Photography News Issue 48

Camera test 30

Photography News | Issue 48 | photographynews.co.uk

Performance: exposure latitude

Original image

-1EV

-2EV

-3EV

+1EV

-4EV

We shot this set of bracketed exposures on a bright August afternoon. The exposures were shot in manual mode and the metered corrected exposure at ISO 200 was 1/250sec at f/11. Bracketing was done by adjusting the shutter speed. The bracketed exposures were corrected using Lightroom without any other adjustment apart from exposure. The -4EVshotwas recoveredvery well and there was no issue with matching the tonality and colour quality of the correctly exposed shot. Checking the shadows, though, does show an impact as regards noise and grain is evident although this

looks filmic. Also there is a loss of resolution in the finer details. That is no surprise though. Noise levels drop noticeably with the -3EV shot and while it still lags behind the correct shot, the effect is very good and fine detail looks clean. On overexposure, performance is less strong. The +4EV shot you can’t do much with and is beyond help. Youhavemore chancewith the +3EV shot and it is possible to get decent results although this depends on how strong the highlights are in the first place and intense highlights can look grey and flat. Shots of low contrast scenes overexposed by this degree can be recovered well.

+3EV

+2EV

+4EV

Overexpose by one or two stops and there is no problem; recovered shots look the same as the correctly exposed ones. The X100F’s sensor deals very well with exposure abuse especially on the side of underexposure where

-3EV shots still look good and even -4EV can be more than acceptable. On overexposure there is less wiggle room, but +2EV shots work fine, and that applies to +3EV shots too providing the scene isn’t too contrasty in the first place.

Verdict

Features Excellent hybrid finder, fine sensor, built-in 3EV ND filter Performance AF speed and exposure accuracy impressive Handling Fast start-up, focus joystick, silent even withmechanical shutter Value formoney You get a lot of camera for the money so rates highly Overall One of the very best premium compacts on the market Pros Lens quality, hybrid viewfinder, AF speed, responsiveness as a whole, high ISO performance, battery life Cons No control lock feature, compensation dial can be adjusted by accident What’s more the lens has a very strong supporting cast. Notably, there’s a very high- quality sensor with excellent high ISO performance and a responsive AF system that is significantly superior to the X100F’s predecessors. Factor in an accurate exposure system, the option of different shutters and an elegant design and the X100F has got a great deal going for it. It’s certainly highly recommended. The X100F is priced at the higher end of the premium compact market so it is more expensive than many, more versatile interchangeable lens cameras. But it’s not what you’ve got, it’s what you do with it that counts, so while the X100F has a fixed lens it is of a very high quality and a useful focal length ideal for many forms of photography.

For Performance: noise reduction

Original image

Noise reduction is a menu option with settings from 0 (default) to +/-4. For this test I shot at ISO 3200, 6400 and 12,800 using 0, +2, +4, -2 and -4 settings and the pictures shown here are straight out of the camera fine quality JPEGs. You can certainly see the benefits of using NR. Set it to -4 which is effectively turning it off because there is no off option, and the level of noise is quite obvious. Go to the other extreme and set +4 and the benefit is very evident and it doesn’t seem overdone either so the image is not overly soft, artificial or strident which can happen with strong noise reduction. It would depend on the scene but I think +4 is usable. However, if there is any doubt then setting +2 is the safe option and gives high-quality images which do not appear overprocessed.

-2

-4

Images The Fujifilm X100F has an excellent ISO performance and is capable of producing exhibition-size prints at very high ISO settings. For JPEG shooting noise reduction is an option to minimise any digital noise and it certainly proves its worth. The default setting is 0 and in my tests +2 and even +4 are usable. Higher settings can ‘smudge’ the image and make it look unnatural but the X100F’s feature performed well.