Paranoid mall.........
This guy was the most annoying security guy I have ever encountered in my life. He followed me and chased me and asked me to delete all images shot on a tripod. But oddly enough, he did not care about snap shops that did not include clearly exposed human faces of famous or specific persons.
I wonder why my iPhone and Samsung phones nail WB always right, it is really amazing how accurate their AWB is.
Compared to that phone's accurate AWB, the AWB of my Sony cameras is really terrible, I always need light meter of some sort to nail the color temp every time when the light gets a bit complex like this scene. Sony AWB and Jpeg really suck.
Obviously, they need to learn something from Apple or Hasselblad, or maybe Phase One.
Here's why I think Fuji will be the next Samsung 4--there is no market for Fuji(updated3)
Fuji community always trash any new model from Canon and Nikon as boring , or the last breed of dinosaurs. They say those D-SLR guys are really doomed.
According to the latest interview of Fujifilm , Nikon has been the biggest loser in this business since about 2013 and most of those left Nikon moved to Fuji X or G, not to Sony or Canon, they repeatedly stressed on this, and they also stressed on no Fuji fullframe because the APS-C X system is already better than any 24mp FF system we can buy now......and they were sure when 32mp next generation X-Trans introduced, it would easily surpass the current 36mp or 42.4mp FF sensor........
Honestly, pretty optimistic claims from a minor camera brand......it sounds very much like dreaming or even lying. I do not think it is realistic, it sounds too optimistic and does not look like honest assessment of their own ILC system at all.
According to Fuji community, the APS-C is the sweet spot of the sensor.
And we do not need FF, the APS-C X-Trans is already better than most of FF, and even serious people do not need to shoot RAW because Fuji Jpeg is much better than any RAW converter we can buy now.
Fuji ignores FF and One inch compact market segments altogether and that two are the only two actually profitable segments of the camera market for the camera makers for years.
Many Fuji ILC fans asking about Fujifilm's FF cameras, but they ignore the request, just like Nikon was telling us DX was the best repeatedly back in 2007 before actually announcing the D3, Fuji is now telling their fan base that the APS-C with the silly X-trans CFA system is the best, sweetspot of ILC.......
But many of their fans want FF and it is a fact, so why they ignore it ? I thought Fuji is the only one camera manufacture that actually listens to their user base.
Like it was the case for the recent fail of Nikon as a camera company, Fuji too seems to have the" too much pride in their own creation( in Fuji's case the so-called X trans )" issue, they never learn to listen to the actual users and market but proud too much about their own products.
In case of Fuji X Trans , they may be even a bit worse than Nikon. I mean where is DXO support for it? where is proper support for it from Capture One, etc? I mean where do we see any of their cameras outside of review sites and Fuji fanatic forums?
I went to Kyoto university in Kyoto prefecture for work and academic conference held at Kyoto international conference center in the north end of Kyoto city..
I attended a social study conference for a couple of days there and after that I traveled there for 4 days with one of my coworkers. I think I visited Kyoto, Uji(a small but important city in the Southern part of Kyoto prefecture), Osaka, Kobe and Himeji.. There are about 2000 world heritage sites around this area, and so most of tourists places in Kyoto, Osaka area have been always very crowded with many foreigners.
After this short academic trip to Kansai, Japan I realized the death of consumer , especially the death of D-SLR thing is greatly exaggerated by extremely gear focused fora online. It is not like D-SLR is dying, but maybe Nikon's consumer class D-SLRs are dying?
In camera fora D-SLRs are said to be already dead for long long time now, and many of aggressive Fuji fanboys mock it every time they get any chance to.
But the sad reality to the Fuji community is any one with any sort of MILC is the odd ball(I am included) out there- out side of the camera gear forum, and mirrorless(especially Fuji X) are still very rare to find in the real world. Honestly, I seldom spot it in any city I have been to recently , let alone in any village.......
The pathetic sells figure of the X system clearly tells it's bleak future-it may die prematurely even before Nikon F that they mock and ridicule as the last breed of dinosaurs every chance they get to.
From what I see in all the places I visited this time, the budget DSLR is far from being dead. And the rebels seem to be still the dominant player of the ILC( regardless of the finder type) at all tourist venues like Kinkakuji, Gion, and many places like that in Kyoto.
And it is the same even at our camera store and most of big electronics shops throughout the East Asia.
I see a lot of people still using budget D-SLRs at many many tourist venues.
Of course more people using cell phones, but my point is almost no budget shooters using so-called MIRRORLESS, and those mirrorless fanatics who are willing to pay about 3k for a camera body usually prefer one of the Sony E mount FFs to a crop tiny sensor mirrorless system like the Fuji or the m43.
The reason why so many young Asian budget shooters still using D-SLRs today may be that, today, a D-SLR kit consisting of camera + a kit lens is so cheap, and offers so much capability in it, it is hard to resist the offered value if you are just starting out this now. All mirrorless cameras are still very expensive to most of average camera buyers and many of them are very stingy(even if they are rich), not like those of us who are obsessed with image quality and the latest and greatest things our money can buy......for many of us 3k for a camera is nothing, but for most of people even 1k is a lot of money for a camera.....and most of mirrorless cameras even the tiny sensor ones(like the X-T2 or the EM1M2) cost over 1.5k......or sometimes more (like the Panasonic G9 or GH5).
The D7500 plus the cheap 18-140mm ED G VR kit lens costs only 1050 USD or so, while the similarly specified Fuji X-T2 with the 18-135mm f3.5-5.6 lens costs more than 2350 US.
So the real reason why MILC is not really outselling D-SLR in the real world is the high price and the relative bad value compared to a decent D-SLR body like the D7200 or the D7500, the Fuji and Olympus bodies are extremely overpriced for the sensor and absolute IQ you can get out of it.
So be careful and do your own research before investing any penny into the bleak looking Fuji X system. I mean I think it wants to be a cheap Leica like system and tries to attract the Leica-wanna-be who can not afford the real Leica or even the A7X but want to have a hipster fashion over performance kind of camera system..........I think this is the market Fuji is really after. But the problem for Fuji is there is no market like that for them.
Those really want to Leica always buy a Leica real Leica, for them nothing else is really a substitute for a Leica.
Those who cannot justify the price of a real Leica but want to use Leica glass buy a FF Sony.
So Fuji will never attract or sway Leica buyers or wanna-be to Fuji system with the camera like the X-T2 or X-Pro2 , which may look like an old Leica but cannot fully utilize the coveted Leica glass........because of the tiny APS-C sensor and the odd crop factor comes with it.
Well then, why is Fuji so popular among the online camera fanatic forums?
In many forums , still people just simply prefer Nikon or Fuji over Canon or Sony, whose tech background and base is always based around their respective electronics field and many of old camera fanatics of my father's age simply despise or having some strong aversion towards Canon , Sony, Panasonic, etc, they simply prefer those so-called real camera makers(like Nikon, Fuji, Leica, Pentax,etc).
My father always say Canon is a printer or robotic company, Sony is an insurance company, and Panasonic is a TV brand, nothing more or less.....he simply hates them all and he always prefers his Nikon over them.
And many of his generation here think the same way and kind of looking down those electronics companies that also run camera business.
But in the real world, outside of the extremely prejudiced old fart dominating camera fora , Canon has been always the no 1 and many East Asian tourists using them or some of Sony E mount products, even the already dead (according to Nikon guys)Sony A mount cameras are more popular than Nikon or Fuji among young Asian, European or even local tourists we see in Kyoto.
I think the reason why they all prefer Canon or sometimes Sony, sometimes m43 over Nikon or Fuji is that the fast LV focus of those are much more practical for their shooting style. In LV video mode, the Nikon bodies are like snails in the East China sea; they are extremely slow in LV mode, even the latest best D850 and D7500 are very very slow, well I admit that by Nikon standard, it is faster than the older models say the D7000, maybe ? but it still very slow compared to any Canon, Sony or m43 cameras in video or LV mode.
Fuji is also very slow in LV AF mode, and their video is really dated, even the Fullframe priced expensive APS-C X-Pro2 did not get proper 4k treatment until recently.
And most of young tourists interested in dedicated cameras always want hybrid-ability in any of their new cameras , and they really seem to use both motion and stills equally and blend them together to make new type of creative work of their own style easily.
So for this market, Fuji has no chance to win because they have the worst AF and worst video in mirrorless world, and on top of all that, there is the X-trans issue.
Then what about older more dedicated stills kind of tourists market?
Well they all prefer FF regardless of the finder type and those seem to prefer Nikon, Sony or sometimes Canon, and if they can afford or justify the cost of Leica, they prefer Leicas.
And the high-ranked pro commercial market is now dominated by Phase, and no chance for other brand, especially a half frame format like the Fuji GFX.
Then what about the budget pro commercial market?
Well now they are dominated by Sony A7RX with high-end Zeiss and Sony GM lenses.
I think if the GFX had a decent flash system and a set of proper leaf shutter lenses , then they might have had some chance beating Sony and Nikon in this budget commercial market, but as they obviously(decidedly) omit it(in favor of the old legacy lens adaptability) in the GFX, they will have no chance, can't hold a candle to the Sony E mount system..or the Hasseblad X1D system.
So despite of all small mirrorless hypes, all the serious gear obsessed high-end camera buyers buy the FE Sony, all the budget shooters still choose the cheap Nikon or Canon or maybe Sony A6000 kind.
And high-end commercial and landscape guys still choose Phase, if they cannot afford Phase, then maybe Hassy or Sony......
So the problem for Fuji is there is no market for their products.
Despite of the occasional internet hypes and despite of the crazy worship for their Kaizen BS, Fuji seems really doomed and many people now begin to see the much hyped overrated Kaizen policy is just a very cunning way of dishonest business practice that often misguided users and reviewers think a huge plus of Fuji system..but it is actually a big minus of that system.
Basically, what Fuji calls Kaizen is releasing a series of half-baked beta-stage products and use the early adapters who pay big full Fuji asking price for every Fuji product they buy as beta testers to help Fuji sort out all potential issues and fix these issues with a series of subsequent FW updates.
So it really is cheating their users, there is no reason to appreciate it or rate them higher than others for the Kaizen policy.
Now I think I am convinced Fuji will be the next Samsung, they have spent extraordinary R and D money for their unprofitable camera business, their camera business was profitable in the last two years because of the Instax film camera sells.
Now the Instax boom is ceasing, and Fuji has to make some money from their X system and G system digital camera sells while decreasing their disproportionately huge R&D money for their ILC products.
Yeah Fuji is a big company with very strong financial state, but their shareholders are not very happy about Fuji's business strategy of wasting a disproportionately huge amount of R and D money into dying stills camera business.
And they will eventually force Fuji out of the market, or the investors will force Fuji to rectify their ILC business rapidly.
And their time seems to be running out now.
UPDATE: Fuji X is becoming more popular than I thought it is.
I met a few Fuji X shooters in Hokkaido, and I tried their lenses for a few minutes and I was quite impressed but the real core issue of the X system (the lack of true ISO100 issue)
that I have been writing about since my first X-Pro2 experience is still not fixed or even not sorted out yet.
I think the crop cameras really need lower base ISO value to get the same light gathering power of the FF and therefore the lack of ISO100(better be ISO32) on all Fuji bodies is a huge issue, in fact , it is the biggest issue for me.
Also, as I wrote they must develop a set of Loxia or Voigtlander like modern high quality manual focus primes, or just ask Coshina and Zeiss to join their system.
To me the real reason I always choose Sony E mount over anything else is not its being FF or hybrid-4k-ability but the Loxia and Voigtlander primes.
I actually wish all makers to make lenses like that in native system with all needed electronics chips inside.
At least, Sony has had the courage to open the mount and let Zeiss , Voigtlander, Laowa, etc do whatever they want to do for that system. To me most of Sony's own lenses are not interesting , the Batis line is also boring, the Tokina lenses are boring, the Samyang may be good but not very interesting to me.
So if it's not for the Loxia or the Voigtlander 40 and 65, I may have left out of the Sony system a year a go.
Sure it is not a huge market but a very solid profitable market.
I really cannot understand why the other lens makers cannot try the Loxia kinda lenses?
Not every one wants boring AF lens like the Batis line or the Sony's own FE lenses.....and if they want that , then there are many options already. Lack of those kind of lenses is the biggest reason why crops systems are boring, not because of the sensor or noise........since all IQ related values are relative to your DOF choice and required shutter speed for the scene.
IOW, there are many situations where FF produces noisier images than APS-C or m43 or even One if the scene is DOF limited and use of a tripod or super slow shutter speed is not your option.
UPDATE2:IMHO, the biggest problem with any crop sensor ILC system is that they do not have anything really wide or manual focus-able lenses such as the Voigtlander 12mm f5.6 or Sony FE12-24mm f4G.
To me , m43 and all tiny APS-C sensor format are dead systems and I think they should be even more doomed than Nikon or Canon D-SLR dinosaurs. If I need to go 12mm equivalent wide on m43, I'd need a 6mm prime or wider, but there are no such lenses in that system, I think Fuji's situation is even worse, they do not even have 15mm lens equivalent in the current X line.......and even worse there is no real manual focus prime options, I think the high quality modern manual focus prime market is not huge but a very profitable important one indeed, the current boom of the Loxia and Voigtlander primes proves that, and it is one of the main reasons why I shoot Sony.
The widest lens Fuji X has seems to be the XF10-24mm zoom and 10mm on APS-C is just like my Laowa 15mm f2D on my A7RX cameras and it is not wide enough for many things.
Now Fuji X-H1 is confirmed out and specification seems to be pretty impressive, but it is unnecessarily huge for a crop body.
It is bigger than most of Sony FF bodies, and even bigger than the mostly video focused GH5s from Panasonic, and I think it is embarrassing, showing how inefficient the Fuji's electronics surroundings around the sensor are.
The Panasonic G9 is a great body, no doubt about that and I personally want one, but why is it so huge designed based around the tiny sensor?
We compare it to our A7R3 side by side, and realize the latest tiny sensor mirrorless cameras are bigger than their FF rivals, not much bigger but wider and taller than the A7R3 by a quite clear margin.
I think Fuji and m43 are both heading to completely wrong direction trying to keep up with Sony A7RX and D-SLR in absolute performance.......this is exactly what Olympus Panasonic did to their original FT format system to kill its system charms.
I guess their marketing guys are really obtuse-- never learn anything from their past mistakes.
Now, I am quite sure the next Samsung NX would be either the m43 duo or the Fuji X system, but honestly I think it will be the Fuji that ceases next.
The m43 at least has video or hybrid shooters with them and I always have one of their bodies for video needs as I do not like FF for video.
But there is no market for the Fuji system, well actually there is but they do not listen to the niche fanatic voice calling for more serious manual lenses or wide angle lenses.
UPDATE3: the biggest flaw of the Fuji system is the X trans sensor but what is the second biggest problem of that system?
Well, it is the lack of true ISO 100, let alone the ISO32 that is what the system really needs to shine or equal to ISO100 base ISO of most of FF bodies.
UPDATE4: it is really odd to me that no one really starting any "coming death of m43 " threads in any camera forum although it is definitely the most doomed system with the advent of the one inch super zoom cameras such as the RX10MK4 and Panasonic FZ2000.
The One and the m43 both have the same 20mp resolution and the One is backside illuminated and the m43 is not.
So the IQ is basically not much different , the One just needs a bit faster lens to over come the smaller sensor size over the m43.
But if one really needs a big sensor advantages , then he or she would have to go up to at least APS-C anyway.
Now I think Fuji was very wise when they chose APS-C as their smallest ILC camera format. APS-C is the smallest acceptable ILC sensor format in the near future and it is obvious because of the advent of the RX10 and FZ200 type of One cameras.
So it is really odd no one talks about the coming death of m43 but many talk about the coming death of Nikon or Canon , or Fuji.
Honestly, take a honest look at m43 financial reports, they are pathetic , their future seems really bleak. Nikon is at least in much better shape than the m43 duo. Fuji is far better now and Canon is in a totally different world.
Honestly there is nothing more doomed than m43 now, only diehards try to deny it.
