Fuji X-T3 and X-T4 discussion

[Snowbro]

Top pic I posted was XT3, bottom Canon. No surprise, the fuji with LOG & 10 bit helps a lot to prevent highlight blow out. 

Quick thoughts from comparing 1DX ii to XT3 for a few days:

I thoroughly tested AF in different settings/modes on XT3. It seemed to work about as good as the 1DX while testing in my house under decent lighting. Outside, under lighting that wasn't extremely bright (morning/afternoon), it would lose focus many times, even with face tracking + eye detect on (tested at f2). It showed that it had a box on the face + the eye in a few scenarios, but when I checked the footage later, it lost focus for a second at least 5 times in a 10 second clip. When using on a gimbal following someone, if face detection is on, it will jump the AF box to a random spot of the screen when it loses their face. I would click back to mid screen, it finds their face again and when they turn to walk etc. it jumps again to a random focus area after losing the face. The Canon will track regardless if it finds the face and didn't lose focus. 

I would say that the AF is much better than the sony a6500 I had, but I wouldn't rely on it for anything that matters. Indoors, it seems to be fine however. I would use manual focus for most things. 

The AWB is very unpredictable and highly sensitive. I found it to be very inaccurate; I can use AWB on the 1DX and it rarely messes up (once in about 10 hours of video). Oddly enough, the video and photo files from the camera seem to be more sensitive to WB adjustments than the Canon. I can push WB pretty far and have it look normal on the Canon, I barely touch the slider on the XT3 and it looks very blue or yellow. 

Not a fan of their lens lineup for video and no Sigma available. I do think that it is a very good camera though. The image is clean and handles very well in post. Build quality seems good; I did have a few weird freezes where it wouldn't recognize aperture. I will still probably use my 1DX more, I don't push grades extremely far and I don't have to worry about anything with the Canon, I know it's going to do its job when I turn it on. XT3 is pretty mind blowing for the size/price; great choice if you own a bunch of Fuji glass. 

[IronFilm]

On 12/8/2018 at 7:49 AM, Kisaha said:

Yep, a Panasonic advertising video pushes a specific Varicam. No surprises here, but when you compare Alexa vs Varicam in real world productions, the difference is something like 9.9 out of 10 productions use Alexa and 0.1 Panasonic (in the productions between them and not other brands). Sony and Red have a much bigger share in such productions also.

The filmmaking industry can be surprisingly traditional and risk adverse, one of the reasons why Arri Alexa cameras are so common place. 
Just because a camera is popular doesn't mean it is "best".

On 12/8/2018 at 7:49 AM, Kisaha said:

 My point was that consumers/prosumers/pros have/need different equipment.

I'm not disagreeing. But I was also pointing out they have similarities too....

 

On 12/8/2018 at 7:49 AM, Kisaha said:

 You are trying to mix consumers, prosumers and pros in one camera, while even the Varicams are highly specialized professional cameras than noone will say "what should I buy? A Samsung S9+,  GH5 or a Varicam LT?".

As it was being said earlier that good lowlight capabilities are of no benefit for "big budget" shoots, and I was giving the Panasonic Varicam as an example against that. 

10 minutes ago, Snowbro said:

Not a fan of their lens lineup for video

Not even their 18-55mm T2.9?

 

 

[Snowbro]

6 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

Not even their 18-55mm T2.9?

Those Cinema Zooms they have are amazing; I was talking about the ones most of us would buy lol. I usually don't spend $4k on a lens. I wish they had a bunch of cinema primes though.

[thebrothersthre3]

43 minutes ago, IronFilm said:

1) a7Smk3 is a purely hypothetical camera
2) but would it? Am sure Sony will hold back some things, be it 10bit, waveforms, timecode, or more (and give you things you don't want, like record limits or overheating or who knows what next time around)

I mean purely in terms of high ISO performance. That is if they go with the low MP route again. 

24 minutes ago, Snowbro said:

Top pic I posted was XT3, bottom Canon. No surprise, the fuji with LOG & 10 bit helps a lot to prevent highlight blow out. 

Quick thoughts from comparing 1DX ii to XT3 for a few days:

I thoroughly tested AF in different settings/modes on XT3. It seemed to work about as good as the 1DX while testing in my house under decent lighting. Outside, under lighting that wasn't extremely bright (morning/afternoon), it would lose focus many times, even with face tracking + eye detect on (tested at f2). It showed that it had a box on the face + the eye in a few scenarios, but when I checked the footage later, it lost focus for a second at least 5 times in a 10 second clip. When using on a gimbal following someone, if face detection is on, it will jump the AF box to a random spot of the screen when it loses their face. I would click back to mid screen, it finds their face again and when they turn to walk etc. it jumps again to a random focus area after losing the face. The Canon will track regardless if it finds the face and didn't lose focus. 

I would say that the AF is much better than the sony a6500 I had, but I wouldn't rely on it for anything that matters. Indoors, it seems to be fine however. I would use manual focus for most things. 

The AWB is very unpredictable and highly sensitive. I found it to be very inaccurate; I can use AWB on the 1DX and it rarely messes up (once in about 10 hours of video). Oddly enough, the video and photo files from the camera seem to be more sensitive to WB adjustments than the Canon. I can push WB pretty far and have it look normal on the Canon, I barely touch the slider on the XT3 and it looks very blue or yellow. 

Not a fan of their lens lineup for video and no Sigma available. I do think that it is a very good camera though. The image is clean and handles very well in post. Build quality seems good; I did have a few weird freezes where it wouldn't recognize aperture. I will still probably use my 1DX more, I don't push grades extremely far and I don't have to worry about anything with the Canon, I know it's going to do its job when I turn it on. XT3 is pretty mind blowing for the size/price; great choice if you own a bunch of Fuji glass. 

Face detect on the XT3 only works for specific scenarios. I find for gimbal work just using the regular focus modes works way better. 

I hope Fuji does a firmware update improving the face detect auto focus. I think Fuji should have IS on its f2 primes. I really hope Tameron and Sigma start making X mount lenses. 

[Snowbro]

I used the regular mode without face tracking thursday & yesterday, changing the sensitivity and af speed around. It still would drop focus a lot outside; I just switched to MF + peaking. I wish my Canon had peaking, that's the only reason I haven't bought any cine primes for ef.  

[thebrothersthre3]

20 minutes ago, Snowbro said:

I used the regular mode without face tracking thursday & yesterday, changing the sensitivity and af speed around. It still would drop focus a lot outside; I just switched to MF + peaking. I wish my Canon had peaking, that's the only reason I haven't bought any cine primes for ef.  

Yeah it's not perfect, was it very back lit?

[Snowbro]

3 minutes ago, thebrothersthre3 said:

Yeah it's not perfect, was it very back lit?

Anything outside of mid-day sunlight could experience AF dropping/pulsing. I shot to the east & west, so backlit and non. I just really wish Canon didn't have the patents on DPAF lol. How long do they have left on the patent? They have quad pixel af in the works as well

[thephoenix]

i am strongly considering returning my xt3.

the thing is that it is a great camera there are no doubts but to me it lacks one major thing which is stabilization

ok it doesn't have internal stabilization, that's fine.

but if you look at the lenses offer, there is no choice, only a few stabilized lenses and most of them are zoom and nothing bellow f2.8

fuji lacks a larger offer for lenses

i wish i had been able to keep my canon lenses, i have full set of them and don't want to sell them as i would lost to much money and still what to replace them with ?

i was hoping to use an adapter but 2 problems:

- no real reviews of adapters with xt3 for video, the best seem to be the fringer but it doesn't seem to be that great

- no speedbooster at this time, so i would have to buy new lense anyway as my 24 would be a 38 and i won't have any large lens even if i go for the fringer.

 

all others brands have larger lenses offer and that is a pitty that fuji does not push to get stabilized lenses.

i shoot a lot of handheld and don't want to use a gimball all the time, and even then it wouldn't solve my issue with my canon lenses + adapter

don't either want to use post stab as it crops too much

maybe it is better for me to wait a few monthes to see what panasonic will release and get a bmpcc4k that i can use with larger offer of stabilized lenses and that does have speedbooster

[Snowbro]

Get a monopod

[Snowbro]

I havent had the camera in "boost" mode. Will that improve the video AF or anything else pertinent to video?

[Attila Bakos]

11 minutes ago, Snowbro said:

I havent had the camera in "boost" mode. Will that improve the video AF or anything else pertinent to video?

I don't have my X-T3 with me to confirm it, but check page 212 here: http://fujifilm-dsc.com/en/manual/x-t3/x-t3_omw_en_s_f.pdf

[Prandi]

• The boost mode should always be on

[DanielVranic]

14 hours ago, Snowbro said:

I used the regular mode without face tracking thursday & yesterday, changing the sensitivity and af speed around. It still would drop focus a lot outside; I just switched to MF + peaking. I wish my Canon had peaking, that's the only reason I haven't bought any cine primes for ef.  

I can agree with this. With face detect and on my Ronin, I had issues. With all of that set off and then just normal area AF on, have very little issues. But since getting the follow focus motor, I have been fully manual all day and love it

3 hours ago, thephoenix said:

i am strongly considering returning my xt3.

the thing is that it is a great camera there are no doubts but to me it lacks one major thing which is stabilization

ok it doesn't have internal stabilization, that's fine.

but if you look at the lenses offer, there is no choice, only a few stabilized lenses and most of them are zoom and nothing bellow f2.8

fuji lacks a larger offer for lenses

i wish i had been able to keep my canon lenses, i have full set of them and don't want to sell them as i would lost to much money and still what to replace them with ?

i was hoping to use an adapter but 2 problems:

- no real reviews of adapters with xt3 for video, the best seem to be the fringer but it doesn't seem to be that great

- no speedbooster at this time, so i would have to buy new lense anyway as my 24 would be a 38 and i won't have any large lens even if i go for the fringer.

 

all others brands have larger lenses offer and that is a pitty that fuji does not push to get stabilized lenses.

i shoot a lot of handheld and don't want to use a gimball all the time, and even then it wouldn't solve my issue with my canon lenses + adapter

don't either want to use post stab as it crops too much

maybe it is better for me to wait a few monthes to see what panasonic will release and get a bmpcc4k that i can use with larger offer of stabilized lenses and that does have speedbooster

1. Get a Tripod/Monopod/GImbal

2. Did you not do ANY research on this item before you dropped 1500$+ and then complained about it online? In a forum full of people who do their research?

[Mark Romero 2]

4 hours ago, thephoenix said:

i wish i had been able to keep my canon lenses, i have full set of them and don't want to sell them as i would lost to much money and still what to replace them with ?

I am not going to try and tell you what to do, but one thing you should think about is that your Canon lenses - as good as they are  - will still continue to go down in value. I don't expect them to go up in value (unless you have a very rare canon lens that is a true collectors item).

Most likely Canon (and third-party manufacturers) will continue to make lenses for a long time in Canon mount, and some / many will improve upon the lenses you already have. 

Again, not telling you what to do. But if you ever decide which system you want to use, then do realize that whatever lenses you currently own will (most likely) continue to depreciate their value (although generally not as quickly as camera bodies).

[thephoenix]

1 hour ago, DanielVranic said:

I can agree with this. With face detect and on my Ronin, I had issues. With all of that set off and then just normal area AF on, have very little issues. But since getting the follow focus motor, I have been fully manual all day and love it

1. Get a Tripod/Monopod/GImbal

2. Did you not do ANY research on this item before you dropped 1500$+ and then complained about it online? In a forum full of people who do their research?

try using a monopod in car shoots for example or following people.

gimball yes but not always besause i don't always like the too steady effect and using a rig is not always possible when framing at knees level or lower

i don't also want to have tons of accessories like a gimball, a rig and why not a steadycam as i am often shooting by myself.

i did some research and knew it but i thought there were some good adapters or speedbooster, apparently not, my bad

but still can return the body ang get my money back so no pain for me

37 minutes ago, Mark Romero 2 said:

I am not going to try and tell you what to do, but one thing you should think about is that your Canon lenses - as good as they are  - will still continue to go down in value. I don't expect them to go up in value (unless you have a very rare canon lens that is a true collectors item).

Most likely Canon (and third-party manufacturers) will continue to make lenses for a long time in Canon mount, and some / many will improve upon the lenses you already have. 

Again, not telling you what to do. But if you ever decide which system you want to use, then do realize that whatever lenses you currently own will (most likely) continue to depreciate their value (although generally not as quickly as camera bodies).

i know all that but what to replace them with on the fuji side ??

i have 28mm 1.8 stabilized, 50mm 1.2, 85mm 1.2, 100mm 2.8 macro stabilized canon lenses and tamron 24-70 2.8 g2 stabilized

the choice in fuji lenses is pretty small

[Mark Romero 2]

3 minutes ago, thephoenix said:

i know all that but what to replace them with on the fuji side ??

i have 28mm 1.8 stabilized, 50mm 1.2, 85mm 1.2, 100mm 2.8 macro stabilized canon lenses and tamron 24-70 2.8 g2 stabilized

the choice in fuji lenses is pretty small

Ay, there's the rub!

Isn't there an adapter for Canon glass to Fuji X Bodies (like the fringer or something like that???)

Going Off Topic: Is there a reason you aren't interested in the EOS R?

[thephoenix]

adapter yes, fringer seems to be the best, but i haven't seen any review in video mode with it.

and still it is an adapter not a speedbooster and or focal reducer, which means that all my lenses get x1.6

eos r... 4k crop, rolling shutter, price, that's a joke, to me canon is digging it's own grave with their product policy

[TheRenaissanceMan]

17 hours ago, IronFilm said:

As it was being said earlier that good lowlight capabilities are of no benefit for "big budget" shoots, and I was giving the Panasonic Varicam as an example against that. 

Wtf? Do people on this forum even work in production? EVERYTHING with a budget I work on is Alexa with fast lenses close to wide open, big soft LED sources, and practicals that play as real scene lighting. Low light levels are the current flavor, not only for speed (HUGE on paid work where producers are trying to save pennies anywhere they can), but because at those intensities, lighting looks about the same to the eye as it will to camera, as opposed to high levels where you'll often have no idea of your ratios until you pull out a meter or a monitor. This also means controlling your sources, blocking light, and choosing visually conducive locations becomes more important than ever, as your keys aren't nearly bright enough to knock errant light down. 

Maybe we need to make a topic detailing current industry visual and sound techniques, just so we're all on the same page with how things are done now and what matters.

[Cameramoto]

I just bought the fringer ef-fx adapter and it works well with IS lenses and the autofocus works well on recent canon lenses. My Tamron is old I guess so it doesn’t autofocus as fluidly.

[thephoenix]

8 minutes ago, Cameramoto said:

I just bought the fringer ef-fx adapter and it works well with IS lenses and the autofocus works well on recent canon lenses. My Tamron is old I guess so it doesn’t autofocus as fluidly.

good news only problem is the 1.6 crop, i like wide angle