The 4K Fuji X-T2 is here

[Kubrickian]

I'm not talking about the focus ring feel or smoothness - I meant the fact that a fast focus pull will catapult the focus to infinity while a slow, steady turn barely moves it. All the focus-by-wire X lenses do this, right? 

[jonpais]

52 minutes ago, Kubrickian said:

I'm not talking about the focus ring feel or smoothness - I meant the fact that a fast focus pull will catapult the focus to infinity while a slow, steady turn barely moves it. All the focus-by-wire X lenses do this, right? 

I hardly ever shoot manual focus anymore, but if nobody else can answer your question, tomorrow I'll pull out all my lenses and test them for you.

[BTM_Pix]

Thought I'd have a look at external recording with it today.

Just a quick test to compare FLOG, a flattened PRO Neg Std and an internally recorded regular PRO Neg Std.

I haven't got a 4K external recorder so thought I'd just plug it into my Blackmagic UltraStudio Mini and record straight to the MacBook and do it in HD.

Well, that was the plan anyway until I discovered it just won't play nice with the Blackmagic and, erm, doesn't output FLOG in HD.

The former I can understand as sometimes it can take specific switch on sequences getting HDMI handshaking working but why the hell does it only output FLOG in 4K??

And even then it won't do it when you are recording internally so its an either or situation.

So I was left with having to make do with plugging it into a 4K monitor and just looking at instead!

I was only messing about pointing it towards a wall in my office that has a window in it and adjusting the exposure manually so that the clouds (against a very blue sky) were just about blowing out. The camera meter was showing this exposure to be +2.0 and even with that overexposure there was barely any detail visible in the rest of the room around the window. Switching to FLOG, the meter was now showing -0.6 and I was able to adjust exposure to bring everything up and maintain the highlights in the clouds.

It was a very rough and quick test and only by eye on a monitor so I wouldn't be too committal about it until I've been able to test it properly and actually record the output but it was definitely interesting.

Anyone here actually recorded any FLOG?

[Taranis]

+1 to that, I'd love to see F-Log compared to Pro Neg Std -2, -2 as I'm saving up for an external recorder and I'm not exactly sure if it's worth it

[BTM_Pix]

9 minutes ago, Taranis said:

+1 to that, I'd love to see F-Log compared to Pro Neg Std -2, -2 as I'm saving up for an external recorder and I'm not exactly sure if it's worth it

I've got my eye on the Atomos Ninja Inferno and desperately applying some justification economics to it !

I'm rationalising it as £500 for a pro spec field monitor with all the exposure and focus aids I'd ever need and the other £450 split between three cameras so I'd be giving each of them a ProRes record module for £150 each. Which is a bargain when you think of it like that isn't it!!

Just need to find somewhere with one in stock so I can test it to confirm the promise of FLOG I saw in my quick test. 

[Inazuma]

I also have only been able to look at Flog through a monitor. It seems to have up to 2 stops more DR. But you lose the nice SOOC colours. So youll have to decide which is worth more to you. 

Btw theres a recent blog somewhere about a guy who used the original blackmagic video assist with the Xt2. In the comments section he said that it can downsample the 4k signal to 1080p and record it. 

[Taranis]

11 minutes ago, Inazuma said:

I also have only been able to look at Flog through a monitor. It seems to have up to 2 stops more DR. But you lose the nice SOOC colours. So youll have to decide which is worth more to you. 

Btw theres a recent blog somewhere about a guy who used the original blackmagic video assist with the Xt2. In the comments section he said that it can downsample the 4k signal to 1080p and record it. 

Well then you have to grade it to look nice, I'm not sure if anything is lost. I played with downloadabe F-LOG footage earlier and I could achieve very pleasing results. Did not have skin tones though.

[BTM_Pix]

I've just done a small test if anyone is looking at options in the 28-35mm prime area.

I've got a Sigma 35mm ART 1.4 in Nikon mount (with a Zhongyi Lens Turbo II booster), Fuji's own 35mm 1.4 and for a bit of an older school alternative the Contax Zeiss Distagon T* 28mm F2.8

All collages have the images in the following order :

 

Top Left - Sigma 35mm ART 1.4 with Lens Turbo

Top Right - Sigma 35mm ART 1.4

Bottom Left - Fujifilm 35mm 1.4

Bottom Right - Contax Zeiss Distagon T* 28mm F2.8

 

All shots are OOC jpeg with the simulation set to ProNeg STD -2 -2 with the lenses wide open and shutter speed of the exposure used to compensate.

The first collage shows the full field of view each lens produces.

The second collage is an adjusted matched crop which makes it a bit easier to see OOF rendering etc.

The third collage is an adjusted matched crop of the focus chart to compare sharpness and DOF differences.

For me, if I had to choose one to put in the bag now, then the Sigma and the Lens Turbo combo offers the greatest flexibility. Yes, there is some degradation in IQ with the booster but its by no means near enough to not use it considering the advantages it brings. However, its bigger, its manual focus and the weight of it unbalances the camera completely. Plus, I'd have to carry the dumb adapter with it too.

The Zeiss is small, slightly wider to give a nice 40mm-ish equivalent FOV which I prefer to 50mm-ish from the 35mms and with the extra bit of crop of the X-T2 in 4K its even more important and is sharp enough without having the razor edge that the other two have. I also have the 50mm,135mm and 28-85mm from this range and I'm on the hunt for an 18mm so I'll write something up about them as a set at some point if anyone is interested.

That leaves us with the Fujfilm lens which, to be honest, is probably the one I'd go for if I had to put one in my bag and go out and shoot right now. It's far lighter than the other two, performs as well as the much vaunted Sigma (albeit without the ability to do the extra tricks with the speed booster) and has the massive advantage of AF. As you can see on the closeups of the charts, even with relatively short focal lengths like these and even on a crop sensor, you are still looking at a depth of field of around 6cm when you are shooting wide open. The X-T2 has brilliant focusing aids like the split view and really good peaking but when you're dealing with such low tolerances its still nice to have something quick when you need it.

EDIT>>>>>

Mmm.....hosting them on tiny pic has bollocksed the resolution.

Forum was having a lot of problems uploading anything so it was the only way of getting them but I'll try again if anyone feels the need to see a bit more detail

[Inazuma]

thanks @BTM_Pix, interesting comparison! I'm surprised by the performance of the Fuji at f1.4. I have the lens too and knew it was sharp but didn't think it'd be as sharp as the Sigma Art. What I also like about the Fuji is the flare it renders. 

[BTM_Pix]

7 minutes ago, Inazuma said:

thanks @BTM_Pix, interesting comparison! I'm surprised by the performance of the Fuji at f1.4. I have the lens too and knew it was sharp but didn't think it'd be as sharp as the Sigma Art. What I also like about the Fuji is the flare it renders. 

Nice shot. 

I was thinking about running a few more tests at different apertures with the 35mm lenses but to be honest its shown me enough to think that the Sigma is only going to be making an appearance with the speedbooster attached when I need a 24mm that can see in the dark with the DOF of a cigarette paper.

[jonpais]

On 4/5/2017 at 3:36 AM, Kubrickian said:

I'm not talking about the focus ring feel or smoothness - I meant the fact that a fast focus pull will catapult the focus to infinity while a slow, steady turn barely moves it. All the focus-by-wire X lenses do this, right? 

Here's my highly unscientific test of all five Fuji lenses in my possession. A more experienced person could probably get better results, but the fly-by-wire lenses, particularly the longer focal lengths and the zooms, are very difficult to focus quickly (for me!). Though I've never seen the need to move the ring so fast in real life. For the tests, I focused on the bottle, then moved the focus ring around 1/4 to 1/2 turn out of focus before beginning. Results would have been worse if I had to turn the ring even more. 

 

[BTM_Pix]

7 hours ago, jonpais said:

Here's my highly unscientific test of all five Fuji lenses in my possession. A more experienced person could probably get better results, but the fly-by-wire lenses, particularly the longer focal lengths and the zooms, are very difficult to focus quickly (for me!). Though I've never seen the need to move the ring so fast in real life. For the tests, I focused on the bottle, then moved the focus ring around 1/4 to 1/2 turn out of focus before beginning. Results would have been worse if I had to turn the ring even more. 

 

Great that Jon

[Kubrickian]

Thanks. I just wanted to verify that manual smooth focus pulls are possible. I want to be able to use a follow focus down the road if need be. I have a Fuji X70 for stills which I love, but the predictive manual focus is an absolute mess. 

[Thomas Hill]

Can anyone recommend a 5-7" field monitor for the X-T2 that is less expensive than the SmallHD 701?

[jonpais]

Can someone tell me if manual focus assist (magnification) can be assigned to a function button? Also, how do you change the size of the focus points in video?

[BTM_Pix]

2 hours ago, jonpais said:

Can someone tell me if manual focus assist (magnification) can be assigned to a function button? Also, how do you change the size of the focus points in video?

Like a few other functions (locking images being one for me that is its achilles heel for my work) Fuji don't have all them to be mappable. The best you can do is use the MyMenu function at put it at the top of the list, that way its always the first item when you press the Menu button. Annoyingly though, the should be the option to map MyMenu to a function button as well as if you ARE using it then every time you press the Menu button you generally have to navigate a few clicks up to get away from it as often as not what you want to fiddle with is in another sub menu higher up.

They could do with the custom C setups which even cheap cameras from Panasonic etc have or at least just two sets that are automatically activated when you switch between stills and video mode. I shoot JPEG for work and remembering to change the highlight/shadow/sharpness etc back doesn't always happen with my ageing grey matter! 

The AF is locked to 91 points in video mode, irrespective of HD,4K AF-C or AF-S combos that you have active as far as I can see.

They definitely need to tidy a few things up video wise in the next firmware. A custom settings function, changeable focus points, internal FLOG, FLOG in HD internal AND External should be looked at in my opinion. I'd also say face detection only in HD and not in 4K is an anomaly that they could address but after seeing whats going on with Panasonic then I reckon Fuji won't want to touch that with a bargepole!!

[jonpais]

2 minutes ago, BTM_Pix said:

Like a few other functions (locking images being one for me that is its achilles heel for my work) Fuji don't have all them to be mappable. The best you can do is use the MyMenu function at put it at the top of the list, that way its always the first item when you press the Menu button. Annoyingly though, the should be the option to map MyMenu to a function button as well as if you ARE using it then every time you press the Menu button you generally have to navigate a few clicks up to get away from it as often as not what you want to fiddle with is in another sub menu higher up.

They could do with the custom C setups which even cheap cameras from Panasonic etc have or at least just two sets that are automatically activated when you switch between stills and video mode. I shoot JPEG for work and remembering to change the highlight/shadow/sharpness etc back doesn't always happen with my ageing grey matter! 

The AF is locked to 91 points in video mode, irrespective of HD,4K AF-C or AF-S combos that you have active as far as I can see.

They definitely need to tidy a few things up video wise in the next firmware. A custom settings function, changeable focus points, internal FLOG, FLOG in HD internal AND External should be looked at in my opinion. I'd also say face detection only in HD and not in 4K is an anomaly that they could address but after seeing whats going on with Panasonic then I reckon Fuji won't want to touch that with a bargepole!!

Thanks for the quick response, BTM. If it's assignable to the My Menu, it's unusable for me, since by the time I do that, the picture will have disappeared. I'm sincerely hoping they can sort out the app so I can remotely control the camera and record 4K.

[BTM_Pix]

23 minutes ago, jonpais said:

Thanks for the quick response, BTM. If it's assignable to the My Menu, it's unusable for me, since by the time I do that, the picture will have disappeared. I'm sincerely hoping they can sort out the app so I can remotely control the camera and record 4K.

I might have misunderstood what you meant I think Jon.

Are you asking for a quick way to invoke the MF assist zoom display when in AF mode rather than quickly changing its functionality?

If thats what you're after then if you have AF+MF in the AF menu set to ON then if you keep the shutter half pressed, turning the focus barrel on the lens will bring up the MF assist zoomed display and dismiss it again when you let go of the shutter. Alternatively, like it behaves when you have manual lenses on it, push in the rear command dial wheel and this should bring it up as well. 

 

SPOILER ALERT !!!

Unless you're in video mode, in which case you have to be in manual focus mode and then it will invoke automatically when you turn the barrel. Or via the rear command dial if you are using manual lenses.

So, no AF with MF in video mode is another one on to their list.

[jonpais]

11 minutes ago, BTM_Pix said:

I might have misunderstood what you meant I think Jon.

Are you asking for a quick way to invoke the MF assist zoom display when in AF mode rather than quickly changing its functionality?

If thats what you're after then if you have AF+MF in the AF menu set to ON then if you keep the shutter half pressed, turning the focus barrel on the lens will bring up the MF assist zoomed display and dismiss it again when you let go of the shutter. Alternatively, like it behaves when you have manual lenses on it, push in the rear command dial wheel and this should bring it up as well. 

 

Right you are. But when I press it, I get focus peaking. I have to press it like three times before I get magnification... It seems kind of erratic, anyhow. It seems to be working for me now. Thanks!

[BTM_Pix]

Just now, jonpais said:

Right you are. But when I press it, I get focus peaking. I have to press it like three times before I get magnification...

I think at best it might be quirky (aka a potential bug). I had to go in and come back out again twice before it worked at all. If I turn the barrel I get magnification and peaking but if I just use the command dial then I only get magnification.

But nothing in video unless I'm in MF mode