A move to Fuji mirror-less

A few months ago I decided that I was going to replace my rather old Sony Nex 6 model with a new mirror-less camera and started saving so I could buy it. The obvious choices to replace it would be the new Sony A6300 or the Sony A7 full frame camera, but in the end I went for what may seem an odd choice, another APS-C sensor camera – the Fuji X-T1.

Although I’ve been pleased with the general performance of the Nex 6, there have been a few issues which made me decide not to replace it with another Sony Model. The first reason, and to me the most important, is Sony’s view on firmware updates. Although there are updates during the first few months of a new camera’s life, new features are vary rarely added after that period. If you want new features you have to buy a new camera. With the Fuji series, updates are applied quite regularly – in fact the X-T1 I just bought had new updates applied in only the last few weeks.

The other big reason for the switch was to do with the general control layout of the Sony series compared to the Fuji series. Sony is quite ‘menu’ driven; although there are configurable buttons there are still lots of options which need to be altered in menus. I also found the Nex 6 menu structure to be quite long and complex which didn’t help to make changes quickly.

In contrast, the Fuji X-T1 is a photographers delight, with proper controls to adjust shutter speed, exposure compensation, ISO etc. There are also 6 buttons which can be configured to carry out a variety of functions which should mean a visit to the menu system should be a fairly rare option. In many ways, using the X-T1 is very similar to using a 1970’s film camera. The other thing which immediately strikes you about the X-T1 is the build quality – it is a solid, weather resistant, quality camera.

So, this weekend I took the plunge and purchased the X-T1 with the 18-135mm zoom and this afternoon took a walk around Stevenage Park to take my first pictures with it. There are certainly lots of things I need to learn before I feel comfortable using it, but my first impressions of the camera are very positive.

I took most of the pictures above as RAW and imported the files into Lightroom. There are a few pictures which are the same scene with different treatments, and they are using the camera’s ability to produce pictures with the look of some vintage Fuji films. Most of the pictures needed very little post processing – just a pull back on highlights in the sky in some cases.