gordonrussell76

One thing to mention here and I see it time and time again people complaining about AF in video mode. I get that VLoggers and some types of videography need it, but in my opionion one of the best things you can do to make your video look smooth and as we see on TV is to turn AF off and shoot in manual mode. Unless you are deliberately going for bokeh effect, set you aperture for a deep depth of field, ideally F8 or so, set it so that the DOF scale is infinity and back to say 3ft ( i use the 10-24mm a lot as a wide angle is your friend with video) and keep it manual, your shot will be in focus, will tolerate movement of the subject, and won't have the horrible artifacts introduced by AF hunting, which even the best AF systems cannot totally eliminate. Its is no co-incidence that all the high end Cine lens are manual focus only, even Fuji's new releases, yes you can buy an add on that controls AF, but these often cost the same as the lens again for a reason. Try what I suggest above and you will see that 9 x out of 10 you will get more pleasing results, the other nice thing about this, is it works with vintage lenses and will work on any system you use in the future as it is a general no brand specfic technique. G

Definately buy the kit lens, its a stunner and even though i now have some lovely primes I regret having sold it, and often think of picking another up. At 18mm its the best lens in the line up, I would buy it again and happily use it as a 18mm F2.8 prime. in a kit with my 35mm and 90mm that would be a very very useful walkaround kit. Re prime lens, if you are going to get a prime then get the 35mm F1.4, i know everyone raves about the F2, but if you own the 18-55mm its very sharp at 35mm and focus's very fast, you might as well go for something with bokeh and that prime wow factor from the get go. Again you can pick up a S/H 35mm F1.4 for the same money as the F2 new at the mo which is crazy. Oh and don't listen to the it focus's slow stuff, yes its slower than some of hte newer lenses, but on the X-T2/X-T20 generation it focus's very fast, fast enough for what you will want to use it for, its not for shooting sports, for everything else its now fast enough, especially in SIngle AF mode. G

Installed. First impressions 1. AF point moving when you switch between portrait and landscape in both EVF and LCD is worth the price of admission alone, well I say price of admission, the firmware was free. 2. SS Auto, very useful feature and quite interesting to see what Fuji considers as SS for each lens. They go by the FF equivalence as far as I can tell from my limited experimentation. IE the 56mm it picks 1/85 rather than 1/56, which is what I had been doing when manually choosing a SS. I think it would be nice if you could (for primes) at least set your prefered SS for each lens in the auto mode. As I often would set it higher than 1/85 to be sure. I suppose though that is what full manual mode is for 3) The AUTO ISO COmmand function is great, not only can you scroll continuously through all ISO values, when you get to the end of the scroll and are at the highest ISO value you then go into Auto 1, 2 and 3 of your iso menus, so it can still work as the old auto ISO function, but is even easier as you can now switch between your pre-programmed Auto Iso presets with the front wheel (you have to press it first) which is very useful and has just free'd up a custom button I had programmed to that function for something else now These 3 are the most obvious from the first 10 minutes of having a play. I have yet to test Face and Eye detect as I am home alone WIll update if I have time later. G

Firstly lets deal with Microphone, yes X-T2 internal mic will probably pick up your voice at that distance, but it will also pickup up all the background noise. I would highly recomend a Lav Mic for this application, it will save you much headaches. You could get an in-expensive wired one for your application or go wireless at not much more money. In terms of video footage you have two options here, first you can record in 4k which gives you the option of then cropping in and reframing with less penalty to resolution. Once you have framed shots you could then output at 1080 or 720 whcih woudl be more than enough for youtube. If you don't want the flexibility or resolution 4k offers then I would suggest just recording in 1080 as most modern computers have no problem handing editing of 1080 and you can still output to 1080 or 720. ALso in 1080 mode there is no extra crop of the sensor so your focal lengths remain as you would expect from stills. However some people have reported that because the 1080 does not crop there are some wierd behaviours. This is anecdotal and I have not shot enough in 1080 to talk on this with authority. I suspect that on balance 1080 will be best for you. You can choose what you camera shoots for video in the video options menu on the X-T2 there are several 1080 options. You will need to choose a frame rate 24 FPS = cinematic, I would not bother, 25/30 = Normall frame rates UK and US, youtubes native framerate is 30FPS and you also have 50/60FPS which framerates are good for high speed action and if you want to shoot something and then slow it down to 30 FPS for slo mo. Personally to keep things easy you should probaly go with 30FPS, however given its driving and speed may be involved 60FPS could work well, Experiement. I would highly recomed shooting in full manual, set you ss to match FPS ie at 30FPS use a SS of 1/30th, set your aperture for your desired DOF (ideally F4-8) to ensure good DOF and then use the ISO to set exposure. I would also avoid auto focus and use zone focus'ing combined with deep depth of field for your applications. It will remove hunting af as a distraction in your videos. Hope that helps as a very high level starter for 10 EDIt Just noticed the lens you are using is the 16-55mm I am going to assume this is the F2.8 version. This lens does not have OIS and if you are in a moving vehicle that could be a problem. You may want to invest in a gimbal mount or look into picking up the 10-24mm or 18-55mm which both have stabilization. I can highly recommend the 10-24mm as if you are shooting inside a car, the extra width will be most welcome and the OIS will help you with stabilization. The 18-55mm would be a more in-expensive way to access stabilization as you can pick them up very cheaply on ebay, it is also a stunning lens. Hang on I hear you say its variable Aperture by zoom and not par focal. None of the Fuji still lens are truly parfocal, and for the sort of shooting you are doing I am guessing you won't be altering zoom once you have hit record so this should not be a problem.

Sorry just checking back To answer your question as to why I did not mention Photoshop. I think of photoshop as post post production. Essentially both PS and Lightroom use ACR to de-mosaic RAW files and if you have the latest versions of both the conversion will be the same. I think of LR as being more photographer specfic as it offers a raft of very useful cateloging functions and workflow. PS is more for post post production as some of its sharpening is better but its also a design software and has many many more bells and whistles. I am also old school and I am still in the old price paradigm where LR was significantly cheaper than full fat PS, and therefore for someone who is photographer only better value. In these days of the CC package where you get both PS and LR together for a monthly fee then its less of an issue. The point still stands that in terms of RAW conversion there is no difference between the two software's.

The 35mm F1.4 is the lens is my yardstick, its just magical and on the X-T2 with Acros the love affair has just been getting deeper for me. In terms of other lens in the system that have a similar rendering, for me the only one that comes close is the 90mm, the 56mm is more in the same camp as the 23mm a bit more clinical, its a lovely lens, but the 90 and 35 are nicer. I have not used the APD, my suspicion is that the APD might get closer to the 35mm magic. At the wide end the 18mm is probably the closest match rendering wize, possibly the 16mm as well I have not had hands on experience of that lens. Fuji seems to have camps of lenses 18/35/90 - Have that look, kind of creamy dreamy but with nice contrast and they do wonderful things with light and fall off, I think of this lot as the vintage crew. 14/23/56 - All very sharp, contrasty, bit more clinical, a more modern look. 10-24/18-55/16/55/55-200/50-140/100-400mm - The Zoom crew, all very similar in rendering, also quite clinical, bokeh can be a bit more harsh, although interestingly the 55-200 at around the 90mm -135mm mark is just delicious bokeh wize, harder to get but when you do nicer and more attractive than the 50-140. The odds and sods 16mm (sort of between the vintage and modern primes, not enough hands on experience to decide which camp its in. 60mm this has its very own rendering in my opinion, can be very crunchy contrast wize. Nice lens 27mm again has its own rendering, probably closer to the 60mm than anythings else.

I think its the card. I have only Fuji batteries, I have 1 that came with camera and 2x Fuji X-T1 style batteries so mix of old and new. I use 2x Sandisk Ultra 295MB card, both formated in camera after everytime I download pictures or video. I have not had a single lock up. Has anyone noticed what the aperture reading is when its locked? Back in the day the X-T1 would lock if the lens was not seated properly or got a knock and you would see F0 as your aperture reading. Just wandering if its an old issue re-surfacing. G

14-40 or 24-70mm given the 4k and APS-c crop yup that would be a very handy lens.

Another +1 for the grip, if i did not know better I would say that the buttons were designed with the grip on its feels so much better with it. I had one on my X-T1 and now on my X-T2 it balances camera better with larger lens, it gives it a solid heft that makes it feel much more business like and basically get one. I like this interaction of it better than the X-t1 version as previously on the X-T1 it had an allen key tightening which was bad as a) always potential over over tighten with that much leverate available to you and can't swap it easily in the field say you want to put battery grip on or go out in the evening with a smaller camera (27mm users I am looking at you) The new X-T2 version has a coin slot type tightening so much easier to remove or instal

Sorry don't believe the hype, the 35mm F2 is not as well optically corrected as the F1.4 and relies on more in camera or in processor correction which means Jpegs workflow is great, RAW is down to your converter. Good luck with capture one. F1.4 renders better in my opinion F1.4 now focus's very fast on X-T2, is it as fast as the F2 no, but its fast enough that the difference no longer matters ie you won't be missing any shots. Its not that noisy apart from when you turn it on and the lens racks out to its starting position. Give it a couple of years and the newness has worn off on the F2 and people will be coming back to the F1.4. Still my favourite lens in the line up, and has produced most of my favorite shots in the system. Now I grant you I love that focal length but still in terms of IQ the only other lens that has the same vibe is the 90mm, Those two lens are just stellar and while the 56mm is a great lens and useful focal length every time I shoot I am always thinking why can't you be more like the 35 and the 90 Its going to need councilling soon

Sorry it can't be the best mirrorless camera it does not have IBIS, Full frame or a Bayer sensor. That's just crazy talk Tongue firmly in my cheek

RTM 'One setting randomly affecting another setting' er no One setting effecting another setting in a pre-determined way that is detailed in the manual. Not random at all I really hate the way that when I am in AUTO ISO the ISO Randomly gets much higher when I use a higher Shutter Speed, I hate the way it randomly changes like that when I change another setting G

George P You got there first no questions. Length is no substitute for brevity, sadly a lesson I never seem to learn

By the way the usefulness of a zoom is often overrated. I took the following to Canada for a 3 weeks trip 10-24 35 56 50-140 Rough percentage those lenses were used. 10-24mm - 15% 35mm - 50% 56mm - 20% 50-140mm - 3% 50-140 plus 2xTC - 12% As you can see the majority of my shots were taken with the two primes. The zooms are good at the extreme ends of the focal range spectrum as they are used less it makes more sense to prioritize flexibility, in the center of the range bring the quality. Both the 35mm and 56mm are incredibly flexible lenses, Wide open they are bokeh and rendering machines especially the 35mm F1.4 which just sings. Stopped down they get very sharp and work great for travel and street. But the 35mm is slow to focus I hear you say. Not as much as it used to be, the Canada trip I was shooting an X-T1 and FW 4.0 speeds that lens up a lot, plus for landscape and travel you will be at around F5.6-10 and I found that the DOF at those apertures insured that focusing was very quick and forgiving. Since upgrading to the X-T2 the 35mm F1.4 is now FAST, probably on paper its slower than the newer lenses, but really its now fast enough that you need a machine to notice it, it has not held me back at all. I just went into a very dimly lit room in my house (energy saving bulb just turned on not fully warmed up) and tried focusing single point, SAF and it hit focus instantaneously each time I half pressed shutter at a variety of ranges on some very small objects. Basically its no longer a limiting factor. I love this lens can anyone tell? G

Are you recording RAW + JPEG or just RAW? Basically with Fuji is you record RAW only it saves a very small low quality JPEG in the RAW file container which is what it uses to show you a preview on the back of the camera. If you record RAW +Jpeg then when you hit playback and review on camera the camera shows you the JPEG as its better quality and will give you more information about sharpness etc. My theory is that either you are capturing only RAW and the ipad needs the JPEG to provide import preiview to work as in the tutorial, or its the other way round and you are shooting RAW +Jpeg and the ipad/app combination needs the smaller RAW embedded Jpeg for its preview. I suspect its the latter option as the import is probably only looking for RAW files and its going to be more efficient with a smaller embedded JPEG. Anyway have a play with those settings ie try the opposite of what you currently have set and see if it resolves your issue. G

Another +1 for using the 35mm 90% of the time compared to 18-55mm however its a great choice as your wide angle, don't compare it based on it being your normal. I had the 18-55mm and 35mm F1.4 in my kit for a long time and loved the 18-55mm it was my 'wide angle' as at 18mm is almost as bright as the 18mm prime and in my opinion is sharper edge to edge and better quality. If you are going to change that lens for another wide angle the only route to go is 10-24 or 14mm if you want wider or 16mm if you want wider and brighter. I would seriously consider getting the 18-55 with your X-T2 you won't get it cheaper any other way, and you can always shift it s/h with no loss then rock 18-55 35 90 or 55-230 Personally I would go mainly prime goodness with the 90 for telephoto. The 18-55 all round single lens when you want to travel light and then in a full kit treat it as a 18mm prime to complement your rather lovely 35mm (either of them although I prefer the F1.4, particularly in this setup as its your lowlight beast) and 90mm EDIT - Just seen George P post which basically makes the same point as me, sorry we must have been posting at the same time, Synchronicity my friend

Nevermind forgotton how to add images to forum

Its all subjective. I love the rendering of the 35 F1.4, its my favourite lens in the system, its on my camera about 90% of the time. The AF improved massively on X-E2/X-T1 after Firmware 4 and it improved again with X-T2. Basically you will have to pry that lens from my cold dead hands unless they release a Mkii that is WR, and slightly better build quality int eh saeme vein as the 90mm. It just does nice stuff I think it renders and has bokeh on a par with the 90mm, only its more practical as you can use it in a wider range of scenarios. G

+1 for Capture one, it has not had X-T2 added yet (you can work around by changing camera name to X-Pro2 in meta data if you can be bothered. But it handles X-Pro 2 files very well and that means it will handle X-T2 once they pull there finger out. G

You don't need software to download the images, you can just put the SD card in a USB SD card reader and transfer them to your computer. In terms of processing the Fuji provided software (in the box with the camera or download from there website) is Sikypix I have never used it and the general consensus is that the image quality and colour profiles/film simulations are well done but that the software is clunky and the UI is terrible. Still its free so probably a good place to start. The alternatives are Lightroom - Built in film simulations and lens correction, some issues with sharpening, a lot better with the latest generation sensor. I am still not convinced, but I need to work more on the input settings Capture One - Great software, no lens corrections although on most Fuji lenses they are not neccessary as they are optically corrected. Very good home brewed film simulations availalble in a thread in this very forum. Sharpening is great. Iridient - Supposedly the best of the bunch for sharpening, but no cateloguing features. There are others such as photo ninja, but the above are the main 3 really. Iridient is MAC only the others are system agnostic. I use Capture One by preference, although right now for X-T2 I am experimenting with LR again as Capture one doesnot recognize X-T2 yet. G

Do you have a stigmatism in the eye you use with the viewfinder. Glasses correct stigmatisms but at the viewing angle and the fact that the lens in your glasses will by nature have a curve this could all be combining to give you the effect you are noticing.

Given flysurfer post I am not sure of the validity of the comparison, and I no longer have my X-T1 as I part exchanged it for the X-T2. However even if this was true it would be a bonus for me as I always felt the X-T1 slightly overexposed for my tastes when I was in any kind of Auto mode i used to have EV at -1/3 to -2/3 of a stop as default. So it will be niec ot know I can leave it at 0

Its interesting the Sony is obviously a very capable camera, in fact on paper more capable than the X-T2 but in my opinion its all about the difference of design ethos. I get the impression Sony design to a spec there mission statement seems to be give the absolute best technical spec for less money than the traditional contenders ie Canon and Nikon and in all fairness to them its working and its doing all mirrorless manufacturers a favour as people are starting to take them seriously as proper camera's I always feel like the Fuji is designed to use cases, its engineered to solve problems, to meet needs. Therefore it may not have the best specs (although its pretty damn good on that front as well) but that all the specs have a purpose and more importantly it is designed holistically as a whole with each feature considered and integrated with the other features. I think its this that gives it the soul the sony lacks. PLease note I am not saying one approach is inherently better than the other, for some technical ability is everything even if they have to work round some quirks or it does not 'feel' good, for some the above would just be touchy feely gobbldygook and thats fine its nice that there is somethign for everyone. Just my 2 pennyworth.

So far I have actually found it to be unsettingly fast. I put about 5000 shots through an X-E2 about 14000 through my X-T1 and I sort of had a muscle memory around shot time and I used to sometimes trigger a shot early to catch the definitive moment and I am having to retrain myself as the damn camera gets there too quickly and i have the weird problem of not lag but the camera being too fast. Its a good problem to have, but sligthly disconcerting IF you want to emulate it with your X-T1 switch to manual mode, use the AE-L button to lock exposure put it in 1/4000 second mode and take a few pictures, thats how the X-T2 feels at 1/250 of a second wtih AF and AE turned on G

So far I am running -3 noise reduction and the rest generic till I notice somethign I don't like. I never liked the NR in the previous sensor for JPEG so I just turned it off/down, all good so far. G