Spyro
Well-known
+1, very eagerly. I tried my CV28/3.5 and the corners are smeared to death. I'm still in search of a pancake 28 for this camera. The triplet as well as the CV would be a perfect lens for it, it makes the camera (jacket) pocketable, it gives the "perfect" fov of 40mm, it has a mechanical ring, focus distance markings and a tab and therefore can be focused by feel, with the magnifier on you can use the whole VF and the coverage looks about right.
Another little tidbit, I remember reading an article (can't remember where) which said that this camera will never be any good with any non-retrofocus wide not built for it, mainly because it has a very thick layer of glass on the sensor for some reason. Didnt pay much attention at the time but I had to clear a smudge on my sensor recently, and I thought the swipe stopped way far from where I could see the sensor was. Dont know, maybe I'm just imagining it. Anyone else noticed it?
gavinlg
Veteran
I'd bet an OM zuiko 28mm f3.5 would be sharp to the corners. They're brilliant optically - mine was quite a bit sharper than any of my canon wide angle zooms, plus they're super cheap and almost pancake-ish.
Spyro
Well-known
yeah I have one of those babies, and also a zuiko 24/2.8 which is even better and also tiny, and I'm sure both would work very well. This is not my problem though, I wanted a lens that would make the camera small enough to not require a bag, unfortunately these are SLR lenses and just the adapter would make the camera as deep as an SLR. Also I wanted to focus this blindly, and I prefer a tab for that.
Fuji has promised a pancake 28/2.8, but the roadmap says next year (and unlikely to have mechanical focusing).
There's also the contax G 28/2.8 which is small-ish and can be adapted, but the rear element at infinity goes way too deep for comfort. And I'd have to file down some fins.
Fuji has promised a pancake 28/2.8, but the roadmap says next year (and unlikely to have mechanical focusing).
There's also the contax G 28/2.8 which is small-ish and can be adapted, but the rear element at infinity goes way too deep for comfort. And I'd have to file down some fins.
Did you sell yours yet?
Spyro
Well-known
Ι always enjoyed DAST's blog, and I always had unknown words LOL
what is closed loop AF? Found an article at dpreview, clear as mud.
what is closed loop AF? Found an article at dpreview, clear as mud.
Dante_Stella
Rex canum cattorumque
Thanks... I will add this definition tonight:
Closed-loop focusing means that the camera is looking at the actual focused image to adjust focus. Any passive contrast-detect AF works this way.
Open-loop is everything else - where focus is determined by a measuring method and the lens goes to that point with no post-focusing correction. So Leica-style rangefinders, active IR, and phase-detect autofocus in S mode all fit this category. It is particularly vulnerable to shifts in the focus point that occur when the iris is closed down.
Best,
Dante
Closed-loop focusing means that the camera is looking at the actual focused image to adjust focus. Any passive contrast-detect AF works this way.
Open-loop is everything else - where focus is determined by a measuring method and the lens goes to that point with no post-focusing correction. So Leica-style rangefinders, active IR, and phase-detect autofocus in S mode all fit this category. It is particularly vulnerable to shifts in the focus point that occur when the iris is closed down.
Best,
Dante
Spyro
Well-known
from the definition it sounds as being more accurate/not as fast as open-loop...?
kshapero
South Florida Man
also that I am not as bad a photographer a I thought. Cheers!
semilog
curmudgeonly optimist
Disclaimer: I mainly shoot black and white film on an M. But I look at, and edit, a lot of pictures shot on digital sensors of various formats, and that comment does not add to the discussion. Surely you can do better.
willie_901
Veteran
Dante,
You are indeed a brave man. Telling the truth can make life more complicated.
I though both your articles are fair and accurate.
You are indeed a brave man. Telling the truth can make life more complicated.
I though both your articles are fair and accurate.
semilog
curmudgeonly optimist
If you make a camera that has very high quality lenses, and it has neither IS nor high ISO capability, you will have to use a tripod or other camera support to reliably extract the performance of those high quality lenses. Given that the Barnack ethos is to use the camera handheld and not on a tripod, high ISO capability is the single thing that most improves image quality across a range of real-world field conditions.
It is a big deal and it is the reason that the 5D and the D700 -- and the D7000 -- were breakthrough cameras for Canon and Nikon. Those who dismiss the importance of high ISO either don't shoot in challenging light, or always use a tripod, or don't care particularly about image quality.
These are valid points of view. Much of my recent personal work is shot to film at ISO 80 in moderate light, and is not sharp, but I don't pretend that this setup is technically up to par with what I'd be getting on a leading-edge digital sensor, and I don't pretend that I'm using the glass up to its potential. Clean ISO 1600 would in many situations be a wonderful thing to have.
You can then say "that's what fast lenses are for!" but again, the field of critical focus on an f/1.4 lens -- especially a great one like the 50 Lux ASPH or the XPro's 35/1.4 -- is paper thin, and high ISO means you can actually use moderate apertures. It is worth noting that most of the great pictures in the history of photography were not shot at f/1.4, or even at f/2.8, but at smaller apertures that actually yield some DoF. High ISO dramatically expands the range of conditions under which those sorts of pictures can be obtained. Spend some time looking through books of great photographs across many genres. You will see that this is so.
I will add that my ZM 35/2.8 Biogon-C is more than respectably sharp on a friend's XPro1, right out to the edges (if not the extreme corners). Like Dante, I was unable to generate moiré on fabric or other repeating textures. At 100% colors are true and there's little if any chromatic aberration. Really, really good performance.
True, but many great images were made prior to high ISO capabilities coming into its own. My point is not anti-high ISO... anyone that knows me knows that I use high ISO all of the time (Fuji X cameras). My point is that its importance to MANY is overblown and has become the new "how many megapixels does it have" type concern. Each time new technologies come around everyone makes like the stuff from a year or two ago is garbage... it's nonsensical.
dreilly
Chillin' in Geneva
Is that snark? Reading Dante's review, it's pretty clear he likes the camera, understanding both its limitations and capabilities.
It wasn't "snark." I was under the impression that he didn't like so much about the camera that it was only a matter of time before it is sold. I guess I was wrong. He has been its biggest critic so far....of the people who actually use it.
FA Limited
missing in action
i think his comment was maybe made in reference to Dante's post here:
http://rangefinderforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=118111
Dante's stuff is always good. so logical like always. i think his method of thinking relates to how i look at camera equipment which makes his articles more relevant to me. thanks very much.
Thanks FA....that's correct.
Dante_Stella
Rex canum cattorumque
Most of the time - it really depends on whether your subject (or you) are moving. Closed-loop systems are generally slower, which is why with the X-Pro1 you have to learn to "lead" the subject a little. The gremlin in the test picture on my site moves very quickly.
Some open-loop systems can be equally accurate. The Hexar AF, for example, effects microscopic focus changes in response to the selected aperture. Nikon and Canon SLRs have autofocus compensation that can also be set for specific lenses, although I believe from my D700 that the correction is really only set at one aperture.
The thing to remember is that even an 80th percentile lens, if focused correctly, can beat a 99th percentile lens focused badly. I tend to look at the end result, all-in, because I almost never shoot real pictures on a tripod or using focus bracketing. If you want to see isolation of the lens outside its system (which on a Leica includes the RF train), take a look at how Sean Reid reviews lenses.
Best,
Dante
Some open-loop systems can be equally accurate. The Hexar AF, for example, effects microscopic focus changes in response to the selected aperture. Nikon and Canon SLRs have autofocus compensation that can also be set for specific lenses, although I believe from my D700 that the correction is really only set at one aperture.
The thing to remember is that even an 80th percentile lens, if focused correctly, can beat a 99th percentile lens focused badly. I tend to look at the end result, all-in, because I almost never shoot real pictures on a tripod or using focus bracketing. If you want to see isolation of the lens outside its system (which on a Leica includes the RF train), take a look at how Sean Reid reviews lenses.
Best,
Dante
BobYIL
Well-known
Thank you for the review. Certainly a most insightful one I've read so far. Amazing is always the corner performance of the 35/1.4; stunning! I've remembered a shootout of fast lenses by Sean Reid on an APS-C sensor (RD-1).. I do not believe of finding another 35/1.4 of this class for even double of its cost
http://www.luminous-landscape.com/reviews/lenses/fastlensreview.shtml
TennesseJones
Well-known
Now the thread's stretching into pages, and can't be bullied or biased, I wondered what Bill's more detailed evaluation of the camera was?
Bill Pierce
Well-known
To me, cameras are tools. And there is no camera-tool that does everything. As a working stiff, I’ve got a pretty large toolbox. In the film days it ranged from cameras like the Minilux and Contax T up to an 8x10 view. As first journalism and then much of professional photography turned digital, digital equivalents of most of our working tools appeared. And, in many cases, those digital cameras had significant advantages over their film predecessors.
The one area where this was not true was the rangefinder camera - a camera that was for many, the most important tool in the toolbox.
Let’s look at the film rangefinder’s advantages over the film SLR .
(1) Relatively small and quiet. No problem carrying one ready to shoot and less of a problem attracting attention than when you are shooting with a larger, noisier SLR.
(2) More accurate focus with fast wide-angle and normal lenses used wide open, although this often depended upon cameras and lenses being null-nulled, individually fine tuned, by a skilled repairman.
(3) The availability of high ISO recording films from Agfa and Kodak, and, at the end of the film era, even better low light films like Kodak P3200, complimented the usefulness of the fast lenses and bright line finder in the available darkness world.
(4) The bright line viewfinder allowed you to see what might be out of focus or out of frame in an SLR.
There were other advantages, but these were the main ones. Today, how do the M digitals hold up?
(1) Relatively small and quiet. Still true… But cameras like the Contax T, which were even smaller and had sometimes useful autofocus and autoexposure, were gaining in popularity among rangefinder users at the end of the era of film dominance. Today, the number of digital equivalents to the small T is huge. For many photographers such cameras don’t supplement the rangefinder; they replace it.
(2) More accurate focus. No longer true… Magnified live view, probably the most accurate focus available, is impractical in many situations. Autofocus accuracy varies tremendously over the spectrum of digital brands and camera models. But, certainly, within that spectrum there is focusing more accurate that that of the typical rangefinder. (What worries me is the future of those independent craftsman who could fine tune a set of digital rangefinder bodies and lenses and make a rangefinder’s focusing performance shine. This becomes even more important as a number of manufacturers make M mount lenses. But, at least in the United States, Leitz does not seem to be supporting these people.)
(3) The availability of high ISO… Many other cameras have higher ISO’s with less loss of image quality than the digital M’s.
(4) The bright line viewfinder allowed you to see what might be out of focus or out of frame in an SLR. Still true and still so advantageous in some situations that you see folks using auxiliary bright line finders in the accessory shoes of a number of non rangefinder cameras.
However, the problem the bright line finder had in film days is the same one it has now. It’s not good for macro, long lenses or just looking at the pictorial effect of depth-of-field in picture situations like portraiture. Thus, having to shoot those kinds of pictures, any rangefinder photographer is carrying a double set of gear.
What do I think of the Fuji X-Pro? Relatively small and quiet, very accurate focus with its wide-angle and normal lens wide open, very good high ISO performance, a viewfinder that is both bright line and TTL and a price for a body that is less than 1/4 the price of an M9P - of course I like it. It fills what was the biggest gap in my toolbox. I’m completely infatuated. But I’ve only lived with the Fuji for less than a month. Time will tell whether this is a tawdry affair or match made in heaven. I’ll let you know. I’m hoping for a match made in heaven. (The first step would be for Fuji to cooperate fully with Adobe in setting up a program in Lightroom for the Fuji.)