Pig Bitin`Mad

The X-Pro1 chronicles continue. 

Lindsay Pougnet

Above is a picture of Lindsay Pougnet, Ottawa graphic artist. We got into conversation on the bus and I took a picture of her in with the X-Pro1, in camera settings set to black and white. No Photoshop. The picture is sharp as a tack and the camera is easy to compose with. I gave Lindsay the camera to shoot fellow bus traveller Freeman Stellar. Here is the result:

Freeman as photographed by Lindsay Pougnet

Lindsay took to the camera like an old friend. The composition, contrast and sharpness of focus are remarkable. I am impressed. Thank you, Lindsay. You are a great photographer. I seldom put other people's work on my blog, but this is a first rate work.

That was a highlight of the evening. I spent the night of April 28th shooting in black and white. When the camera worked well, we were in Leica territory.

All of the shots were done at 6,400 ISO. And again, using the in-camera black and white filter. No Photoshop. No augmentation. Just photographic pleasure and remarkable results.

Then there were other shots that failed because of the focusing and the auto focusing.

These are among the shots that I did not delete. A good number of shots were deleted because they were out of focus. These shots were great except for the focusing problem. But the focusing ruined the pictures. Manual focusing is slow and articulated. But it is accurate. The colour picture of the origami strings demonstrate this. Shooting from the hip in manual or auto focus is a different story. Sometimes I would auto focus on a specific spot in continuous AF only to have the lens not recognize the setting. Frustrating.

The focusing problems of the X-Pro1 need to be settled. This camera is superior in all ways to the Sony NEX 5N and 7 cameras except for the focusing issue. (On the blogs, a lot of people have been suggesting that Fuji should, and I quote, `steal`the peak focusing of the NEX series.) Using this camera can be great. It handles in a way that begs to do fast, street-style photographs. And it doesn`t deliver in one crucial area. Fuji, hear our plea. Correct the focusing problems. Please. I hate being pig bitin`mad.