens ). I understand it is a different lens for a different purpose but you catch my drift? Don’t you?

it might be something more radical but I wonder at what point they realize that they start actually competing with itself. There are only so many poles that a fisherman can use before the number of lines in the pool actually gets too big that they are actually in the way of one another.