Fuji X-T3 released

Jim Feeley said:
And bigger savings if you buy an X-T3 body bundled with a 56mm f1.2, 16mm f1.4, or 10-24 f4 lens.
https://www.fujirumors.com/fujifilm...o-1000-on-x-t3-x-h1-gfx-and-x-g-mount-lenses/

OTOH, the 16-80mm f4 is still backordered most everywhere. :-(
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I have verified that the new XF16-80mm f/4.0 OIS still has the exposure compensation issue that plagues almost all of the XF zooms. Just beware that if you shoot reality, events or documentary where you could be rolling and need to slightly re-frame using the zoom, the camera and lens produces a very pronounced exposure compensation
jump as you zoom the lens, both ways. There is no way in the menu to disable this. So if you shoot event, documentary type programming, you basically have useless footage whenever even slightly adjusting the zooms focal length.

All good if you can afford the MKX zooms but for those of us who are trying to work with new lenses like the XF 16-80 f/4.0 OIS, the lens is close to usesless for my kind of work. It's very disappointing, so much so that I have even been thinking of selling all of my Fuji gear and switching brands, which I am really loathe to do because other than the focus twitching and exposure compensation when zooming, I love my XT-3. If you only shoot primes, then your only issue is the focus twitching and it's with all lenses, not just the XF. I've had bad focus twitching with my Canon primes as well on the XT-3.

If Fuji doesn't come up with a fix soon for the focus twitching, I may have to bail in Fuji. I mainly bought the XT-3 as a gimbal camera and if I can't use AF and cant reframe focal length while shooting, I need to find something that works.
 
I just bailed on my X-T3, Dan. Between the AF issue and trying to match with my FS5 I just had enough (the latter isn't Fuji's fault). Great color , bit depth, etc. but this AF issue really killed me on a few shoots. As far as I know Fuji has known about this defect for months and has done nothing so far...
 
scorsesefan said:
I just bailed on my X-T3, Dan. Between the AF issue and trying to match with my FS5 I just had enough (the latter isn't Fuji's fault). Great color , bit depth, etc. but this AF issue really killed me on a few shoots. As far as I know Fuji has known about this defect for months and has done nothing so far...
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I know, I too am getting frustrated. I really like the camera but the focusing issue is kind of a drag and tempers my enthusiasm for the camera. I'm going to talk to Fuji service to see if I can get them to downgrade my firmware back to 2.X. At least the AF wasn't twitching so much.
The exposure compensation thing too is a bummer as I really need something like the XF16-80mm f/4.0 OIS or even for my XF18-55mm f/2.8-4.0 OIS to just work so I can reframe during shoots. You can't really shoot documentaries nearly as effectively with just using zooms as
variable primes. I roll constantly and have captured some magical things when I was rolling and moved the zoom to reframe. The exposure compensation has ruined some many great shots.

Problem is, I really need good AF and the only other two mirrorless I would consider as far as AF would be Sony A7 III possibly or a Canon EOS R or RP so I could use all of my EF glass.
I like the GH5 but the AF is whack and the S1H looks interesting and supposedly has better AF but then I have to buy bunch of expensive new lenses to work with it. What else is there for
mirrorless? I hate the Sony color science so thats a tough sell for me. And I tried out the EOS R and RP and was left underwhelmed but I might have to reconsider.

Or maybe Fuji will fix these issues and I can keep the XT-3? It's a lot of compromises. I could rig up the FF motor that came with my Crane 2 and try to manually focus using the gimbal, that could possibly work. And just train myself to NEVER roll when touching the zooms focal length ring. Or only shoot with my XF16mm f/1.4 WR and just pretend that zooms don't exist?
 
Sony color science is different than what it was. Canon's new auto focus (on R and RP) brings it on level with Sony. Sony's still 8-bit, which doesn't matter as much if one shoots baked-in.

And I'd threaten to sue Fuji for de facto disabling auto focus on XT-3.
 
Yeah, you can't work that way. Not in documentary... I just picked up an A7III, actually. The timing was good because it was the night before Fuji started offering the deals again on the X-T3 so I was able to get a good deal in trade for the Sony ;)... Maybe the EOR R?.. Economics/ergonomics sort of forced me into the Sony camp and now that I'm in I've gotten used to their color science but if $ was no option I'd be shooting on a C200 right now...
 
puredrifting said:
I know, I too am getting frustrated. I really like the camera but the focusing issue is kind of a drag and tempers my enthusiasm for the camera. I'm going to talk to Fuji service to see if I can get them to downgrade my firmware back to 2.X. At least the AF wasn't twitching so much.
The exposure compensation thing too is a bummer as I really need something like the XF16-80mm f/4.0 OIS or even for my XF18-55mm f/2.8-4.0 OIS to just work so I can reframe during shoots. You can't really shoot documentaries nearly as effectively with just using zooms as
variable primes. I roll constantly and have captured some magical things when I was rolling and moved the zoom to reframe. The exposure compensation has ruined some many great shots.

Problem is, I really need good AF and the only other two mirrorless I would consider as far as AF would be Sony A7 III possibly or a Canon EOS R or RP so I could use all of my EF glass.
I like the GH5 but the AF is whack and the S1H looks interesting and supposedly has better AF but then I have to buy bunch of expensive new lenses to work with it. What else is there for
mirrorless? I hate the Sony color science so thats a tough sell for me. And I tried out the EOS R and RP and was left underwhelmed but I might have to reconsider.

Or maybe Fuji will fix these issues and I can keep the XT-3? It's a lot of compromises. I could rig up the FF motor that came with my Crane 2 and try to manually focus using the gimbal, that could possibly work. And just train myself to NEVER roll when touching the zooms focal length ring. Or only shoot with my XF16mm f/1.4 WR and just pretend that zooms don't exist?
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Yeah the A73 might be your best bet. Although if you shoot 4k, overheating is a real problem. Just had a camera overheat today shooting 4k 30p. Wasn't in sunlight either, though the room was a bit how from the hotlights, not crazy though. I've heard the A7R3 is a bit better in that regard. HLG really seems to help with the color issue on Sony's.

I almost bought a EOS R, but the canon cripple hammer was too much. If it could do 1080p 10 bit to a external recorder I would have been in, but they gimped that too.

Seriously considering a Nikon Z6 at this point. Lots of lens choices, decent AF, no overheating (from what I know?). I will be keeping my fuji's though.
 
Haven't heard much about A7III overheating -- hope mine doesn't... The 8 bit thing is a bit of a drag on the Sony cams, but as long as you don't stretch the image too much it's not too bad. I have to say, the low light and DR on the A7III is really impressive...
 
Side note - the latest Olympus firmware upgrades made their auto focus really accurate. It's an MFT sensor but cameras are getting excellent reviews on video performance.
 
scorsesefan said:
Haven't heard much about A7III overheating -- hope mine doesn't... The 8 bit thing is a bit of a drag on the Sony cams, but as long as you don't stretch the image too much it's not too bad. I have to say, the low light and DR on the A7III is really impressive...
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I hate Sony Color science, it's really bad.
My producing partner has a Sony A7 SII and it overheats at the drop of a hat. If Sony hasn't tamed that, no way would I go with Sony
The Sony video specs are a joke, 100Mbps and 8-bit is five years out of date. Would be hard to go to that after having 400Mbps and 10-bit.
 
puredrifting said:
I have verified that the new XF16-80mm f/4.0 OIS still has the exposure compensation issue that plagues almost all of the XF zooms. Just beware that if you shoot reality, events or documentary where you could be rolling and need to slightly re-frame using the zoom, the camera and lens produces a very pronounced exposure compensation
jump as you zoom the lens, both ways. There is no way in the menu to disable this. So if you shoot event, documentary type programming, you basically have useless footage whenever even slightly adjusting the zooms focal length.

All good if you can afford the MKX zooms but for those of us who are trying to work with new lenses like the XF 16-80 f/4.0 OIS, the lens is close to usesless for my kind of work. It's very disappointing, so much so that I have even been thinking of selling all of my Fuji gear and switching brands, which I am really loathe to do because other than the focus twitching and exposure compensation when zooming, I love my XT-3. If you only shoot primes, then your only issue is the focus twitching and it's with all lenses, not just the XF. I've had bad focus twitching with my Canon primes as well on the XT-3.

If Fuji doesn't come up with a fix soon for the focus twitching, I may have to bail in Fuji. I mainly bought the XT-3 as a gimbal camera and if I can't use AF and cant reframe focal length while shooting, I need to find something that works.
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1. Focus twitching will be fixed in a firmware update, in the next month or two.

2. Fuji zooms all have that flicker issue during zooming, it's not exposure compensation. It's the aperture changing to facilitate movement of lens elements, it's part of the lens design.
 
Can't really get mad at stills lenses for not delivering for motion work - their design parameters are chasing such wildly different objectives.

Fuji will no doubt address the focus twitching soon (at the very least, bring it back to how it was before the v3 firmware - which everyone seemed fine with).

The S1H had me briefly pondering whether I should switch from the Fujis over to the Panasonic (which is perhaps the only large-sensor mirrorless camera that can trump the XT-3 at the moment). But as I dug down into it, there's so little between them. The S1H can do 4k 10-bit 4:2:2 @ 400Mbps up to 24p or 30p, but for everything else, it's maxes out at the XT-3's 400Mbps 10-bit 4:2:0 level (albeit at 6k up to 24p). So, given that both are downsampling to 4k from a 24-26mpx sensor at the same bitrate and colour sub-sampling, there didn't seem enough justification (especially as I've now been able to pick up a speedbooster to use my full-frame cinema lenses with the Fuji).

I just don't know what other options are out there that wouldn't either be a side-step, or a step backwards, compared to the Fuji.
 
I think the best options in terms of IQ right now, in the <$5k market, are S1H, XT3, and p4k/p6k. The blackmagics are superior for me (I love shooting RAW) but they're worthless for anybody who wants to use AF. And the cameras with really good AF (Sony and Canon) are a clear step down in terms of IQ (maybe two steps down in the case of Canon).

I think great AF requires more engineering power than great IQ nowadays, so I expect Sony to be the first to offer both great IQ and great AF. But they've been letting me down for a couple years already, so I won't get my hopes up.
 
Yes Samuel, I certainly agree with everything you said. It seems like currently in that market we only get one or the other when it comes to great IQ and great AF. At RedUser, Jarred mentioned that the upcoming RED Komodo will have PDAF. It will be interesting to see how it compares to other cameras like the Sonys and Canons when it is finally available. Then again the RED Komodo may be slightly above the <$5K market.
 
puredrifting said:
I hate Sony Color science, it's really bad.
My producing partner has a Sony A7 SII and it overheats at the drop of a hat. If Sony hasn't tamed that, no way would I go with Sony
The Sony video specs are a joke, 100Mbps and 8-bit is five years out of date. Would be hard to go to that after having 400Mbps and 10-bit.
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Agreed. My primary reasons for choosing the A7III was matching my A-cam and the AF, which Fuji failed me on. I've sort of got used to the Sony look and have come to accept their color science as not so much "bad" but different. It's a bit more neutral than Canon or Fuji CS and yes, sometimes the skin tones are pretty unpleasing. But 8 bit in a 2018 camera that retails for $400-$500 more than the X-T3 is a real compromise...
 
I tolerate Sony FS7/F55 color. I really like Sony Venice color (though I've only worked on a couple projects with it, so I'm not an expert). So I'm intrigued to see how the FX9 and FX6 look in the real world.
 
scorsesefan said:
Agreed. My primary reasons for choosing the A7III was matching my A-cam and the AF, which Fuji failed me on. I've sort of got used to the Sony look and have come to accept their color science as not so much "bad" but different. It's a bit more neutral than Canon or Fuji CS and yes, sometimes the skin tones are pretty unpleasing. But 8 bit in a 2018 camera that retails for $400-$500 more than the X-T3 is a real compromise...
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If Sony would just offer a 10bit out on their cameras.
 
marvinhello said:
1. Focus twitching will be fixed in a firmware update, in the next month or two.

2. Fuji zooms all have that flicker issue during zooming, it's not exposure compensation. It's the aperture changing to facilitate movement of lens elements, it's part of the lens design.
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Hi Marvin:

1. Source?

2. You are sure the exposure compensation is designed into each lens? If that's true, that's really disappointing because it means that no defeat can be built into the camera's firmware.

Hmm...maybe I wont sell my Fuji gear yet. If they fix the focus AF twitching, that would be huge for me. The exposure compensation I will eventually get around by buying the MKX 18-55 t/2.9. I most shoot the XT-3 on gimbal where I use primarily the XF16mm f/1.4 so the zoom thing doesn't matter in that scenario.
I've been looking at alternatives. While I don't think it will look as good as the XT-3, it would ironically be the Canon 90D that would appeal to me more than the EOS R or RP. 90D has standard S35 1.5x crop versus the 1.75X of the EOS R and RP. Less rolling shutter too although I would lose 10-bit from the XT-3 and
Log. I don't plan on ever buying any RF lenses so the mirrorless Canons just don't look very appealing for the money. Most importantly, I know the DPAF on the 90D will romp all over the Fuji's mediocre AF. And most of my Canon EF lenses don't have exposure ramping on zooming. But I know the image from the XT-3 will be superior.

Ughh, as usual, the cameras we buy get 70% of the way there, but there are always 30% gotchas.
 
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sgttom said:
If Sony would just offer a 10bit out on their cameras.
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And greater than 100Mbps data rates, that's joke for UHD or DCI, it adds noise to the recording, artifacts, macroblocking. I personally think anything shooting UHD should be 160-200Mbps minimum and preferably more.
 
Jim Feeley said:
I tolerate Sony FS7/F55 color. I really like Sony Venice color (though I've only worked on a couple projects with it, so I'm not an expert). So I'm intrigued to see how the FX9 and FX6 look in the real world.
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The tests I've seen with the new S-Cinetone, I thought it looked pretty great. Not as good as Canon skin tones but 85% as good. I agree, the Venice looks great, but at that price, I'd spend more for the Alexa Mini LF. Just for me, nothing still looks as good as the Arris.
 
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