Search the Community

Hello, I am an experienced amateur with Canon and Sony experience who has decided to give Fujifilm a try. I've just unboxed the x-e3 with the 18-55mm lens. I shoot mostly landscapes, travel and street scenes and enjoy digital editing with Photoshop, Affinity and other things. I would like to experiment a bit with Macro, in the future. Mostly I am looking to record memories and express art ideas. My fundamental belief is that all photographs are an incomplete reflection of reality and therefore always open to any type of adjustment and manipulation in search for richer expression of an idea. I have to say that my first experience with x-e3 (unboxed late at night, when it's dark) has not been overly positive. Since I really shot outdoors 99% of the time, I only shot a few indoor pics to acclimate to the controls. I spent more time connecting the camera to wifi and bluetooth and trying to use the PC AutoSave and Remote Camera App on my Galaxy S7. What a piece of crap the Fuji software is! That is not a good start. All I want from the Remote Camera App, is a remote trigger and geotagging but it seems that I also have to have wifi connectivity and I seen to have a complete misunderstanding how to get any value out of the app; so far all I've gotten from the app is frustration. The PC autosave works a little better but after setting it up I could not change my upload directory so I had to delete my connection and re-set it up for a different disk/filesystem, UGH - While there is a 'Change Directory' option it only would let me chose folders under my desktop, which I did not want. If these two software products are a reflection of Fuji's commitment to a quality photography experience then I may have to return the camera ... but I am getting ahead of myself - Naturally I bought the camera after much reviewing, with high expectations. Now that the sun is rising I am heading out to get some photos. If I have a good experience with that, then I can overlook the software crap because I really didn't buy the camera for the app or PC AutoSave. I bought it as a photo tool and as I ramble here, I see that there is now enough light to head out and do the real test! Hopefully that can smooth out the rough parts of my first experience. One final note, I find the manual and controls a bit overwhelming. My preferred shooting is manual aperture, but I will shoot some full auto, manual aperture and AE bracketing initially as that is how I usually shoot. But it seems like some of the options have multiple ways of getting there, that could be good or just clutter - for example do I really need or want an exposure dial AND the ability to set exposure bracketing? Perhaps, time will tell, but if I think I have to adjust for exposure, why not just shoot a bracket instead to increase the chance of really getting it right? Long term I think I will like the flexibility to quickly chose one over the other but my first impression is 'complexity' I would be interested in hearing success stories from others, specifically around things like, 'best custom settings', 'useful quick function assignments' and of course, getting value out of the software. Thanks, JW Follow up after first day of shooting: First let me say that I got the camera wifi upload working just fine. I had to uninstall and start over, but no big deal. But more importantly, the x-e3 is an awesome camera and I could not be happier with it. It's simple to use and manage, I can quickly find and use all of the different shot modes that I prefer. The unit itself is light weight, fast and responds like a point and shoot with all the manual control that I prefer. I am very happy with this camera!