Tag Archives: Fujifilm X100F

Black & White, Inspired Eye, Philosophy of Street

February 27th, 2017 … Mojo and Andre’ the Fujifilm X100F

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Let me start off with saying this is not my best work. It’s not Andre’ the Fuji X100F’s fault. Most decide to blame the camera when they aren’t hitting well. I don’t I am accountable to myself first and foremost.

Restless sleep last night as always and with most Vets. But this was different. Instead of seeing bad dreams and visions, I was seeing Andre’ in my hand and around my neck and we were walking and just relaxing . We need to get to know each other. Now, I live in Philadelphia, USA, the home of Freedom and Liberty and even soft pretzels. So, walking down the streets talking to my camera may seem odd but it’s acceptable.

Anyone can buy and use a Fuji X100F or any of the Fuji cameras. It’s that simple…..but there exist a small esoteric group of believers in Magic, Love and MOJO. I am a proud member. I would rather be out looking for the photos that are looking for me. That means I need as little of intrusions as possible. Just like magic, intrusions will break the spell  of love.

Photography is about love. Love of being a human with a camera, seeing, the lovely sense of vision, the feeling of being an observer and trying to understand what lay in front of our lens. It’s about passion and the way that passion drives our heart to want to make photos. It’s about looking at our photos and just being so satisfied and not worrying about others think or feel.

Photography is about communication and the dialog we get with ourselves and with others. It’s about gear and if you don’t love your gear, it’s not right, get rid of it. If your not attached to your camera, poof! It’s about love, the love of seeing, the love of feeling, the love of living and the realization that we are merely visitors on the planet for an undefined  period of time. We as photographers have the gift and responsibility to show what life and the planet looked like while we lived.

I write about this because I have a passion for life and photography that never ceases to burn. So what does this have t do with the Fuji X100F? Ok, here’s the way it is for me. I am totally in love with photography. That means that I must be totally in love with my camera. It must love me in return. I know you’ll find this hard to believe, but trust me, at my age, I have seen a thing or two. Rumor has it that there are many shooters that think and feel of their camera as a tool. Shhhhhhh!

I can’t fathom that. I mean really. A camera is a tool. We all have our rights to think and do as we please. Even if that’s like some kind of detachment to things, it’s sad to me.

Andre’ the Fuji X100F is a fine camera and will be a close friend in a short period of time. For the time being, We need to shoot JPEGs because Adobe is taking their time. Affinity does the X100F raw files and works well. I hear Silkypix does also. The thing is, when I get into this situation and am forced to use JPEGs, I start to rethink things. Look at the photo above. This is bright sunlight. The dark tones in the windows holds detail easily.

The highs like the statue’s feet, there is detail. Maybe you can’t see it so well on the screen but I dang sure can on the original. This is SOOC. Amazing. I’m using Acros for these and will try Acros+r soon. Maybe I don’t need raw as much as I thought. I mean, this is better then fine. That’s really what I’m doing right now, testing the camera. I have to tell you, Andre’ is a champ.

It’s fitting Andre’ would make a photo like this. I uses M Focus mostly and at f11. I’m focused at 7.7′ and that gives me 3.8′ to infinity. Same as if I was using my M camera and a 35mm lens. The other thing is I use M Mode with auto ISO. The meter in the X100F is really tuned. It doesn’t get fooled but contrast range. Ya get 3 auto ids settings, plus L & H.

So, say you wanted to work in your own way. well normal people would kinda set the high limit to maybe 6400. Perhaps they would set the low limit to 200.

Well, what if you wanted to over expose you frame? I mean I do that all the time well not all the time but a lot of the time and it works. In Manual mode proper, you set 3 points of exposure. Aperture, shutter and ISO. Fuji put the Exp Comp on a dedicated dial and I never use it. I’d like that to be programmable. So, that’s like the purist way to use M Mode. Changing any one of the points will either make an under exposure or over exposure.

I like Auto ISO and the X100F does it very well. So, if I set the limits on Auto ISO in a way that would intentionally over or under expose, for me it’s more fulfilling. It allows me to think about exposure in a way that allows me to design the tonal range.

Above is also SOOC. Kinda scary to me because it’s all there. Her face is visible and that’s an achievement in itself. The shadow detail is utterly amazing. JPEG, out of camera, hmmmmm? Adobe better get their act together quickly. Look at the mid tones and even the highs. The detail is super. The X100F does exactly what I need a camera to do and then some.

I’m not selling these cameras, recommending this camera, just using it.

I am not a X Shooter or whatever they are labelled. I certainly have interviewed many X Shooters. It’s not about that, it’s about a camera for me that does what I need it to do, that creates a symbiotic love affair with me and that provides an internal satisfaction to live as a shooter.

There is a feeling of creative freedom that I must have or I don’t work. I watch CNN and get ranty. No good at all. I’m only a few days with Andre’ the Fuji X100F but I see the path ahead and it’s gonna be a pretty picture, I tellya. I did do some very low light stuff with AF and this camera is not the fastest and none are but it’s extremely accurate. Hey, look… if your in low light, what the heck is the big hurry?

I did some work on theis because I wanted to see if the tones would block up. Ya know how when ya lower the highs a lot they get that funky gray tones, This doesn’t. The shadows are all there and it seems that Fuji did a bang up jog on the X100F

What it comes down to is….. for me a camera is more then a tool. (The Horror!) My cameras are my friends, my companions, my collaborators in my creative life. I name my camera’s because they are a part of me and I am a part of them.

The Fujifilm X100F is a great friend. If you see it as a tool, be blessed and I hope someday you see fit to name your camera. If you don’t and it’s just a tool, good, it’s a great tool. For me, there are windmills out there and Andre’ the Fuji X100F and I are out to find them and conquer our fears of being a human Being.

I’ll do more in a day or so.

 

Dreamcatcher, Philosophy of Street, Street Photography

February 26th, 2017 … Fujifilm X100F … (but not only)

32 Comments

FujiFilm X100F jpg OOC

So, I am going backward but I think I have to. It was Friday and the weather was nice and I wanted to go and work. I got a note from Adorama that my camera has shipped and would arrive Friday.

So I told Tanya that I didn’t feel like going to the VA and I just wanted to sit on the couch. Not just on the couch but the precise spot where I can see the door and out the window when UPS arrives.  I had that kinda nervous twitch and also the look of fear on my face, nah… all over me in fear of missing the long awaited knock on the door. She looks at me and raises her eyebrow and just,,,, hmmmm. I think maybe she found out that I’m in the “waiting for my new camera so leave me alone to sweat and just let me breathe mode. She ask me if I want coffee and I said no because I’d be painting the walls and then cleaning the house nervously. No, I’ll sit this one out. Tanya walks to the kitchen, CNN is on and I’m just like in limbo but it’s not limbo because the frigging world is moving and I don’t have my camera! She say’s Donusha,( semi Russian for Donald. I made the name up and her family agrees that I am part Russian. Please don’t tell CNN or Congress or Pres Trump. ) She ask me what I’m waiting for? Uh oh, she knows the mode I’m in. I’m dead I tellya, it’s over, the wife finds out about a new camera and nothing for her move, it’s not pretty I tellya, it damn sure ain’t gonna be pretty. Then, harken, I hear the voice from an angel, an angel sent from mother Light and Father FujiFilm…. is this the new Andre’ camera’?

GASP! The Horror! Oh, you mean the camera I’m waiting for, sure, it’s the new X100F but hold on, I have to watch Jake Tapper.  I’m pushing 68 real hard but not yet, oh no…not yet. I remember when I was young when Mom got us all a present, well the feelings I had them followed my all thru these years.

I would be all excited and feeling special and loved, well that’s how I’m feeling now. So, now I know Mommy, er…Tanya won’t be mad at me for buying a new camera. All is well in the universe and I’m feeling….hey, wait a minute… where’s the damn UPS truck? Ya think he dares to make stops before he gets to me, nahhh, I don’t believe that for a minute. Tanya brings me a cup of black tea with lemon. I inhale it in .3 sec. I have not mover from this sit and wait for UPS spot in a few hours.

My face is sweating and I’m fighting my natural water waste removal system. she looks at me and smiles, would you like me to do the waiting duty while you go pee? I told you she was an angel and I smile and make it upstairs to the bathroom in .7 sec flat. A new record. I spend more time then I wanted doing the Lizard Draining Procedure. shake, wash hands and back on duty in less then 3 min.

So, I’m waiting and then, all the sudden FEDEX comes down the street. Sooo anti climatic. I pick up the iPad and look at messages from Olivier and some other ppls about things that I am normally concerned about but at this minute I don’t remember what planet I’m on and don’t care BECAUSE UPS IS HERE! The guy, like the Santa Clause of Photography hands me the box. This is the box from the never ever land of FujiFilm. This is the box that contains my beloved Andre’. Adorama as so many times is right on the money and they mad me happy again.

So I need to be cool right. I mean Mrs Shooter is sitting there looking at me and I have to restrain myself and act as this is no big deal. I sit on the couch and holding the box on my lap. Inside me is this teen boy that is looking at the most beautiful girl ever existed and she wants to kiss me. This is a metaphor and for real, don’t come close to my excitement about this camera.

So I just sit and then Tanya says, “aren’t you going to go upstairs and open the box”? Before the question was finished, I was upstairs in my office, had the box open and everything laid out neatly on the desk. There, there on the desk where all cameras from recent history have been given their name and birthday sits the still unnamed Fujifilm X100F.

I feel this familiar energy buzzing around my head and heart… it say’s, yo pop, let me go home already. Quickly I close the door to the office, Barsik the Cat is lying on the floor watching. I close the blinds on the window and then walk to the unnamed Fujifilm X100f and pick it up. I close my eyes and raise the camera to the sky and I chant, and then there was Andre’. The energy used as Andre’ transforms into the camera henceforth named, Andre’ the Fuji X100F is miraculous. I place Andre’ on the desk and look at the manual. He says, shooter, put a battery in and a card. Together we will make the path we follow without interference from manuals etc. I turn around and think, I’m  not crazy, my camera is.

So I realize Andre’ the Fuji X100F is right. Without looking at the manual, the camera is extremely intuitive. Well, I have had all the X100 series, XE models, X-Pro1 and some other things so maybe it’s learned intuition but regardless the X100F is very intuitive.

The first photo is with the X100F and a jpg OOC. Not by choice but by force from Adobe as there is no way to process Raw files yet. The others are from Serendipity the Oly Pen F.

If you’re looking for a technical review of this camera, I am not the one for you to read. If you believe in Don Quixote and the magic of love and photography and the love a shooter has for his cameras, your home my friends.

I’ll be working starting tomorrow heavily with Andre’ and using jpg, Acros. I’ll post during the week as things get interesting.

be blessed all………………………………………………………….