Fujifilm X-Pro

Hey James! I made the same choice 5 years back. Fujifilm XPro3 and now X-H2. I've been enjoying photography so much more knowing I don't need to stare at Lightroom for hours after a day out. I also use my iPad (photos app, USB-C UHS-II reader, albums strategy) to do all my culling now, and couldn't be happier.

This is the opposite of my experience. I went from a D300s kit with about $10k of lenses to Fuji. I had an X100s, then an X-E2, and now an X-Pro3. The X-Pro3 especially is light, has excellent physical controls, and very much feels like a vintage Leica. It's what I'd consider an "art camera" -- not what I'd choose if I were shooting weddings regularly, but perfect for street photography, family stuff, and perfectly capable of higher-end commercial work if you're willing to put up with its quirks. The quirks are the point , though.

They really don't. I regularly take photos outside, at night, in ambient light with my Fujifilm X-Pro3 and 56mm f/1.2. I'm stretching the limits of it a bit, using high ISO and as low a shutter speed as I can get away with. In the same lighting conditions, an iPhone will basically take 3-5 shots and composite them together in software. The result, predictably, is unusable for most moving subjects.

It's so cute. I love the touch of analog on the rear display. I have a XPro3 myself, which was another line they tried these analog features on, and it has been a wonderful camera! If I had to upgrade, the X-E5 is the only other model that appeals to me for now. Also: iPhone cameras don't seem like they're ever going to replace a hard camera for me. They can take incredibly photos, but the processing is just so HDR heavy and approaching Canon's sterile level of accuracy, they don't have the character I want in photos I'd print and display around my home.

> Then soon enough they no longer want to put in the effort. Why, when an LLM can do it perfectly right now? Assuming we get to the point where the output of these models is adequate for the task, I don't think that's a problem. Sure, we'll end up with many fewer poets, playwrights, songwriters, photographers, and the like - but those we do have will be doing it because they're passionate about it. They'll be doing it in spite of the economics, not because of them. I'm in my 40s, and very much a software engineer at this point. I don't want to do anything else professionally if I can help it. Yet, I have a Fujifilm X-Pro3 sitting on my desk right now. I've got about $5k in lenses in my bag, and still love photography. I've done it professionally. I know with certainty that I can sustain my family on it as a career, and I know how much work that is. I'm not interested. Instead, I'm mostly the "official photographer" for my wife's side businesses. I take on jobs here and there for friends and acquaintances when they seem fun and interesting. I do just enough to keep my name out there in the community, so I can fall back to it if my "real job" goes away unexpectedly -- which is always a possibility working for startups! Basically, I do think creative fields will shrink significantly . I agree that we'll see AI-generated art used more and more frequently. The quality will improve - though, honestly, there is already a market of almost unlimited size that wasn't being served by h…

I shoot an X-Pro3 for similar reasons. I still have my previous camera, an X-E2. The “older” Fujifilm bodies can be had for quite little money, relatively speaking.

All of the above applied pretty much equally to Fujifilm at this point, though. I’ve heard it said that Fujifilm is the Leica of the 1970s, today. I think I agree with that. I love my X-Pro3. It’s 100% a choice I made for the joy of photography, not practicality. I considered Leica. I could afford it, but they just didn’t offer anything Fujifilm didn’t outside the brand itself.

> I've often seen photographers use black gaffer tape to hide the prominent camera manufacturer logos. Most of us do that for reasons other than theft protection. It's especially common for street photographers, as an obvious Leica or something will draw attention that we don't want - we want people not to notice us, because our whole goal is to capture things in their "natural setting". I do it - in fact, I bought my camera partially because it doesn't look like a modern pro-level dSLR. It's a Fujifilm X-Pro3, and I've covered the logo with black tape and often use vintage (or vintage-looking) lenses. My intent is for people to assume I'm part of a college art class or something. It gives them an easy way to "put me in a box" in their hears, classify me as understood and unremarkable, then forget about me. Prior to this, I had a silver X-E2. I'll never forget the time I was out shooting with a friend who had a brand new, black, Leica M. Twice people came up to us and spoke only to me, wanting to talk about photography or ask about my camera. I'd picked it up on Craigslist for ~$200 - my friend was standing next to me the whole time with a ~$7k Leica with an amused look on his face. That was the moment I decided I'd never buy a silver camera again.

Not sure what you were using, I don't see that at all with my Fuji kits. I have both a X-Pro 3 and a X-T30 for street photography and both shoot much, much superior pictures than any smartphone is capable of... APS-C is still pretty relevant, your old DSLR might not be up to par to latest smartphone cameras though. And the image processing done by smartphones using AI tend to create weird and ugly artefacts depending on conditions, that doesn't happen with my mirrorless cameras, for example. Have you tried printing smartphone pictures and compare them to your DSLR shots?

One of my favorite thing about the smaller Fujifilm interchangeable cameras is the very encouraged film simulations built in. Editing after taking pictures is my least favorite activity so getting some high-quality well graded shots out of camera makes photography more enjoyable. My camera is an Xpro3.

I have an xpro3 myself and love it. It’s a beautiful little titanium box that takes really lovely photos. It was my entry into the fujifilm ecosystem and I’m looking forward to diving deeper.

I spent some time doing press photography for concerts and couldn't imagine shooting mirrorless during a show. High-action environments demand super low-latency, high-resolution viewfinders. No mirrorless I've handled so far can keep up with an optical SLR. And the crummy digital viewfinders make low-light manual focus into a painful chore. The closest thing I've found is the Fujifilm X-Pro 3's "hybrid" viewfinder. It has a Leica-style rangefinder that can, with the flip of a switch, convert into a digital image like every other mirrorless. It can even overlay the frame and a digital focus preview onto the analog image in the rangefinder as you move it around. It's not useful for concerts - the 23.5x15.6mm sensor is too small - but I photographed some of the the 2020 protests in NYC and the extra field of view in the rangefinder is actually an advantage in that kind of hectic environment.

I have a Fujifilm XPro3. My favorite camera of all time. But I would trade it in for a camera with equivalent specs that runs a proper operating system and supports app development. Cameras are so far behind smartphones in terms of their software that it has become embarrassing. Paying $2000+ for a camera, only to find out your smartphone does a better job of autofocusing and handling noise is just annoying.

As a "serious amateur" photographer at this stage of my life, the last thing I want my camera to do is be "smart". I use a Fujifilm X-Pro3, and while I have a variety of lenses, I almost always have my 23mm f/1.4 mounted. With the crop factor that gives me a "traditional" 35mm focal length. I almost always shoot with fully manual exposure, and only use autofocus about half the time. I chose this kit specifically because I have full control over the image with physical controls to make changes - I can change shutter speed, aperture, ISO, and even dynamic range without taking my eye out of the viewfinder. The X-Pro3 is pretty much made for me and my use case. While it has a "screen", it's folded into the back of the camera and isn't visible unless I manually flip it down. It can't practically be exposed when I'm using the camera normally. It's handy if I want to shoot at waist level or if I want to show someone standing next to me an image... but that's it. I have nothing against "computational photography", and it definitely has its place - but for me, as for most photographers, that place is in post-processing. Adobe is responsible for that stuff, not my camera. I expect my camera to produce a RAW file as an artifact, not an "image".

Yup! I have an X-E1 and I love it to death, but it’s quite long in the tooth these days. I’d love to get a modern X100 or Xpro but Fuji is still recovering from supply chain issues and prices are through the roof. No shade re Sony’s mirrorless cameras, btw. Great cameras. I’m pragmatic about what I shoot and, honestly, the number one reason why I pick up a mirrorless instead of my rangefinder is because I often don’t want to spend my weekend processing and scanning 10+ rolls of film. :-)

While most camera companies have come to focus on full-frame (i.e., 35mm) sensors in the last few years, Fuji has stuck to APS-C (one size down from full frame) and digital medium format (one size up). Fuji’s medium-format line is called GFX; I don’t know too much about it except that it’s well regarded and inexpensive by medium-format standards. I would look into it if you are interested in landscape photography or high-resolution studio work and you are willing to spend serious money to make that happen. Fuji’s APS-C line is focused on producing something which is pleasant to physically handle and use. It’s historically been smaller and handier than full-frame competitors and focused on physical controls for a lot of core settings. The different models within the APS-C range are distinguished as much by their form factors and controls as by their technical capabilities. Some of these advantages have been eroded over the years as they have competed with bigger cameras, particularly in video. But they have just released the X-H2 and X-H2S, targeted at action and event photographers, which should free the classic X-T and X-Pro series to return to their roots. Concrete APS-C models to check out: X-T4 if you want an SLR-style mirrorless with more physical controls; X-Pro3 if you love old rangefinders; X-H2 and X-H2S if you want a PASM dial or heavy video. Fuji is expected to announce the X-T5 on November 2, and the rumors have it looking good, so I’d keep an eye out for r…