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Who's opinion do you most trust on Youtube about Fuji?


antsyl

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There are a few guys I regard as both knowledgeable and friendly toward Fujifilm gear. Theora Apophosis, Omar Gonzales, Bigheadtaco, Three Blindmen and an Elephant, and the Fuji Guys all come to mind. Of those, Ken Wheeler (Theora Apophosis) stands out for me with his technical acumen, and he has even written an ebook on Fujifilm gear. He is not palatable to everyone, as he is very blunt, and not apologetic for it. 

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My shortlist: Chris and Jordan from DPReview, bigheadtaco, Denae & Andrew, Dustin Abbott, Ted Forbes (Art of...) and grandmaster Hugh Brownstone (3bmep). For inspiration I turn to Ted Vieira... not so short list after all and the common denominator is that they refrain from "awesome", "epic" and "I have more gear than God"... 😉 adding Gordon Laing to my long list...

Edited by Herco
added Gordon Laing and corrected spelling of Vieira
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Theoria Apothasis.  The Angry Photographer.  Down to earth.  No BS.  No affiliate links so he doesn't have a horse in the race.  Tells it like it is.  Now, for entertainment:  Bigheadtaco, Omar.  I can't stand the sound of or the look of Deanne and Andrew.  Ugh. 

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I think it’s a tough ask. I take each with a grain or sometimes a block of salt.

I’ve produced videos and know it’s a ton of work and when it comes to someone doing it for their income... it changes everything.

 Plus in todays internet, I think business knows how to protect their products with hidden sponsorships, articles and with comments, down votes and customer reviews from employees acting/pretending to be normal users. 

My thoughts in no order:

 

Gordon Laing - for a long time I’ve felt he was honest in evaluations and I like his consistency in testing. Dislike his newer dummied down rating system.

 

Theoria Apothasis - has vast experience and equipment, not sponsored publicly or hidden.  But I’ve stopped watching because I’ve also grown extremely tiered of his consistently praising himself, then repeating it again and again and again in every video. The tidbits of “on topic” info. happen between long episodes of self praise. It’s exhausting and just not worth sitting through because it happens in every video. 

 

Kai W - entertainment. For me, he’s funny and original.

 

Maarten Heilbron and a few “others” I’ve gotten useful info from. Maarten’s a bit old school but I find him more educated then the others.

 

Pal2tech - Comes to mind but I think there are a great deal of regurgitated reviewers like him that offer repacked info they pull from others work and give bad and clueless advice to people who need real help.  I realized what he was doing after viewing others content and then his, plus his thoughtless bad advice on multiple topics told me he was actually a danger to people. Those poor folks didn’t know that what he was advising them to do was actually bad advice and showed his  inexperience. I have no interest for players.

 

Edited by Robr
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  • 1 month later...

My God this was eye opening. I just so happened to be one of those YouTubers. I try my best to be as objective as possible in my reviews but must admit that to survive on YouTube and actually make it on the platform, Youtubers eventually get too tempted by affiliate links and the like. As a person doing this from the other side I would strongly advise all of you to not expect a whole bunch of objectivity from a YouTuber with a great deal of success. Why? Well basically all YouTubers start with good intention and realize at one point that giving away info does not pay the bills. If the Youtuber is paying the bills really well? . . . You do the math.  I am not offering an excuse for us, I am just making the observation. Also, just putting this out there, look for videos about the process and less about the gear. When I look at my stats and see that my video on gear has gotten 20,000 views and my video about a natural light photo shoot with the X-T3 has only gotten 400 views. . .  You can guess what the next video is going to be about. You guys should not be looking at YouTube for your next gear choice and more as a way to be inspired and motivated to go out and shoot. I will not change YouTube nor do I claim to have the best channel out there but the answer to this question all depends on what you want to get out of the channel. Cheers....Now go out and shoot!  

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  • 3 weeks later...
On 5/30/2020 at 5:52 PM, jlmphotos said:

I started my own YouTube channel on photography - especially travel and landscape but I've yet to garner anything but immediate family and close friends (pity followers).

You should rather use the time you have left for more valuable things than to run a YouTube channel. Apart from that, the work is extremely time-consuming and nerve-wracking. If you are seriously interested in videography, I recommend investing in a good video camera and recording for you and your family what moves you the most. It's completely irrational to share anything and everything with the rest of the world, just to impress people you don't know at all. Most of the time it ends with the fact that their judgement is obviously so limited that one can very well do without their criticism.

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2 hours ago, jlmphotos said:

I do enjoy teaching -- something I do quite often at local clubs, and at the high school(s).

I think this is a much better way to interact with people with a certain topic or subject. So you can answer any questions much more targeted and also show practical solutions. Some things can also be discussed more easily and openly. ^_^

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I personally hate watching videos. I much prefer a well-structured text document, with illustrations / photos when needed.

(Don't like watching TV either ... give me a newspaper or a good book please).

So I don't really trust the opinions of any "Youtubers", since I don't watch them.

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  • 1 month later...
6 hours ago, FujiDave said:

I think you have to add Damian Brown to the list, a working photographer who, like others, doesn't rely on handouts or preview kit from manufacturers and isn't afraid to give an honest opinion.

 

 

 

 

 

 

After your post I watched this review of his

“Fujifilm XF 8-16mm f2.8 R LM WR (feat. NYC/NJ)”

It has almost all positive reviews but I couldn’t sit through it. Is it a review or a tool to post his work? Picture after picture with small bits of field opinions and back to picture after picture with another small bit of info then back to picture after picture.

I don’t mean to sound rude, just guess it’s a style that’s not of my interest.

 

I looked at his website. ? W T _ ... flower coming out of brides mouth (flower is behind bride, just unusable poor positioning). 2nd pic was Bride with (100% unusable) oily highlights/blown out face. These are his selected cover shots? I’m actually horrified.

Wow

Edited by Robr
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I tend to pay more attention to the working photographer types like KentuckyMan30 or Andy Mumford than the 'Influencers' like Theora Apotheosis,  or the Northrups (neither of which have produced much youtube content of value in the last couple years IMHO, they're clickbait through & through). I will say that Andy could mumble less (great channel, lousy audio because he doesn't enunciate well)

Dustin Abbot and Christopher Frost are the only really gear-focused channels I pay much attention to, as both do a good job of communicating real world performance of gear and understand the value of cost to the user. 

Edited by mawz
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I’m only recently a Fuji user but I like Theora Apophosis. There is a certain YouTuber team I avoid like the plague as I don’t believe a word he says but I won’t get personal, no need for names! 😊 I’ll check out some of those mentioned as I may have missed them.

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  • 8 months later...
On 7/21/2020 at 12:34 PM, Arbalist said:

I’m only recently a Fuji user but I like Theora Apophosis. There is a certain YouTuber team I avoid like the plague as I don’t believe a word he says but I won’t get personal, no need for names! 😊 I’ll check out some of those mentioned as I may have missed them.

Yes, Kenny is by far the best Fujifllm reviewer and overall teacher by far.

No affiliate links and offers free books and trips and tricks that are well worth perusing.

His lens reviews are superb and so different from the crowd.

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Me watching peter mckinnon and dope squad members channels........."hmmm okay !!. i really doesn't watch most of the fujifilm oriented channels ! except omar gonzales and few times kai w . i should check out some of the fujifilm focused channels mentioned by you guys !. thanks for the information !. wish you a really great day ahead !". i really didn't watch much videos or channels etc.. before buying fujifilm gear actually . but i like fujifilm .especially because of it's compactness and it's physical looks ! the vintage style and the analog dials are lovely !. also the results from it is also pretty nice. it's always satisfied me , so never even thought about checking more about gear videos to compare . yup , i do need some lens etc. and want to learn something specific about fujifilm (recommendations are very helpful and i have used other brands before and thinks that i didn't miss any special fujifilm feature , but let me know) not the recommendations about buying gear (i usually decide it spontaneously and feel satisfied about it while buying gear) . still good to know about all those youtube channels. wish everyone share more website , or channels etc.. in this thread . not only about gear ,but more about photography techniques , accurate information , filmmaking. especially the channels were they do it in a interesting or fun way . wish you all a great day ahead !

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  • 2 weeks later...
  • 1 month later...

Most of the above mentioned people are lame, lacking even foundational knowledge, except for Ken Wheeler (Theoria Apophasis, not Apotheosis, or Apohposis, or Apothasis,  or whatever, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/apophasis) - he actually made me to switch to Fujifilm, hehe), and maybe that always ecstatic guy from pal2tech.

Edited by syborg
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