rdelbar

14/2.8, 23/2, 50/2 (soon)

I had the opportunity to participate in two workshops led by Matt Brandon, a Malaysia based humanitarian and travel photographer, and by Piet Van den Eynde, a Belgian freelance photographer and Lightroom and off-camera flash expert. Both are official X-photographers. The first one, in 2014, was more of a 'normal' workshop throughout Rajasthan with 9 participants. Through a combination of one-to-one tuition, individual assignments and group sessions, Matt and Piet help each participant develop their own vision and style, as well as push them to explore new directions. The second and rather 'atypical' one, just two months ago, brought three alumni participants together with Matt and Piet focusing on one common goal: making environmental portraits on location using off-camera lighting, in and around three North India cities. You can find more info on these workshops as well as reports from past ones on Matt's The Digital Trekker site, or on Piet's MoreThanWords blog.

What can you expect when combining a recent camera, an older lens and some accessories that were never intended to be used together? Actually, the results are surprisingly good! I tested a number of Nikon F-mount lenses combined with a Metabones adapter and the new XF 1.4x TC on my X-cameras. The extra flange distance provided by the mount adapter solves the issue with the protruding front element of the TC. The image quality results from the tested lens+TC combos turned out to be more than acceptable. A few pairs of 100% center crops to illustrate: Combining the 1,4x TC with older primes may help fill some of the remaining holes in the X-mount lens line-up. Definitely worth the try, and a lot of fun as well! For an extensive discussion, see this article.

I have done extensive testing with the (original) Metabones Speed Booster and a series of Nikon F (and compatible) lenses. There's lots to read at fujixtras.blogspot.com. Part of the 'improvement' in image quality (or, at least, the reduction of original imperfections from the adapted lens) is due to the reduction of the imaging circle: most optical abberrations get reduced through the same process. When using a top quality focal reducer, that largely compensates for the imperfections from the additional lens elements. Having an adapter/focal reducer with electrical contacts at the body mount side does not bring any advances unless there's an equivalent provision at the lens mount side AND the adpted lens has electrical contacts/control AND the adapter offers is an appropriate translation between the respective control protocols. That's a lot to ask for. To my best knowledge, the only working case is with high-end Canon EF-S to Sony E-mount adapters.

See te diagram: the red numbers along the X-axis on top are for an adapter with a scale going to '7'. Y-axis shows stops below full aperture. So (rounding slightly) F=f/4.0; 1=f/5.6; 2.5=f/8; 3.5=f/11; 4.5=f/16; 6=f/22; 7=f/32

Over the last 3 years I went all-out on alternative kens hoods for my XF glass collection: More details and recommentations at All about that Hood

Because of their shape, the wide hoods no not hold pinch caps inside the hood (near the front lens element). The cylindrical hoods in general still accept the original Fujifilm lens cap (i.e. same diameter as filter thread size) but in my experience do not hold these caps tightly in place. In addition, especially for the deeper ones, inserting the cap creates the risk of scratching the grooved interior, which ultimately will expose bare metal and potentially cause reflections. In both above cases, I prefer and recommend caps that cover the front of the hood. The vented hoods all perfectly accept the original lens caps, which then get to sit halfway into the hood (past the vents, so the space immediately in front of the lens is sealed off).

I have updated by blog post with a quick overview table, showing which hoods types and sizes work with each XF lens, and have also indicated the appropriate sizes for additional lens caps:

The "vents" are only open looking from the back (or front). It is as good as impossible for light coming from the sides to hit the front lens element.

My MH-62 vented hood on the XF23 perfectly accepts the original Fujifilm lens cap.

Thanks for letting me know. Fixed!

How I spent a little money and a lot of time exploring alternative lens hoods for XF lenses: new blog post.

I am the guy that has (almost) all Kipon adapters for the Nikon F to Fuji X combination. Your observations on the Kipon tilt (only) adapter are correct. For precise or repeatable work, this adapter lacks any form of scale for the tilt angle, not even a way to (re)set it to the 'zero' position. The ring operated by the two pointy protrusions has a clamping effect: you can loosen the ball socket to a more or lesser degree. But the operation is not necessarily smooth, somewhat degrades over time (lubricant?) and unstable especially with somewhat larger/heavier lenses. For those reasons, I almost always move over to the tilt&shift adapter. When I do use the tilt only adapter, I set it fairly loose and move the lens around while I compose and focus, a bit like you would do with freelensing. I use focus peaking to have some indication of where the sharp zone ends up. As you have experience with studio cameras, you will know that both tilt angle and focus distance directly affect the position of the plane-of-focus. I hardly shoot portraits, so I don't have any meaningful sample images around. Besides, I am not fully clear on exactly which type of effect you are looking for. If you are willing to do some playing around with math, to see the differences resulting from varying focal length and aperture, I can point you to two resources: there's an excellent article on using tilt shift lenses to control depth of field at cambridgeincolour.com. It includes (near the end) an interactive Depth of Field Calculator; make sure to select the advanced mode; if you have an iOS phone of tablet, there's a brilliant Tilt Calculator app from snapi that will show you a lot of data related to a specific setting. I am rather busy with some other projects at this time, but I do have 20/24/35/50/85/100mm Nikon lenses at hand. If you could more precisely describe a test setup, I would at least look into whether I could be of assistance. Good luck!

This is one blog post I wrote on the topic.

Almost two years after starting my reviews of Nikon F to Fuji X lens adapters, I just added an update on the Metabones Speed Booster Ultra and improved aperture control ring. Enjoy!

I love vented lens hoods, like this one. I* use models with the appropriate diameters on my 18, 23 and 35mm lenses. Beware : there is (too much) vignetting with this type of hood with the 16mm - better use a wide angle model.