Fujifilm X-M5 Review

Dustin Abbott

January 20th, 2025

Fujifilm scored a huge hit with their X-100VI and its retro-cool design and fixed lens. But there are plenty of people who like the vibe but want the ability to use more than one lens. Enter the new Fujifilm X-M5, which has a similar cool vibe but uses Fuji’s ubiquitous X-mount that can host probably more than a hundred different lenses from a variety of brands at this point. It utilizes Fuji’s 26MP X-Trans sensors, has their most recent focus algorithms, and also boasts a deeper video component than many competitors. So is this new Fujifilm X-M5 worth considering over the competition? Find out by watching my video review below…or keep reading.

Thanks to Fujifilm Canada for sending me a review loaner of this camera. As always, this is a completely independent review, and the thoughts and opinions expressed here are my own.

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So what are the major competitors to this camera? The closest competitor that springs to mind is the similarly vlog-focused Sony ZV-E10II that I reviewed in 2024. That camera costs more (+ $200), has slightly lower video specs, but also has a more robust autofocus system.

There’s also the Canon EOS R10, Nikon Z50II, and even the long in the tooth Sony a6400 might be worth considering, as while it is five years old now, its AF system still beats what Fuji can deliver. Autofocus is improved on the X-M5 over previous models, but unfortunately this does remain the Achilles heel for Fuji products. But Fuji brings its own strengths, including more stylish design, its famous film simulations, and up to 6K30 video recording specs.

If you are looking for a stylish vlogging camera, want to travel light, or generally want to keep things as compact as possible without compromising on imaging, the X-M5 might just be the camera for you. And, at $799 USD for the camera alone or just $899 for a kit including the XC 15-45mm f/3.5-5.6 Lens, the Fujifilm X-M5 offers a very compelling value.

I’ve got a few complaints that I’ll detail as well, but there’s a lot to praise here…so let’s dive in.

Spec List

26.1MP APS-C X-Trans 4 CMOS Sensor
Latest AI-Assisted Processing Algorithms
6.2K/29.97 fps Video, 10-Bit Internal
425-Point AF, AI-Based Subject Detection
Up to 30 fps JPEG Shooting w/ 1.25x Crop
Compatible with X-Series Lenses
3.0″ 1.04m-Dot Tilting Touchscreen LCD
SD/SDHC/SDXC Card Slot
Wi-Fi and Bluetooth Wireless Connections
*XC 15-45mm f/3.5-5.6 OIS PZ Lens (if purchased in kit)

Some of the biggest omissions to the feature list include a viewfinder of any kind along with having no camera-based stabilization.

Build and Features

The X-M5 does have some visual connections to the X100VI, particularly in the silver edition that I’ve reviewed here (a standard black finish is also available). It shares a similar topline, the tiny bulge of the grip, and a somewhat similar top control scheme.

Fuji has forged a reputation for retaining a more analog control scheme that relies more on dials that touchscreens (a good thing, as Fuji’s touchscreens remain unimproved in the more than six years I’ve been reviewing their products). That’s less true here, however, and the main concession to that aesthetic is the film simulation dial on the left side of the topline of the camera.

This allows you quick access to Fuji’s film simulations, though, frankly, this is going to appeal more to people who shoot JPEGs than those who shoot RAWs, as shooting with a preselected film simulation doesn’t affect a RAW image on import. Case in point is that I turned the dial to PROVIA for the shot on the left and then VELVIA for the shot on the right. The JPEGs will look different, with much more saturation on the VELVIA image, but the two RAW files arrived in Lightroom looking identical:

If you are a JPEG shooter and love Fuji’s film simulation, this quick access dial is going to be great. For me (a RAW shooter), it is a waste, as I would strongly prefer an extra control dial, and thus far I haven’t found a way to assign a different function to that Film simulation dial. Also somewhat odd is the fact that the front command dial has to serve multiple functions, which are accessed by clicking the dial in (each click will cycle through the default 3 options in sequence unless customized otherwise). One of those default functions is film simulations, but this feels very redundant when there is a large dedicated dial for this function already on the top of the camera.

The X-M5 is a very slim and stylish camera, but that stylish exterior does come at the cost of ergonomic practicality. You’ll note from the comparison above that out of the competing cameras the X-M5 is by far the slimmest. It’s just 38mm (1.5″) deep, which means that the grip is nearly nonexistent. There is a very slight bulge on the right side of the camera that serves as the grip, but there’s nowhere near enough depth there to actually wrap your fingers around. This is more a camera that you pinch rather than one that settles into your grip. The minimal height of the camera also means that my pinky has no place to go and has to float underneath the camera. This is a camera that is better suited to smaller, lighter lenses, and you probably won’t want to often use the larger, heavier telephoto lenses with the camera. Even the new XF 16-55mm F2.8 II, which is considerably smaller than the first generation lens, feels a little awkward in balance.

You can see from this shot of the battery compartment that the grip above is a just a little bump. There’s very little to hang onto. I personally don’t find this camera very easy to hang onto, though your mileage may vary. The flipside of this design is that it takes the portability way up. Pair this with a pancake style lens (an X-mount version of Viltrox’s 28mm F4.5 VCM would be perfect!) and you would truly have a pocketable camera. The camera is 111.9 (W) x 66.6 (H) x 38mm (D) or 4.4 x 2.6 x 1.5″. The weight is just 355g (12.5oz) without a battery or memory card. That’s a little heavier than the Sony ZV-E10 II, and a little lighter than the Canon EOS R10.

You might also note from above that there is no room in that grip for a battery, so the battery sits laterally in the camera. The NP-W126S is a relatively small 1260mAh unit that is rated for as much as 440 frames in “Economy mode” but drops to 330 frames in normal mode. Economy mode reduces performance of both the LCD screen and the autofocus system, so that probably isn’t going to work for most people most of the time, particularly considering the LCD is the only way to compose with the X-M5. That battery charge is also only good for about 45 minutes of 6.2K or 4K60 recording. You probably want to pick up a spare battery or two.

The second disappointment is that the memory card is housed there. I hate this position as it makes it far more likely that you’ll walk away without a memory card inserted because you have to close the battery door to set the camera down (happened to me!) If you have a tripod QR plate attached you also won’t be able to open the door to get at the card without removing it first. I also couldn’t figure out a way to just attach a USB-C cable and directly transfer images to my computer. That meant that I either had to do without my Peak Design capture plate that I put on all my cameras to make them easy to attach to either straps or tripods, or I had to use a hex key to remove the plate every time I needed to access the memory card. I really, really dislike this card position, and it is made worse here because the card is located on the far right of the bay, closer to the center of the camera and the 1/4″ tripod socket.

The card slot is only UHS-1 compatible, but that seems to be enough for steady data flow for the 6K30 footage. Buffer depth (as we’ll explore later) is pretty decent as well thanks to the more reasonable 26MP (rather than 40MP) resolution of the sensor.

While the X-M5 has some of the retro aesthetic that Fuji does so well, the control scheme (outside of the film simulation dial) is pretty routine. As a personal preference, I actually like even my compact cameras to be big enough to have decent ergonomics. Controls are not bad here, but there’s a few questionable decisions in with the good. You can see from the top plate (where most of the controls are) that there is a mode dial and a rear control dial in addition to the film simulation dial. The rear control dial is a little stiff, but works well enough. What I really don’t like is the tiny, tiny Q menu button between those two dials. It is hard to access with a bare fingertip, and impossible when wearing gloves (I’m doing a winter review).

The rear buttons above the LCD screen are also very small, and those wearing gloves will also find them a little difficult.

The drive/garbage button is harder still to access due to the prominent port for the mic input. Mic ports are usually on the side. I don’t mind this position in a small camera, as it has good proximity to the hot shoe where the mic will likely be mounted, but it does make the adjacent button a little difficult to access.

This includes a headphone monitoring jack, which is important on a video-centric camera like this. A second port has a USB-C port that can be used for either data or charging the battery in camera, and a micro-HDMI port. I don’t love micro-HDMI (it feels more fragile), but obviously there isn’t room in a camera this size for a full size HDMI port.

On the positive note, there is a little navigational joystick that helps with menu navigation. On the negative side, however, there is no full menu navigation by touch, which isn’t true of most of the competing (non-Fuji) cameras. There are two other buttons below this for further control.

The limited touch capacity makes navigating Fuji’s menus a little clunkier than other cameras where you can use whatever combination of touch and/or physical control that you like. I’m mostly frustrated here because I haven’t seen any progress on this front in all the time I’ve been using Fuji. The reactiveness of what touch is there (touch to focus, navigating the Q-menu, etc…) feels imprecise and with a lower reactiveness than competing cameras.

Another disappoint regarding the screen is a fairly low resolution. This is a 3″ fully articulating screen (which I personally like!), but the resolution is just 1.04 million dots. That’s not great when the screen is your only compositional tool. There is no viewfinder. While the screen has reasonable brightness, it is definitely very hard to see in bright, sunny conditions. There were many times in those situations where I instinctively began to bring the camera up to my eye only to remember that there was no viewfinder.

Also missing is one of Fuji’s useful control points – an easy to use switch that controls the focus mode (Manual, Continuous, and Single Shot). This is more missed on Fuji than other cameras because most Fuji lenses do not have an AF | MF switch because this is usually handled by a camera-based switch.

All we have on front is the aforementioned control dial and a lens release button located on the right side of the lens mount.

The shutter is threaded in a typical Fuji fashion, and surrounding it is the ON/OFF toggle. You can choose either a mechanical style shutter with a 1/4000th shutter speed limit, or an electronic shutter that can reach a much higher 1/32,000th shutter speed. Fuji has a nice hybrid option where you can choose to use the mechanical shutter for slower shutter speeds (with all of the advantages that come with a mechanical shutter) and then automatically switch to the electronic shutter when faster shutter speeds are needed.

The X-M5 is compatible with Fuji’s FAN-001 cooling fan accessory. It seems like most of their recent cameras with a fully articulating screen can use this. It’s an interesting (if somewhat clunky) interesting concept, as it plugs into the body in the port pictured above with the screen rotated out and actively cools the camera chassis to extend video recording time. You aren’t going to be able to close the screen with the FAN-001 attached (for obvious reasons), but it seems like a fairly intelligent solution to a common problem for those focused on long format video capture at higher bitrates and resolution levels. I didn’t have the FAN-001 on hand, but here’s what it looked like attached to the X-S20.

The X-M5 is a very cool looking compact camera that definitely wins style points, though, as per usual, the compact nature of the camera comes with some serious ergonomic challenges.

To me, going back to my X-H2 was a treat, but I’m more of a fan of more conventional controls and chunkier camera bodies. If you want small, and compact, the X-M5 may be perfect for you.

Kit Lens

I’ll take a moment to give you a look at the potential kit lens, which is the XC 15-45mm F3.5-5.6 OIS PZ. Bought in kit, it will only set you back an additional $100, but bought separately it will cost three times as much! You’ll obviously want to make that decision before purchasing the camera!

This is a useful focal length, and I will give some credit for having a slightly brighter aperture than some competing lenses (F6.3 is pretty common on the telephoto end). The lens also provides OIS (Optical Image Stabilization), which could be important since the camera body itself has no stabilization.

I also appreciate the fact that while the lens is a retractable zoom design (the inner barrel emerges when the lens is powered on), it doesn’t require a manual twist to make the lens usable like Canon’s RF kit lenses do (a feature I hate!!)

The lens is a PZ, or Powerzoom lens, which means that the zooming mechanism is motorized. When you twist the larger of the two rings the lens will zoom either in or out depending on the direction. This allows for smoother zooming than you can accomplish with a typical twisting zoom, making it useful if you want zooming shots. In the VLOG mode you will also get on-screen zoom controls that will allow you another option for zooming.

A kit lens can be useful in a few scenarios: 1) if you are new to photography or to Fuji and don’t have any lenses. Buying a kit lens means that you can immediately start taking pictures, and at $100, the XC 15-45mm offers a low cost point of entry. 2) If you want a general purpose video zoom. The lens is lightweight, has a useful focal range, and gives you some stabilization.

But there’s a good chance you’ll quickly want an optical upgrade, particularly for stills. Kit lenses tend to be cheap for a reason, and that’s true here right down to the plastic lens mount. Sometimes video is a little less demanding for optical performance, but for stills I sometimes find the image quality rather soft.

Fortunately there are a lot of great, inexpensive options for sharper image quality (particularly if you are willing to use prime lenses, or those with a single focal length). Zoom lenses are fewer and more expensive, but I’m very fond of the Sigma 18-50mm F2.8 DN, which I reviewed here. You can see the Sigma’s sharpness advantage in the center:

…and along the edges of the frame, where it has noticeably stronger contrast.

It’s also considerably more expensive, however, so if you’re on a tight budget, the kit lens at least gives you a functional lens, and I’ve definitely seen worse kit lenses.

Vlogging Mode

One of the key features of the X-M5 that positions it to directly compete with a camera like the Sony ZV-E10 II is the dedicated vlogging mode and associated features. We’ve already noted that when you turn the mode dial to “VLOG”, completely different screen controls appear. New options include zoom control (if a powerzoom is present). When I attached the non-PZ XF 16-50mm F2.8-4.8, that option disappeared. Other new controls include record (to begin or end video record), playback, and then a menu button.

If you touch the menu option, a number of other options will arrive displayed around the edges of the screen.

It’s a little frustrating in one sense, as while the touchscreen still isn’t amazingly responsive, it does show that Fuji is capable of doing more with their touch capabilities. There are a decent amount of menu options here, and that gives you more direct access to some of these controls. It’s also worth noting that these controls can be easily accessed if you have the touchscreen facing you in “selfie mode”, which could save a bit of frustration of going back and forth.

But it isn’t just software, as the X-M5 also has hardware upgrades to the audio recording. According to Fuji, “(the) FUJIFILM X-M5 is the first X Series model to feature three built-in microphones for the highest-quality audio. Four different audio modes are available: Surround, Front Priority, Back Priority, or Front & Back Priority, giving the flexibility to get crystal-clear sound from any direction.”

If you touch the Mic option on the touchscreen, you’ll get a nicely illustrative menu that gives you the four different options for sound recording.

Because there are actually multiple mics, these options will in fact really change the way that sound is recorded by the camera. There’s a bit less of an obvious difference between the “surround sound” and “front/rear” (1st and 4th options) if there isn’t a lot of sound to the sides, but there is a very obvious difference in the sound if you are selecting either front or back modes. I tested in vlogging mode, with the camera faced towards me, and when I had the rear only mode engaged my voice was recorded at a much lower level and a different sound quality than when the front microphones were activated.

The best sound in many cases will come from using separate mics, but you definitely have more creative options here than are typical with most cameras using the built in mics.

There are a few other design elements that reflect modern content creation. There is a “Shorts” mode that allows you to record short clips (up to 60 seconds) in vertical mode…but without having to rotate the camera.

Also, in addition to being able to record high bitrates and high quality footage, you can also record at very low bitrates (as low as 8Mbps) to allow for quick sharing or transfer.

You’ll have a few other options regarding focus and the look of videos. Background defocus mode will simply choose the largest maximum aperture available on the lens you have attached so the background is blurred more, but that’s going to be limited to by your lens selection (don’t expect a strong background blur with the kit lens, for example). Portrait Enhancer will do some skin smoothing, with three levels of intensity that is user selectable. Product priority mode will set the autofocus to focus on anything that is moved towards the camera rather than staying locked on the presenter. It allows you to highlight a product or item you want the camera to focus on.

In many ways I was reminded of the ZV-E10 II, as a lot of these same features are making priority lists for these type of cameras.

Autofocus Performance

Ahhh, my least favorite section when reviewing Fuji cameras. Over the years that I’ve been reviewing Fuji I’ve seen a variety of improvements, but somehow the end result is always just falling further and further behind the competition. When I first reviewed the X-T3, I though the autofocus was fairly good (at least for stills) relative to, say, the Sony a6500 I owned at the time. But since that point Sony, Canon, and Nikon have all made great strides and have nearly perfected autofocus for stills and video, but Fuji’s AF has only made very incremental improvements. I’ve become convinced that what is needed is not the continual focus algorithm updates, or even the AI chip and tracking, but rather a more fundamental hardware improvement.

Fuji says, “FUJIFILM X-M5 features the same built-in AI-driven subject detection autofocus as FUJIFILM X100VI and X-T50 mirrorless digital cameras. Along with Fujifilm’s latest-generation image processor, this delivers incredible focus accuracy in nearly all lighting conditions, even if your subject is moving. X-Processor 5 features subject detection autofocus that is built with deep-learning AI technology. In addition to providing incredible AF tracking and detection for human faces and eyes, FUJIFILM X-M5 can also automatically detect and track a broad range of subjects, including animals, birds, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, airplanes, trains, insects, and drones.

FUJIFILM X-M5 is equipped with Fujifilm’s latest predictive algorithm, recording subjects with highly accurate AF even in scenes requiring tracking of moving objects or in low-contrast environments. It tracks a wide range of subjects, including sports and animals, and subjects in motion.“

So yes, the X-M5 receives all of Fuji’s most recent autofocus improvements, but they are almost all software rather than hardware based. The underlying hybrid Contrast/Phase Detect autofocus system that has undergirded Fuji’s cameras for the past few generations is still in place (and in need of an upgrade!), but it has been augmented in the most recent generation of cameras with Fuji’s X-Processor 5.

This adds AI based deep learning for subject detection AF to accurately track a range of subjects. The system detects animals, birds, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, airplanes, trains, insects, and drones (though you choose “bird” to track insects and “airplane” to track drones). My experience with Fuji’s most recent autofocus in a variety of cameras is that the AF system definitely works best when there is a trackable subject in frame.

The most recent firmware updates to cameras like my X-H2 and what’s present in the X-M5 do feel like a more significant improvement in terms of stills autofocus. I found that things don’t feel too far behind my other cameras for shooting stills.

Obviously focus is going to depend somewhat on the lens you have attached, but using the most recent generation of Fuji lenses produces good results (the new 16-55mm F2.8 II was used for the shot above). I did notice in my “around the house” shots that I’ve gotten very accustomed to having IBIS in my cameras, and I wasn’t quite as attentive to shutter speed as I should be, resulting in some unexpected motion blur in some of my shots captured with the X-M5.

I’m not sure I would treat this as an action camera. Fuji’s tracking capabilities vary quite bit according to what lens is attached, but even at its best it doesn’t quite match what other brands can do. More relevant here, however, is that tracking action (particularly in varying lighting conditions) without a viewfinder is TOUGH.

The burst speeds here vary according to what shutter is being used. The mechanical shutter has an upper limit of 8FPS, which does place it behind some of the competing cameras. You have the option to switch into electronic shutter mode, however, and get up to 20FPS with the full sensor and then up to 30FPS with a sports crop of 1.25x. These electronic shutter burst rates are faster than what competing cameras offer. As per usual, however, there will be some limitations with the electronic shutter in a camera that doesn’t have a particularly fast readout speed. Here’s a breakdown of some of the primary burst rates along with the buffer depth per file size and compression.

The lower resolution point of 26MP (relative to their 40MP sensor) helps considerably with buffer depth, as the JPEG buffer rates aren’t too bad, with as much as 173 frames (mechanical at 8FPS) or as little as 127 frames (electronic at 20FPS). If you try to get it all (Uncompressed RAW + JPEG), that buffer will fill really fast (in about a second)! The lossless compressed RAW (my preferred format) buffers are relatively shallow, but compressed RAW isn’t too bad. If this is your only camera, then by all means use it to capture action, but don’t buy this camera particularly for that purpose. Cameras without viewfinders are rarely top choices for capturing high speed action.

Fuji’s eye detection has definitely improved, with better recognition of the eye and better stickiness once the eye is acquired. One questionable ergonomic decision persists, however, in that Fuji separates human eye detection from AI detection of any other subject. This means that you have to separately access these two features, so if you want to assign eye detection to a button, for example, you can’t put both types of eye or subject detection on one button. I have to have two separate shortcuts set up on my X-H2, for example, which just means that you have one less thing you could map to your camera.

Some brands have started to add a smart auto subject detection mode, a move I applaud as it allows photographers to be more reactive to changing subjects and conditions. Fuji is improving in overall detection performance, but it does still lag somewhat behind competitors.

Video Autofocus

Video focus has been the area where I feel like Fuji has fallen the most behind. I have been able to rely on face detection to provide stable footage for my review videos when I’m in front of the camera for years on my Sony and Canon cameras. I don’t hesitate to set up a tripod with a wide variety of lenses and get in front of it, knowing that focus will be rock solid during the video clip. I used to shoot at least a portion of my review videos with the lens or camera that I was testing, but I stopped doing that early on with Fuji reviews because often there would be so much hunting and focus slippage that my audience would complain about how distracting it was.

This area, at least with good lenses, has improved on the X-M5. I shot some test segments using the XF 16-55mm F2.8 II and got reliable focus results when I was sitting in front of the camera. I didn’t notice any focus pulsing or slippage, and focus remained solid during the clip of roughly one minute in length. That’s progress, and it shows that the AI detection is certainly helping.

I also had good results while moving along in selfie mode while walking through the forest and talking to the camera. Focus changes are minimal in that scenario (the subject is mostly a constant distance from the camera), but I did have to periodically duck under branches and focus stayed consistent. I could see in the articulated screen that the tracking box was staying locked on an eye, though it it would occasionally swap eyes.

Where things really fell apart is during persistent movement, however. I ran multiple tests where I stepped into frame, pause for a moment to give the camera a chance to detect me, and then walked towards the camera. While the camera initially picked me up, focus was quickly lost as I started to move, as you can see above. This is a relatively simple test that most cameras from other brands handle just fine, so that’s an area for concern if your video capture includes action.

Video Performance

Outside of the video autofocus performance, video performance is actually a relative strength relative to the competition. Most competing cameras will top out at 4K60 recording (some even at 4K30 like the Canon alternatives), but the X-M5 will allow for open gate 6K recording. What is open gate? It is essentially allow for the whole sensor to be recorded…in its native ratio. We are accustomed to seeing video in 16:9 ratio, which would look like this:

There are plenty of 16:9 crops (and even 17:9) crops available here, but the open gate 6K is using all of the pixels of the sensor for recording video just as it would for recording stills. That results in a 3:2 aspect ratio, which looks like this:

There’s obviously a whole lot more on frame that would have been cropped out in a 16:9 crop. It gives more flexibility to the videographer in post, as with those extra pixels they could more easily produce a vertical crop for a reel:

This is what enables the camera to do the short clips in 9:16 (vertical) while in vlogging mode. It is taking the crop from the open gate image rather than requiring the photographer to rotate the camera vertically.

So, just know that you won’t get 6K 16:9 footage. If you want to do the typical widescreen look, you will have to do a 16:9 crop in post. The good news is that you’ll have more flexibility on how you choose to frame those shots, as you can crop closer to the top or bottom than would normally be allowed.

4K60 recording is also available, though that does come with a mild 1.18x crop (though that is more than the ZV-E10 II and its 1.10x crop). 4K30 or 4K24 is shot without any crop.

Bitrates range from 8Mbps to 200Mbps, and footage will come in either the MOV or MP4 wrapper depending on your choices. Here’s a list of some of the bitrates and framerates available.

There are high speed full HD modes available in either 17:9 or 16:9 aspect ratios with framerates as high as 240FPS. These will be shot in the higher 200Mbps bitrates.

Both FLog 2 and HLG recording are available, and of course all of Fuji’s film simulations and your custom tweaks can be made. There is a digital stabilization available when shooting movies, though that does come with a pretty significant crop attached to it (as much as 1.44x, depending on shooting mode).

Footage generally looks good. It has nice detail and color. My computer doesn’t recognize the codecs on the open gate footage, however, so that might be something to watch for.

Image Quality

The X-M5 used Fuji’s familiar 26.1Mpx X-Trans sensor. I’ve reviewed at least half a dozen cameras with this same sensor. The sensor was originally developed for the X-T3, where Fuji said of the X-T3’s sensor, “[with] a newly developed sensor, the X-T3 features an APS-C-format 26.1MP X-Trans CMOS 4 sensor, which has a back-illuminated design to afford smooth tonal rendering, improved low-light performance, and a low native ISO 160 setting. As an X-Trans sensor, it still utilizes the randomized pixel array, too, which provides a high degree of image quality and sharpness due to the omission of an optical low-pass filter. Versus conventional pixel patterns, the X-Trans design more closely mimics the organic nature of film in order to produce nuanced colors and tonal transitions, while also reducing moiré and aliasing.”

It used to be that this was the higher resolution point of the Fuji X lineup, with a more standard Bayer 24MP sensor used on some lower models, but now a number of cameras utilize the higher resolution 40MP sensor. This 26MP sensor is a good but not exceptional one. I’ve spent time with and reviewed most all of the competition, so, my quick conclusion is that this sensor is a competitive but not a clear winner in any category. Sony’s 26MP sensor sports a little more dynamic range (about a half stop) but slightly inferior high ISO performance.

After reviewing at least ten cameras with Fuji’s X-Trans sensors, I can safely say I personally think that the disadvantages of the X-Trans sensors outweigh the advantages over traditional Bayer sensers being used by competitors. Fuji says that the X-Trans sensor produces a more film-grain-like noise pattern, I don’t really see it, and it is rare that I run into the real world moiré issues that X-Trans supposedly reduces.

Here’s a look at the various file sizes and framing options:

If you don’t want the technicalities, here’s a brief summation of the sensor performance. This sensor has a smaller native ISO range than cameras with the 40MP sensor, with an ISO range of 160-12,800 (those cameras have a base ISO of 125). Most competing camera from Sony or Canon have a larger ISO range that starts even lower at ISO 100. I like to charitably call this Fuji being conservative and avoiding the marketing extremes. I have found that Fuji competes well with, say, Sony, across most of its ISO range (things even out around ISO 12,800).

Likewise, Fuji’s sensors don’t quite have the same amount of dynamic range as competing Sony sensors (close to a stop less DR at base ISO), though the Fuji sensors are more competitive at higher ISO values. I found that shadow recovery is clean, but I start to see highlight clipping earlier on. Fuji does have a feature called DR200/DR400 that open up at higher ISO values (320/640) that will sample the highlight information from the base ISO while taking the midtone and shadow information from the selected ISO value. This does help the dynamic range to be more competitive.

I also find Fuji images a little more complex to sharpen, as the X-Trans sensors have a unique way of handling information.

But what the sensor does have is Fuji’s excellent color science. Many people love Fuji colors (myself included), and they include a number of their film simulations that can give a unique “feel” to images and/or video footage. I’m currently loving the REALA ACE profile for a great look that works well on a wide variety of images. Fuji also has a fantastic JPEG engine, so if you just want to take photos and not spend a lot of time editing them to get the look you want, you may really enjoy the Fuji approach. Fuji also does a great job with in camera correction profiles, and so often the JPEG output looks even better than what the RAW images might suggest is possible. Note: as there are no changes to the sensor itself, the following are results given from earlier reviews of this sensor (in this case from X-S20).

ISO Performance

The native ISO range of Fuji’s 26Mpx X-Trans sensor is more limited than alternatives from Sony or Canon, running from ISO 160 to 12,800, with an expanded range going down to ISO 80 and moving up to 51,200 on the high end. I personally don’t ever use expanded ISO ranges and consider them more marketing than actually useful.. The native range is usable throughout, and even images ISO 12,800 are perfectly usable in many situations. Here’s a look at an image and crop of a guitar taken at ISO 12,800:

There’s some obvious noise at a pixel level, but the basic image is perfectly useful. Here’s another image at ISO 12,800 where I’ve used the Fuji ACROS + G monochrome simulation, and I would argue that the noise in this image is quite film-like and pleasing.

So how about at lower extremes? At ISO 800 there is a tiny addition of noise only detectable in the shadows. There isn’t a lot of difference from base ISO, however, and moving on to ISO 1600 shows little difference. At ISO 3200 there is slightly less contrast and slightly more noise, but still at a very acceptable level:

That pattern continues at ISO 6400 and 12,800, where the noise becomes rougher and more visible in shadow areas, with 6400 being cleaner than ISO 12,800.

You can go up into an “extended” range that gives you the 25,600 and 51,200 options. The first might be usable in non-critical situations, but few people will be happy with what ISO 51,200 is going to give you for any kind of application.

I will say that ISO 25,600 in particular does do a good job of “color fastness”. If we step back and look at the images on a global level, we can see that the sensor has done a good job of keeping a consistent color balance without color shift or color banding.

This is a solid ISO performance, and this is at least one area where the older 26MP sensor found in the X-S20 is going to deliver better results than the larger resolution 40MP sensor of the X-H2 or X-T5.

Dynamic Range Performance

I value dynamic range within a camera in two specific areas: the ability to cleanly lift shadows without introducing noise or color banding and the ability to recover highlights without introducing “hot spots” where information has been permanently lost. The value of good dynamic range is in the margins of photography, as eliminating shadows or recovering blown out highlights doesn’t always produce the better image. Having good dynamic range (particularly if you shoot RAW), allows you a lot more creative vision over how the final image will turn out (particularly with Adobe’s new AI tech for getting more information out of the sky). This shot, for example, has all of the rich detail in the shadows and colors of the trunk of the fallen tree and the moss on it, but also allowed me to recover the sky rather than just a blown out mess. This shot was taken with the new Fujinon XF 8mm F3.5, which is a very sweet little lens, by the way.

Fuji has an extra trick up its sleeve to help you maximize dynamic range performance in such scenes, which we’ll get to in just a moment.

In my tests, I found that the X-S20 (or X-M5) did an excellent job of recovering shadows very cleanly. Here we have an image that I purposefully underexposed by four stops. As you can see in the original RAW image, there is very little information left there. In post I added those four stops back into the recovered image. What we find is an image that has been recovered with very little penalty. Contrast looks good and the image is nice and bright.

Here’s a look at that same image at a pixel level. We see little additional noise, no banding or discoloration, and a nice restoration of contrast to the image.

As is often the case, however, highlight recovery lags behind shadow recovery. While a 2 stop highlight recovery is nice and clean, by 3 stops the recovered image is not natural looking at all:

Moving beyond that is obviously a fools errand. But Fuji does have a nice workaround if you want more dynamic range. If you move beyond the base ISO to either ISO 320 or 640 (and beyond), two new options open up in the menu. These are DR200 and DR400. What these do is essentially split the sensor readout so that the shadow information is gathered from the current ISO setting while the highlight information comes from base ISO. At ISO 320 that gives you one additional stop in the highlights, while at ISO 640 you gain two. This allows you to overexpose the image slightly so that you have plenty of information in the shadows, but since there is one or two stops less exposure in the highlights, you have plenty of ability to recover blown out areas in post. A three stop highlight recovery using DR200 looks just fine:

I can go even further using DR400. Here’s a four stop overexposure (look how blown out the image is on the left), and how cleanly it recovers using DR400:

I certainly will often utilize this for landscape images when I’m shooting Fuji. My priority was exposing for the interesting textures of the little barn in this shot, but rather than a white, blown out sky, I was able to recover something interesting in the sky to add to the image.

I personally enable DR400 in camera, and then it is ready if I have to raise the ISO level (either intentionally or not). Dynamic range naturally diminishes as the ISO raises anyway, so it can be a way of getting better results when the ISO is up. That’s not to say that you should shoot this way all the time, as often retaining contrast and either crushed shadows or blown out highlights makes for a better photograph, but having this technique available to improve dynamic range certainly has its uses…just don’t go too crazy on those sliders!!

X-M5 Color

Color science is the one area where there is a fair amount of consensus on Fuji. It’s definitely something that Fuji does well, and I think it’s true both on the camera sensor side and in their optical glass. Fuji color tends to be really nice, with good saturation levels and a pleasing transition of color tones. I shot this image of a still lake with the 8mm F3.5 and the X-S20, and I think the colors look lovely.

Likewise a standard shot of the woods, where the greens look really rich but without feeling garish:

This shot of Nala (taken with the excellent Viltrox Pro AF 75mm F1.2) looks really rich:

Fuji has long been famous for their excellent film simulations. Fuji is pretty much a JPEG shooter’s dream, as you can tweak your recipes to get images you love right out of camera. RAW images with film simulations will arrive (as usual) flat in Lightroom, as you can easily apply any of 20 film simulations in post.

Here’s an example from the X-T4 shown first with Adobe’s Landscape profile.

Now Astia (Soft)

Now Classic Chrome

Provia

Velvia

Eterna (Cinema)

Classic Chrome is little less saturated but often has a tasteful look to it. I find Velvia (which is Vivid) is often too intense for me, but can be great for landscapes. Provia is the Standard, and it is fairly neutral. Astia is “Soft”, and it’s another one I like. A more recent addition to Fuji’s portfolio (REALA ACE) is one of my favorites for general purpose use.

I also enjoy the monochrome film simulations and also the ability to go into the menus and tweak the look in several ways. For example, if I select Acros, I’ve got the added ability to select whether to apply a Yellow Filter (more contrast, darker skies), Red (slightly more extreme of yellow), or Green (for better skin tones). There is also an option to warm or cool the monochrome image in camera. You can move to near-sepia on the warm side and near-selenium on the cool side. This shot of a coiled rope looks great in Acros + R (red filter):

You can also control grain (if that’s your thing) in camera as well. Bottom line is that color science and the ability to manipulate color in camera remains a great strength for Fuji cameras…and you can utilize that same color science in video as well.

Conclusion

The Fujifilm X-M5 is a camera designed to appeal to a certain segment of the camera landscape. It will be Fuji’s lowest price current model at $799 USD (undercutting the X-T30 II by $100), but Fuji’s pivot to marketing it as a Vlog/creator’s camera is a potentially wise one. It does have a bit of the desirability factor of the X100VI, though as an interchangeable lens model.

It’s easy to define this camera by its shortcomings, but the truth of the matter is that the true competitors for this camera don’t have IBIS or even a viewfinder. Critiquing this model in particular for these lacks doesn’t seem just. I am more apt to critique the autofocus system which still lags noticeably behind competing cameras.

But Fuji also offers up a few more video features than competing cameras along with a great looking physical design. I don’t personally love the ergonomics here, but I could learn to live with them. Fuji’s rapidly growing library of first party and third party lenses is also a calling card, as no other brand is devoting as much attention to the APS-C space. If you can live with the shortcomings I’ve detailed here, the X-M5 is a solid option at its reasonable price tag of $800 USD.

Pros:

Cool retro style (particularly in silver!)
Interesting vlogging specific features
Microphones give options
More video features than competitors
AI Tracking upgrade
Huge video spec upgrade
Cheaper than competitors
More robust library of APS-C specific lenses on Fuji

Cons:

Limited grip means that I’m “pinching” the camera
Autofocus experience only so-so
Lack of viewfinder makes composing in bright light tough
Frustrating memory card access
Q button placement is terrible
Touchscreen functionality remains too limited

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Fujifilm X100VI (6) Camera Review

Dustin Abbott

May 6th, 2024

The Fujifilm X100VI is the one that broke the internet.

We are living in an era where the proliferation of cameras in phones has meant that year over year sales of major camera brands is typically declining each year…until the X100VI. Excitement over this new camera has trigger scalping, hoarding, the necessity of lottery systems to determine who can buy one ahead of launch, and the general mayhem that comes with a “must have” item. So is this new Fujifilm X100VI worth the hype? Find out by watching my video review below…or keep reading.

Thanks to Fujifilm Canada for sending me a review loaner of this camera. As always, this is a completely independent review, and the thoughts and opinions expressed here are my own.

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So what is the X100 lineup? The X100VI is the latest iteration in a retro-inspired series that Fuji calls “premium compacts”. They are dial-based, analog style digital cameras with a fixed lens (a 23mm F2 lens that gives a roughly 35mm full frame equivalent angle of view). I’ve had to play a little personal catch-up, as while I have been reviewing Fuji products for about six years now, I’ve not actually used any of the previous iterations of the X100. On paper, I’m personally less interested in a camera with a fixed lens. It was the whole idea of interchangeable lenses that made me switch from a superzoom point and shoot to buying my first DSLR.

But there are also many, many photographers who crave the purity and simplicity of a camera with a fixed lens. These purists are more about the craft, the art of photography, and less about variety of gear. They like the idea of always having the same tool on hand and learning to use that tool exquisitely well. And frankly, I was pretty inspired by the work of someone like Jonas Rask and his take on the X100 series. The guy is an amazing photographer, and he helped me really appreciate the appeal of the X100VI. The Fujifilm X100 series is a purist’s camera, with a very vintage aesthetic that looks and handles more like some of my vintage SLRs than like many modern cameras.

I shared the camera around with some of my team, as while we were all aware of the hype surrounding the camera, none of us had ever used one. We all agreed that there was a bit of a learning curve. That’s not just coming from other camera brands, but even when coming from Fuji. I’ve reviewed 12 previous Fujifilm cameras, so I have a lot of familiarity with their menus (which is similar here) and their typical physical control scheme. But the X100VI has some things in different places than other Fuji cameras, so figuring out the control scheme took a bit for me (i.e. the shutter speed control ring has an outer ring that needs to be lifted up to control ISO, for example…which is NOT obvious!)

But Craig from my sister channel Let the Light in TV put it well: the longer he used the camera, the more he liked it. This is more than a bit of nostalgia; this is a highly capable imaging machine.

Spec List

Primary updates to the X100 formula:

40MP BSI CMOS Sensor
6 Stop IBIS (In Body Image Stabilization)
X Processor V – AI machine learning and trackable subjects
New film simulations (Reala ACE, Nostalgic Neg and Eterna Bleach Bypass) = 14 total
Ability to upload photos directly to cloud from camera
Up to 6.2K Video
AF Tracking in video mode
HEIF capture
Skin smoothing effect
White priority and Ambience Priority Auto WB modes
Custom AF zone areas
Option to limit available AF area types for AF-S or AF-C shooting
Pre-shot bursts (E-shutter + Cont H)
Self timer lamp on/off
Interval shooting with external timer
Interval priority mode (prioritizes chosen interval, irrespective of exposure time)

A big part of the excitement over the X100VI is over several huge feature upgrades. The two most significant is the transition from the 26MP X-Trans sensor found in the X-T4 to the 40MP X-Trans sensor found in the X-T5 and the inclusion of a new, miniaturized IBIS (In Body Image Stabilization) system that is rated for up to 6 stops of stabilization. This makes the camera more useful (in particular) for video capture, which has become increasingly important in this day of hybrid stills/video imaging. So let’s break down the camera down in greater detail.

Build and Features

The X100VI shares a lot of visual similarities to Leica’s M rangefinder bodies. They both have a squared, retro design that oozes hipster coolness. I would argue that a large part of the “gotta have it” desirability factor has to do with the fact that the X100 series is essentially a poor man’s Leica. There’s a lot of similar qualities, save that the X100VI retails for $1600 while the Leica M cameras typically cost more like $9000!

Look no further than Fuji’s own marketing:

“See. Frame. Create.

Enjoy photography in its purest form with Fujifilm’s X100 Series digital cameras.
Using a timeless dial-based design, passed down from model to model,
the stunning 6th-generation X100VI offers an indulgent, tactile image-making experience
that delivers unforgettable content in every creative moment.”

It’s not often that I see the word “indulgent” used in camera marketing!

Yet it is true. There’s nothing here in terms of technology that isn’t available in other arguably more practical Fuji models, but like many other trendy items, it is the aesthetics and packaging here that make the X100 series so desirable. What’s ironic is that the throwback design with so many film-era cues isn’t really marketed to grizzled film-era photographers…all of the marketing has chiseled 20 something hipsters look stylish while taking photos with the X100VI.

Kudos to Fuji for crafting a beautiful bit of photography art. The machined aluminum frame looks great, with a grain that does remind me of my classic SLRs. This is set off by the vintage leather texture of the lower half of the camera.

The camera is also available in black, but I do love the look of Fuji’s silver finishes more, personally.

Unfortunately that stylish exterior does come at the cost of ergonomic practicality. There is a very slight bulge on the right side of the camera that serves as the grip, but there’s nowhere near enough depth there to actually wrap your fingers around. This is more a camera that you pinch rather than one that settles into your grip. The minimal height of the camera also means that my pinky has no place to go and has to float underneath the camera.

The tradeoff is that this is a very slim profile (aided by the pancake style lens) that will be very easy to bring along. The camera is 128.0mm in width (5″), 74.8mm in height (2.9″), and just 55.3mm in depth (2.2″). The weight is a little more substantial at 521g (1.1lb), though that is with the battery and memory card…and remember that this figure includes the weight of a lens because of the fixed lens.

The X100VI is an interesting mix of modern and retro. The retro portions have to do with the control schemes. We have a profusion of dial-based controls, though there are actually fewer actual dials than on a camera like the X-T5. On the front of the camera there is a standard wheel that is the typical control point for aperture or shutter speed.

But next to it is a an interesting control point that differs from any of the other Fuji cameras I’ve tested. There is a lever that surrounds a button (most resembling what you might typically see around a shutter button). That button can be depressed to open up a sub-menu of optional controls for the lever. By default it will switch between the optical viewfinder and the EVF (when rocked to the right), and, if in optical viewfinder mode, rocking it to the left will toggle between having a small EV-F overlay in the bottom right of the viewfinder. This has a magnified view of the focus area, which can be very useful for manual focus.

Yes, the X100VI does have a very rare optical viewfinder in a digital camera. This is a hybrid viewfinder system with three modes: fully electronic, fully optical and optical with an inset electronic display. There are a few complications with an optical viewfinder that is offset from the lens and sensor, but for the most part it is pretty nice to look through an optical viewfinder again, particularly when you layer in the electronic display. The EVF itself is mid-level – a 0.5″ display with 3.69 million dots of resolution and approximately 100% coverage. There is an easy to use diopter to the left of the viewfinder opening.

While I personally prefer a center viewfinder position, this is a nicer implementation than on, say, Sony’s cameras.

There are also a few controls on the lens itself. There are two protrusions close to the camera body that control aperture. The tight confines of that space might dictate that it is easier to control aperture from within the camera. You can set the aperture ring to “A” to enable camera control, though I had to fiddle around in the menus to get aperture control the way that I wanted. The settings didn’t quite function in the way I typically expect them to.

The aperture ring itself is clicked at one-third stop detents, and there is no declick option.

The manual focus ring of the lens also serves as a command ring when in autofocus modes. One option, for example, is to use it to utilize the “digital teleconverter” settings. The standard focal length is 35mm full frame equivalent, and the two digital teleconverter settings allow for a 50 and 70mm “zoom”, though what is really happening is just a digital cropping of the image. These crops will only show up in JPEGs, by the way, as I found that RAW images came into Lightroom uncropped even when I had used the digital teleconverter. Here’s how those crops affect the resolution.

35mm (23mm APSC) – 7728 x 5152 px – 40mp
50mm (35mm APSC) – 5472 x 3648 px – 20mp
70mm (50mm APSC) – 3888 x 2592 px – 10mp

Clearly this is a feature that only really works due to the higher resolution of the new sensor, as the crops from a 26MP sensor would end up being too low of resolution to work in a lot of applications. It would have been nice to get those RAW images with some of that crop information embedded in them, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.

The ring itself moves very nicely, with a good level of damping. I found that manual focus had a fairly analog feel to it.

There is no lens release button on the front of the camera for obvious reasons.

What is present, oddly enough, is a little flash. It’s just a rectangular grid in the front of the camera (nothing pops up), which they can get away with because Fuji’s engineers could design around a fixed lens and its dimensions (though adding on one of the converter lenses will surely interfere with the flash dispersion pattern). This is not a powerful flash (unsurprisingly), rated at 24.3′ / 7.4 m at ISO 1600! I’m not a fan on on-board flashes because of the look of images taken with an on-board flash.

While playing with the flash settings in the Q menu, however, I did discover that the flash can be used as a commander for slave flash units, which could be useful.

On the left side of the camera is one of Fuji’s useful control points – an easy to use switch that controls the focus mode (Manual, Continuous, and Single Shot).

The top of the camera has a great looking retro aesthetic that also suffers from some retro ergonomic shortcomings.

Fuji’s shutter speed dials have always struck me as rather strange. It is hard to imagine a scenario where a modern photographer would prefer the imprecision of being able to choose only full stops of exposure rather (that’s what’s controllable here) rather than the much greater precision of the one third stops available through the typical command dials. That’s a lot of potentially under or overexposed images! It’s ironic that the largest dial on the camera is arguably the most useless.

Also strange is the implementation of the very clunky ISO controls visible through the little cutout on this wheel. It took me a bit to figure out how to access them, but I eventually discovered that I could pop up dial and twist it to control the ISO settings rather than the shutter speed settings. You then have to pop the dial back down, as there are no defined clicks or detents for ISO settings and it would be very easy to bump the dial and change the settings.

Weird.

It was actually quite frustrating during that process, as Fuji doesn’t really have much in terms of secondary ways to change those settings. On Canon cameras one has the option of just touching ISO on the touchscreen and making a quick change. On Sony you can assign it to a wheel or change it in the Q (Function) menu. You can’t do either of those things here, as ISO isn’t even an option in the Q menu and Fuji’s screens continue to have very limited touch control (and poor responsiveness). The workaround involved putting the ISO control dial setting to C (Command) and then setting up one of the dials to control ISO.

That section of the camera’s controls I would gladly replace. A typical mode dial would be much more useful to me.

Other controls here are more conventional and better for it. The Exposure Compensation dial is very welcome. There is a small programable button to the right of the shutter. The shutter is threaded in a typical Fuji fashion, and surrounding it is the ON/OFF toggle. You can choose either a mechanical style shutter with a 1/4000th shutter speed limit, or an electronic shutter that can reach a much higher 1/18,000th shutter speed. Fuji has a nice hybrid option where you can choose to use the mechanical shutter for slower shutter speeds (with all of the advantages that come with a mechanical shutter) and then automatically switch to the electronic shutter when faster shutter speeds are needed.

The back of the camera is a mix of normal and unexpected. The unexpected comes in the form of the drive button. It has the expected settings like the normal drive options (burst options, etc…), but really it functions more like a mode dial, including a wide variety of bracket options, HDR modes, panorama modes, and even access to movie mode.

It’s a different design than I’m accustomed to from Fuji. One interesting bracket mode I like is the ability to bracket film simulations. It seems to happen instantly, so only one shot feels like it is taken, but you’ve got three different film simulations recorded (for JPEG). You can obviously select which three film simulations you want bracketed. The RAW images arrive in Lightroom unchanged from each other, but JPEGs have the film simulations applied. In this case they are subtle because of the three simulations I chose, which include Provia, Astia, and Reala Ace (a new simulation I quite like).

It unfortunately does not appear that you can add customized presets to the bracketing options.

Other controls are more conventional, with a rear control wheel (which can be clicked for an additional function), a mini joystick, and a variety of buttons.

I’m less crazy about the position of the Q button, which is a very flush button right on the grip. It feels like there was a lot of room to place that button near the other buttons where it would be more easily accessible (and would allow for one hand operation).

Rounding out the back is a fairly large 3″ LCD with 1.62 million dots of resolution. It is a tilting (not articulating) screen that allows for a slightly bigger range of motion than before to allow for better tilting when shooting in a higher position. As noted earlier, there is some limited touch capacity, but little in terms of menu navigation (some touch in Q menu but not main menu) and lower reactiveness than competing models from other brands.

The right side of the camera holds the connection ports, including a combo mic input/remote shutter release port (3.5mm), a USB-C port for communications and charging, and a micro-HDMI port. I’m not a fan of micro-HDMI, but I understand that space is limited in a smaller camera like this so I’m more accepting of it.

The bottom of the camera shows the battery compartment, and there we find a few disappointing aspects of this design. The first is that the battery spec has not improved despite a more power hungry sensor and AF system. The NP-W126S is a relatively small 1260mAh unit that is rated for as much as 450 frames when using the OVF but drops to 310 frames in normal mode when using the EVF. That’s only about 45 minutes of 6.2K or 4K60 recording. You probably want to pick up a spare battery or two.

The second disappointment is that the memory card is housed there. I hate this position as it makes it far more likely that you’ll walk away without a memory card inserted because you have to close the battery door to set the camera down (happened to me!) If you have a tripod QR plate attached you also won’t be able to open the door to get at the card without removing it first. Even more surprising is the fact that the card slot is only UHS-1 compatible, which is really surprising to me when I consider that this is a camera with a 40MP sensor capable of shooting up to 20FPS and recording 6.2K video. That’s a lot of data that needs to pass through a fairly small pipeline (UHS-I is only capable of one third of the speed of UHS-II). I would have thought that at the least Fuji would have upgraded to the UHS-II standard to accommodate the larger data this camera needs to move.

As noted, this is the first of the X100 lineup to include IBIS. The miniaturized IBIS unit that Fuji has incorporated here is rated for up to 6 stops of stabilization. That’s a great addition to the formula here. In theory that should allow for handholding shutter speeds down to one second, though practically you will have limited success getting much of a keeper rate at one second. The greater value will be in the ability to get stable handheld video footage, and I did find IBIS effective for that. On the stills side, I was able to hit a roughly 25% keeper rate handholding shots at 0.5th of a second (five stops).

Accessories

Fujifilm is pretty specific that weather sealing for the camera requires using an adapter ring that adds filter threads and then using a filter to complete the seal.

This first involves unscrewing the metal flange at the end of the lens and exposing outer threads that allow accessories to be threaded on. I have a few objections to this process, however. First of all, clearly adding this filter ring and the filter itself completes the sealing for the lens (that’s the only place where protection is being added), which begs the question, “Why not just have a weather sealed lens?” Fuji has many lenses that come with a WR (weather resistant) designation, and none of them require a filter to complete the process. I’m personally not a big fan of using protection filters for the simple reason that you are adding another glass element, which never improves on the optical formula. It can create more flare issues, a slight softening effect, and if a person doesn’t invest in a very good filter, a more serious degradation of image quality.

The process is also a little clunky, requiring one to bring additional accessories along to complete the process. You can keep it all installed, obviously, but that does add more thickness to a camera that you’ve purchased in part for a slim profile. There is the risk of losing the metal flange that otherwise completes the look of the system. And if you don’t keep it installed, what happens when the weather turns unexpectedly sour (as it often does in spring when I’m doing this review). Doesn’t just having a weather sealed lens make more sense?

There’s also the reality of cost. The adapter ring and filter are not included. The AR-X100 adapter ring costs an additional $46, and their 49mm protection filter is an additional $49. Now, to be fair, you could use another brand of filter, but Fuji’s filter is available in the silver color that is the aesthetic match of the silver edition of the camera. I’m guessing that if you spent the money to get this stylish camera, you’re going to want a filter that matches. So that’s another $100 added to your bill if you want to have a weather sealed camera. Again, I have to ask: doesn’t just having a weather sealed lens make more sense?

There’s one final complication to this arrangement, though it will only affect those interested in using the converter lenses to give either a wider (28mm equivalent) or normal (50mm equivalent) angle of view. Both of these converter lenses need to thread onto the same threads as the filter adapter, so once again you will have the somewhat clunky process of threading off one attachment and threading another on.

I appreciate the fact that these accessories to do add some versatility to the camera, though, frankly, if you are going to this trouble and expense, you might as well invest in an X-T5 (my review here) and have access to a wide variety of lenses. If you’ve already invested in these converter lenses in the past, however, they continue to be compatible to this most recent X100 body.

Another accessory that remains compatible with the X100VI is the LC-X100V leather case (lower half shown above to highlight the throwback ethos). The case costs $80 USD, and offers both retro style and a good amount of protection when full employed.

No to harp on the weather sealing issue, but here we run into the flaw in the design. If you have the filter adapter and filter attached (to weatherseal the camera), the camera doesn’t quite fit. You can force it and make it work, but it was clearly designed with the bare camera in mind. This is one of the top user complaints, though a close second is that the design is in two pieces (top and bottom halves), and the two pieces don’t connect. This means that when you go to shoot, you essentially have to remove the top half, leaving a rather large and clunky piece in your hand(??) while you shoot one handed.

And this sums up the paradox of the physical design of the Fujifilm X100VI. What makes it so cool is its retro design, but almost all the design and ergonomic flaws can also be traced back to the retro design elements as well. I get a sense from X100 aficionados that the quirks are all part of the charm for them.

Autofocus Performance

The X100VI receives Fuji’s most recent autofocus improvements, which are almost all software rather than hardware based. The underlying hybrid Contrast/Phase Detect autofocus system that has undergirded Fuji’s cameras for the past few generations is still in place (and in need of an upgrade!), but it has been augmented in the most recent generation of cameras with Fuji’s X-Processor 5. This adds AI based deep learning for subject detection AF to accurately track a range of subjects. The system detects animals, birds, cars, motorcycles, bicycles, airplanes, trains, insects, and drones (though you choose “bird” to track insects and “airplane” to track drones). My experience with Fuji’s most recent autofocus in a variety of cameras is that the AF system definitely works best when there is a trackable subject in frame.

There are definite improvements here, though it should also be noted that Fuji’s AF systems continue to feel more primitive than those on the other platforms I test.

What’s unique here is that the AF system is designed around use with one lens, so the lens performance is central to the autofocus performance as a whole. That leads to a bit of a mixed bag. Fuji does not specify the type of focus motor in the 23mm F2 fixed lens mounted here, but the fact that they don’t tells me that it isn’t their higher end linear motor. Focus speed is reasonably good (not brilliantly fast, but not slow, either), but the quality of focus isn’t impressive. The focus motor has a bit of a “scratchy” feel and isn’t as quiet as better lenses. Focus precision is good, however, and I had no problem nailing narrow depth of field photos.

Focus was fine for street photography, which is almost certainly going to be primary application for the X100VI.

I did feel like there was somewhat of a “double-clutch” action to focus lock, where focus did a few micro-pulses before final lock. I read a lot of people gush over autofocus, but that tends to be in comparison to previous iterations of the X100. If you are upgrading from another X100 model, I’m sure you will find autofocus improved. But if you are viewing the autofocus performance in comparison to what market competition is at the moment, it is acceptably good but far from top tier.

I’m not sure this is the camera I would reach for for tracking action. The burst speeds are fine, with up to 11 FPS with the mechanical shutter or up to 20 FPS with the electronic shutter, though with a 1.29x crop). If you don’t want the crop, the max burst rate is 13 FPS with the electronic shutter. The problem is with the buffer depth. UHS-1 SD cards just can’t keep up with much of that kind of data, so if you are shooting uncompressed RAW, you can expect a maximum of about 17 shots before the buffer fills. Switching to lossless compressed RAWs gets you up into the mid twenties, fully compressed RAWs the mid 30s, and JPEGs will range from 80-146 shots depending on your speed. Here’s a breakdown of all the options.

This is fine for shooting off a quick burst to capture the key moment for street or concert photography, but the duration before the buffer fills won’t be sufficient for most sports situations. This isn’t really that kind of camera, so buy accordingly.

Video focus is also a mixed bag. Focus pulls are relatively smooth, but focus confidence isn’t high. There’s a bit of settling before focus lock, and the initial focus point isn’t always accurate until it does a minor readjustment. There is some moderate focus breathing.

When I did my hand test (where I alternately block the view of my face with my hand and then remove it), I found that sometimes focus wasn’t quite reactive enough to make those transitions in a timely fashion.

Expect focus to be best when there is a trackable subject in frame. Focus stays fairly sticky on the eye as I moved the camera around, and I didn’t see pulsing in static shots where focus needs to lock and stay still.

In general my autofocus experience was fairly standard for a Fuji review. It got the job done, but without as much sophistication as I often see on Canon or Sony. It was enough to capture the key moments in a wedding, like the groom giving a fist bump coming down the aisle.

Video Performance

Video is one of the key areas of improvement for the X100VI over the X100V. Video capture is now available up 6.2K internally at 30p in 4:2:2 10-bit color. 4K can be shot at 4K60 (allowing for smooth slowed footage). True slow motion can be achieved at up to 240FPS at full HD (1080P).

Here’s a list of all the various video modes available:

You will encounter various crop factors depending on your choice. 6.2K footage will have a 1.23x crop, while 4K60 will have a mild 1.14x crop. 4K30 will have the full sensor width.

Both FLog 2 and HLG recording are available, and of course all of Fuji’s film simulations and your custom tweaks can be made. I found that the IBIS system worked well for static shots, slow movements, but wasn’t enough to compensate for the choppy footage that comes from walking while filming. If you want that silky smooth moving footage, put the camera on a gimbal.

Footage generally looks good. I typically quite like the footage from Fuji cameras, and while the video options here aren’t as robust as my own personal X-H2 camera, the X100VI is now largely on par with the video options on the X-T5.

Image Quality

The X100 series has been upgraded to the “…high-resolution 40.2MP X-Trans CMOS 5 HR sensor has an enhanced image-processing algorithm that boosts resolution without compromising the signal-to-noise ratio“, delivering astonishing image quality.” (Fuji’s language as quoted in my X-T5 review). I’m very familiar with this sensor as it is the same sensor found in my X-H2. My general feelings on this sensor are positive, though I’ve found that it is absolute murder on lenses that are less than perfect. Fortunately Fuji doesn’t have to worry about multiple lenses standing up to this sensor…just one.

Fuji clearly felt that the existing 23mm F2 II lens was up to the task, and it largely is. This lens has an optical design of 8 elements in 6 groups, including two aspherical lenses. The sensor and lens are capable of producing detailed images.

I’ll give a brief breakdown of the lens performance as well as giving you the basic sensor performance (courtesy of my X-T5 review). There’s nothing new here in terms of the sensor itself; what’s new is its inclusion in this lineup of cameras.

Lens Performance

Fuji’s correction profiles are typically top notch, and that’s obviously going to be extra true of a camera where only one lens will be deployed. With corrections turned on, my text chart for Vignette and Distortion looks solid:

Pull back the electronic curtain and you’ll find a mild amount of pincushion distortion (-3) and a moderate amount of vignette (+57 to correct).

If you leave corrections on, you won’t see it. This is about an average performance.

I did see a bit of fringing around some window frames in a few of my video clips, but I would say in general longitudinal chromatic aberrations are pretty well controlled. You can see a bit of fringing on the edges of the various cameras here, but nothing that breaks the image.

I saw minor amounts of lateral chromatic aberrations near the edge of the frame, but those will be taken care of via corrections.

The big test here is whether or not this lens can handle the rigors of such a high resolution sensor. The new 40.2MP sensor is a whopping 53% higher in pixel count than the 26.16MP sensor on the previous generation X100V.

The 23mm F2 lens mounted on the X100VI isn’t a top tier lens, but it does quite well. I examine my test chart results at 200%, and I found that contrast was good in the center, with a dip to the midframe and more to the corners (pretty traditional sharpness profile). The ability to render fine details isn’t top tier, but not bad, either. Here’s my test chart that the crops will come from.

And here are F2 crops from across the frame:

This is a lens that really benefits from some stopping down. Contrast and detail is immensely boosted by stopping down from F2 to F2.8:

You can really see it in this real world shot (100% crop). The F2 frame looks a little low contrast, but the F3.6 shot really pops with contrast and detail:

In less demanding settings, however, I found that I was happy with the detail I saw at F2 even if contrast wasn’t off the charts.

On this high resolution sensor sharpness peaks at F5.6, though corners never really get really sharp. There’s a pretty marked difference between contrast/detail in the center vs the corners.

Starting at F8 there will be some mild regression due to the effects of diffraction (which arrives very early on such a high resolution APS-C sensor). That softening effect will magnify at F11 and be very obvious by F16 (minimum aperture).

Bokeh is okay…not great. Get up close and you can blur out backgrounds fairly well.

Back up just a little and the background can get a little busier.

The lens handles up close shots with a bit of sun coming into the frame pretty well, delivering fairly artful images.

If you want optical perfection, however, you probably are going to be looking elsewhere. This isn’t a $2000 lens, but rather a good enough lens that allows the camera to do its thing and help you create images you’ll love.

Converter Lenses

There are two options – a wide converter (WCL-X100II) and a telephoto converter lens (TCL-X100II) – both retailing for about $350 USD. We’ll start by taking a quick look at how they impact framing. The wide converter lens changes the effective focal length to 19mm, or roughly 28mm full frame equivalence:

Here’s the normal 23mm (35mm equivalent) framing from a tripod of the same scene.

And finally here is the 33mm (50mm equivalent) framing by adding the tele converter lens.

By utilizing the digital teleconverter you can get a variety of other framing options at varying resolutions.

WCL-X100II crop mode resolutions:

28mm (18mm APSC) – 7728 x 5152 px – 40mp
41mm (27mm APSC) – 5472 x 3648 px – 20mp
58mm (38mm APSC) – 3888 x 2592 px – 10mp

TCL-X100II crop mode resolutions:

50mm (35mm APSC) – 7728 x 5152 px – 40mp
72mm (48mm APSC) – 5472 x 3648 px – 20mp
100mm (66mm APSC) – 3888 x 2592 px – 10mp

Using either converter lens does come with some optical costs. Using the wide angle converter (19mm) results in some significant barrel distortion (+17) and much heavier vignette (+92 – nearly maxed out) to recover it.

The telephoto converter increases the pincushion distortion (-13) and has nearly as big of an impact on vignette (+90 to correct).

What’s more, there is a serious impact to contrast by adding the lens converters. Here’s a comparison of the bare lens vs with the wide converter attached at F2:

That’s true when stopped down, too. Here’s a mid-frame comparison at F4:

The impact isn’t as pronounced with the TCL-X100II, though the image is a bit softer.

Surprisingly, though, that’s not true when stopped down. At F4 I actually preferred the results with the TCL-X100II attached:

The TCL definitely beats the WCL for sharpness! Using these converter lenses definitely adds to your framing options here, but if you want a variety of framing options, wouldn’t you be better just buying a camera that would allow you to use different lenses? But if you just love the X100 concept, by all means, go crazy and accessorize!

Film Simulations and Color Science

Fuji has long been famous for their excellent film simulations. The most interesting thing here is the ability to really tweak each of these presets (or create your own recipes) and deliver very cool looking images right in camera. Fuji is pretty much a JPEG shooter’s dream, as you can tweak your recipes to get images you love right out of camera. RAW images with film simulations will arrive (as usual) flat in Lightroom, as you can easily apply any of 20 film simulations in post.

But the X100VI is unique in my experience in that if you create custom looks in camera, those will actually arrive intact in Lightroom even in RAW form, ensuring that you don’t lose the look you have created.

I absolutely love Fuji’s ACROS monochrome variations. They deliver sparkling B&W images.

Give me a nice moody scene and I’m in heaven.

I’m also very partial to one of the new simulations called “REALA ACE”. It has a really nice look that feels very usable and flexible for a variety of images.

Fuji’s color science remains a treat, and, used well, this is a camera that do very special things.

Dynamic Range

I value dynamic range within a camera in two specific areas: the ability to cleanly lift shadows without introducing noise or color banding and the ability to recover highlights without introducing “hot spots” where information has been permanently lost.

Having good dynamic range (particularly if you shoot RAW), allows you a lot more creative vision over how the final image will turn out, though it is always worth mentioning that just because you can raise shadows or reduce highlights it doesn’t always mean you should. Sometimes a photo with crushed shadows or blown out highlights is the better one.

Fuji has an extra trick up its sleeve to help you maximize dynamic range performance in such scenes, which we’ll get to in just a moment.

In my tests, I found that this sensor did an excellent job of recovering shadows very cleanly. Here we have an image that I purposefully underexposed by four stops. As you can see in the original RAW image, there is very little information left there. In post I added those four stops back into the recovered image. What we find is an image that has been recovered with very little penalty, whether viewed globally:

…or at a pixel level:

I could even recover shadows fairly cleanly at five stops, though you can see some additional noise has been introduced in the checkerboard pattern of the tabletop.

As is often the case, however, highlight recovery lags behind shadow recovery. Even at 3 stops of recovered highlights there is damage done to the image with both “hotspots” (information that cannot be recovered) and the loss of some colors in our swatches.

Sony is about a half-stop better in this regard, but Fuji has one other trick that I previously mentioned. If you move beyond the base ISO to either ISO 250 or 500 (and beyond), two new options open up in the menu. These are DR200 (available at ISO 250) and DR400 (available at ISO 400). What these do is essentially split the sensor readout so that the shadow information is gathered from the current ISO setting while the highlight information comes from base ISO. At ISO 250 that gives you one additional stop in the highlights (DR200), while at ISO 500 you gain two (DR400). This allows you to overexpose the image slightly so that you have plenty of information in the shadows, but since there is one or two stops less exposure in the highlights, you have plenty of ability to recover blown out areas in post. I also find that you retain better contrast even if you underexpose and recover using this method (here’s the DR400 recovered result at three stops of overexposure compared to the base ISO three-stop recovery):

Note how much more detailed and bright the right (DR400) recovery result looks. The shadow information looks the same on the two images (ISO 500 isn’t high enough to really introduce any additional noise), but the highlights are brighter and have much great fidelity. You’ll also note how much richer the colors are in the swatches by comparison. The better retention of highlights has vastly improved the overall contrast. I would pick the image on the right every time. It looks like a natural photograph despite the fairly radical recovery of highlights.

This is a technique well worth utilizing where needed, though I found that for the most part I did have enough dynamic range to edit as desired even at the base ISO.

Take this shot of a bridge. There is a bright sky and then deep shadow under the bridge. I have plenty of latitude for recovering the shadows over the bridge and even darkening the sky (not that there is a lot there!).

That’s a very useful amount of dynamic range, and if you need more, just use the DR200 or DR400 modes. It’s worth noting that due to the increased sensitivity in the ISO (base ISO of 125 vs 160) both of those are available earlier than they were previously, meaning that you can keep the noise down even more than on previous Fuji bodies.

On the video front we find that the X-T5 has Fuji’s F-LOG2 which boasts over 13 stops of dynamic range, meaning that you have more video dynamic range available than on previous models that only had the original F-LOG profile.

ISO Performance

Fuji tends to be a little more conservative with their native ISO range than other companies and resort to less marketing hype, though I frankly find the ISO performance to be ever bit as good as the best from Canon and Sony (the other brands I test). In this case the native range is expanded slightly, but on the bottom end, as the base ISO is now 125 rather than 160. The native limit is still 12,800, though expanded options at 25,600 and 51,200 are available. I didn’t really feel like there was much of a step back relative to the 26MP sensor despite the increased resolution, with images at ISO 6400 looking usable in real world situations.

At ISO 800 there is a mild addition of noise only detectable in the shadows. There isn’t a lot of difference from base ISO, however, and moving on to ISO 1600 shows little difference. At ISO 3200 there is slightly less contrast and slightly more noise, and that pattern continues at ISO 6400 and 12,800, where the noise becomes rougher and more visible in shadow areas. The first stop in the expanded range (25,600) looks about the same as what you would find on a Sony or Canon camera (where it is included in the native ISO range), with more visible noise and black levels that aren’t as deep due to “hot” pixels. ISO 51,200 should be be avoided, as image quality is several stops worse even though that is only one stop more. There’s a fair difference between ISO 3200 and 12,800:

Fuji says that the X-Trans sensor produces a more film-grain-like noise pattern, but it mostly looks like the pattern noise I see with most cameras.
What is a strength, however, is color fidelity. I never really see a shift to greens or magenta as the ISO raises, nor do I see obvious banding in the shadow areas. Overall I’m impressed with the performance.

This real world image at ISO 12,800 looks perfectly useful to me.

Switch it to a monochrome where a bit of grain is desirable (Acros +R here) and you’ve got a great looking shot.

Resolution

The new 40.2MP sensor is a whopping 53% higher in pixel count than the 26.16MP sensor on the last few X100 bodies. That additional resolution has a lot of potential value, particularly when, as we’ve seen above, it doesn’t come with a lot of extra baggage in terms of reduced ISO performance. For portrait photographers, that high resolution means that you can take one portrait and get multiple different crops out of just one image.

The ability to deeply crop for street shots is very useful, as the original shot here seems to focus on the architecture:

While the cropped shot allows the walker to show up more prominently in the scene.

I’m having a hard time finding a downside to the resolution here, particularly when there is a Lossless Compressed RAW file option that keeps the file size down to a reasonable 40MB(ish) size, JPEGs are around 18MB, and if you want even smaller file sizes, you now can choose the HEIF image format which delivers 10-bit image quality in files up to 30% smaller than standard JPEGs. The fact that Fuji has managed to control keep ISO performance fairly similar to the 26MP level of the X100V helps eliminate a lot of the downside of the higher resolution. That resolution is going to be super helpful on a camera with a fixed lens.

Image Quality Summary

As I said in my intro, the allure of the X100VI is in its packaging and overall aesthetic. The focus system and sensor are essentially identical to what you’ll find in an X-T5. Fuji’s 40MP sensor is top dog in terms of raw resolution, their color science is excellent, but the true magic lies in the endless customization of their film simulations and the looks you can create in camera. Done right and you can create images that look almost as cool as the camera.

The actual lens is no better than average, but it gets the job done and doesn’t get in the way.

Conclusion

Almost certainly you will read more effusive reviews of the Fujifilm X100VI than this one, as I have tried to separate the hardware realities from the hipster “gotta-have-it” cool factor of the camera package. Having spent some time with the X100VI, I can understand the attraction, and I’m personally all in favor of anything that drives attention to the shrinking camera market.

The true magic of the X100VI is in the packaging. It is more than the sum of its parts, as when I break down the hardware, autofocus, and optical performance, there is nothing really exceptional here. But yet there’s also an undeniable pleasurable feeling of carrying this little camera around making magic with it.

Who knows how long it will be until the Fujifilm X100VI is readily available, but there’s no question that Fuji has managed to get the photography world’s attention with this upgraded premium compact camera. I hope you manage to get one…and hopefully you will feel the “indulgent” vibe that Fuji wants you to feel.

Pros:

Top of the heap for desirability
Very cool aesthetic
Serious improvements to the series in the X100VI
40MP sensor upgrade allows for more framing/cropping versatility
Inclusion of IBIS is fantastic
New film simulations are useful
AI Tracking upgrade
Huge video spec upgrade
Remains compatible with accessories from previous generation
Much cheaper than buying a Leica rangefinder!

Cons:

Retro controls lead to sometime clunky ergonomics
Not much of a grip
UHS-1 limitation slows data transfer
Autofocus experience only so-so
Weather sealing process seems wholly unnecessary

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Keywords: Fujifilm, X100VI, X100, VI, Fuji X100VI Review, Fujinon, Dustin Abbott, Review, Sensor, Tracking, IBIS, Stabilization, Eye AF, XF, 40MP, 40 MP, Review, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, High ISO, Autofocus, Dynamic Range, 26MP, 26 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA #letthelightin, #DA, #Fujifilm

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Viltrox 27mm F1.2 vs Sigma 23mm F1.4 – Fuji Showdown!

Dustin Abbott

September 21st, 2023

It’s been a great couple of months for Fuji X-mount photographers, as we have two new excellent prime lenses from third parties, both of which retail for about $350 USD cheaper than the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 LM WR. The Fuji is a great lens, and you can see my findings in my review here, but both the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 (my review here) and Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN (my review here) are also really intriguing alternatives at a much lower price point.

I’ve compared both in a variety of tests on a very demanding platform – the Fujifilm X-H2 and its 40MP of resolution. You can see all my findings in the video embedded here in this article as we put Sigma VS Viltrox – head to head!

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Keywords: Viltrox, Viltrox AF, Viltrox 27mm, Viltrox 27mm, F1.2, f/1.2, STM, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2, Viltrox Pro AF 27mm Review, Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN, Sigma 23mm, Sigma 23mm, Sigma 23mm review Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2 Review, X-mount, Fuji, Fujifilm, Fujinon, Review, Fujifilm X-T5, X-T5, X-H2, Bokeh, Dustin Abbott, Tracking, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, Autofocus, Build, Real World, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji, Portrait, #Portrait, VS

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Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Portrait Session (on X-H2)

Dustin Abbott

September 10th, 2023

Because I had relatively brief review period in which I was on the road nearly continually, I didn’t initially have a chance to do a portrait session with the incredibly new Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 STM. I definitely wanted to rectify that, as it was clear from my time with the lens that it should prove a great option for portrait work. I put that to the test during a portrait session and collaboration with Craig from Let the Light In TV. He shot behind the scenes footage and interviewed me about portrait work in general, while I shot a portrait session exclusively with the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 on a Fujifilm X-H2 (40MP). You can see Craig’s video by clicking this link.

The lens produced a lot of beautiful photos, and I break down my findings in the video below.

Follow Me @ YouTube | Patreon | Instagram | Facebook | DA Merchandise | Flickr | 500px Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a prerelease sample of the lens for evaluation. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

In short, the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 proved to be a very effective portrait lens, delivering the rare combination of excellent sharpness along with soft bokeh. It’s now my favorite “normal” portrait option on Fujifilm. If you want my full thoughts on the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2, you can read my text review or watch my video review. You can see some of the photos from the session down below.

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Portrait Session Photos

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Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 X-Mount Review

Dustin Abbott

August 22nd, 2023

I completely raved over Viltrox’s amazing Pro AF 75mm F1.2 lens for Fuji at the end of 2022. It delivered pro-grade build, good autofocus (that got better via firmware updates), and one of the finest optical performances I had seen from any X-mount lens. I expressed hope that it would be the first in a series of such lenses for Fuji X-mount and other platforms, and that is indeed the case. Next up is the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 STM, and this is a lens that may excite even more people for the simple reason that 27mm translates to right over 40mm full frame equivalent – an extremely useful general purpose focal length and one that I find incredibly useful for many, many subjects.

There really isn’t any direct analog to this lens on the Fuji platform. Fuji (and other brands, including Viltrox), make both a 23mm and a 33mm F1.4 lens (essentially 35mm and 50mm full frame equivalent lenses), so the 27mm F1.2 falls right in between those two in terms of focal length. Fuji does have one F1.2 lens (the 56mm F1.2 WR), but Viltrox is pretty unique in making these high performing F1.2 options. Both the 27mm and the 75mm are wonderfully sharp even at F1.2, but also preserve really nice bokeh and overall rendering.

I’ve recently spent time with both the Fujifilm XF 23mm F1.4 WR and the Sigma 23mm F1.4. They are both very sharp lenses that rival the 27mm F1.2 for sharpness, but I feel like the Viltrox excels at combining both the excellent sharpness with a nicer general rendering.

The tradeoff is that the Viltrox is considerably larger and heavier than alternative lenses. That larger maximum aperture and high optical performance come at the cost of some bulk, which will obviously turn off some who want to travel light. So should you add one to your kit? We’ll try to answer that question in this review. If you would prefer to watch your reviews, you can choose watch my definitive video review below…or just keep reading.

Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a prerelease sample of the lens for evaluation. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Build and Handling

With the Pro AF 75mm F1.2, Viltrox started a trend where they have really begun to move up into the next level of lens design. They followed the 75mm F1.2 with a full frame 16mm F1.8 wide angle prime for Sony that is truly amazing, and the Sony E-mount version of the 75mm F1.2 was even more feature rich than the Fuji X-mount version. This 27mm F1.2 mostly follows the blueprint of the X-mount version of the 75mm and delivers a feature set consistent with the typical Fuji standard. I wouldn’t be surprised to see the E-mount version of this 27mm lens (when it comes) have a similar feature set to the E-mount version of the 75mm. They added “Pro” into the name for this new series, and it certainly can compete with the premium first party options from Fuji. This a premium looking and handling lens that looks like it belongs on my X-H2.

The lens is a great fit on a body like the X-H2, but the X-H2 is sized more like a full frame camera. This is a lens that, like the 75mm, is going to be a little front heavy on smaller bodies like the X-S10/20 or similar bodies. It is smaller than the 75mm F1.2, but not by much.

It is 82mm/3.22″ in diameter (with a very common 67mm front filter thread) and is 92mm/3.62″ in length. It weighs 560g or 19.75ozoz. That makes it 5mm narrower, 9mm shorter, and 110g lighter than the 75mm, but also means that it is 14mm longer/wider and nearly 200g heavier than the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 (which I reviewed here). Fuji has typically done a great job of keeping their lenses relatively light and compact, which is, for many, one of the primary draws of choosing the smaller APS-C sensor over a full frame system. These Viltrox Pro series lenses are much like the early Sigma ART lenses on Canon and Nikon; often larger and heavier, but compensating with very high optical performance. The appeal of these lenses is going to depend a lot on your personal priorities as a photographer.

The design language is consistent with the 75mm F1.2, with one caveat. The 75mm F1.2 featured an AF/MF switch on the side, which is typically an anomaly on Fuji. Fuji lenses seem to universally lack that switch, as Fuji has tasked that function to a lever or button on the camera body instead. I prefer having the AF/MF switch, myself, and so I celebrated its inclusion on the 75mm, but Viltrox has bowed to the Fuji convention with the 27mm F1.2 and that switch is now absent.

There is a Viltrox badge on the upper right side of the lens, and it feels like a nice balance to the Pro badge on the left side.

The included lens hood is plastic and petal shaped. I would prefer a more definite click into place, as I found the lens hood was fairly easy to bump loose.

The lens hood is plastic, but the rest of the lens is all high grade in terms of materials. It feels like metal in a similar way to Fuji’s premium lenses, and the semi-gloss finish is both attractive and functional.

The manual focus ring is made of metal with tight ribbing. It moves smoothly and with nice damping, and, while I found some stepping movement when manually focusing the X-mount version of the 75mm, I noticed no such behavior here. Manual focus is a simulation (this, like all autofocusing lenses on mirrorless, is focus-by-wire, meaning that input on the focus ring is actually routed through the focus motor which then moves the focusing group of elements). It’s very good manual focus simulation, though, so this is actually quite a nice lens to manually focus.

The aperture ring is pretty standard for recent Viltrox lenses, with a clicked aperture ring that features detents at each one third stop. There is an “A’ position past F16 (minimum aperture here) that will allow you to instead control aperture from within camera if you aren’t an aperture ring person. There is no declick option, but the aperture otherwise works well. You will see a little bit of “stepping” if you try to aperture rack due to not having the declick option.

As an aside, it is a shame that Fuji has not embraced some of the more video-specific features like declicking options for aperture. The fact that Viltrox has 2-3 additional features on the E-mount version of these lenses will certainly be a bit irritating to Fuji shooters.

Starting with the 75mm F1.2, Viltrox has embraced weather sealing on their lenses. There is a nice, thick gasket at the lens mount, and Viltrox calls the lens “dust-proof” and “moisture-proof”. While I haven’t seen the “cut-out” to show the seal points yet (I’m reviewing the lens before its public release), the 75mm F1.2 had 9 seal points at all the typical spots (around rings, switches, and the front and rear entry points into the lens). I would expect this lens to potentially have at least one fewer seals due to not having the AF/MF switch, but I suspect it will otherwise be similar.

This is an internally focusing lens, so there is nothing that moves where dust might intrude. There’s also an HD-Nano multilayer coating on the front element to help with water and fingerprint resistance, making the front element easier to clean. As always, however, “moisture-proof” does not mean “water-proof”, so don’t go crazy!

Viltrox continues with a trend that other lens makers are now imitating by including a USB-C port in the lens mount that allows you to do firmware updates right to the lens. I’m a fan of this approach, as it eliminates the need for a separate dock or lens station for firmware updates, and I find the process a little more intuitive than even doing firmware updates through the camera. This allows Viltrox to future proof their lenses and continue to improve them through firmware – they were able to dramatically improve the autofocus performance on the X-mount version of the 75mm F1.2 though firmware updates.

There is no image stabilization, so I relied on the IBIS from the Fuji X-H2, which worked very well. None of the lenses in this category have OS, however, so the Pro AF 27mm F1.2 isn’t at a disadvantage.

If you look in the front of the lens, you’ll find a LOT of glass, though obviously less than what you’ll see in the longer 75mm:

There are eleven rounded aperture blades inside, and the aperture does an excellent job of maintaining a circular shape. The specular bokeh highlights are still quite round even up to F2.8 (F1.2, F2, and F2.8 shown):

You can see that the wide open geometry has some obvious cat-eye effect along the edges of the frame, though in some settings that can create a slight “swirl” effect to the bokeh that many find visually interesting.

Viltrox lenses have traditionally been stuck at a very low 0.10x magnification figure (basically all of their lenses shared that magnification level), and this has been the one area where I’ve been consistently critical of their lenses. That’s mostly because I’ve been so impressed by their growth as a company that I believe them capable of more. And they are proving me right with the 27mm F1.2, as there is both an improved minimum focus distance (28cm) and maximum magnification figure (0.15x). That’s not high, per se, but it is competitive with the standard for 50mm(ish) lenses. The Fuji 23mm F1.4 is higher at 0.20x, but Viltrox’s figure is certainly useful. Here’s what that magnification looks like:

For perspective, here’s a look at the difference between the magnification of the 75mm (0.10x) and the 27mm (0.15x):

That’s a pretty radical difference, and allows much more flexibility in the kinds of images you can make with the lens. I personally love the versatility that decent close focus provides, so a step in that direction is very welcome.

Viltrox includes a lens pouched with a padded leatherette bottom that is very reminiscent of what comes with Canon L series lenses. I’m sorry to see the AF/MF switch missing, but the improved minimum focus distance and magnification is very welcome. Overall, this is a very well executed package that shows the maturity of lens design that somehow Viltrox has quickly acquired. This lens is on the larger size, but it’s a great fit on a larger body like my X-H2 and I love the images I can get with it.

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 STM Autofocus Performance

The STM motor on the 75mm F1.2 was possibly the weak link there, at least initially. Like the 27mm, it was equipped with a Lead Screw-type STM (stepping motor), which is the better of the two different STM designs, but not quite as good as a linear style motor. I found focus accuracy to be good with the 75mm, but that things quickly declined if the subject was moving. Autofocus could sometimes be slightly slow. Firmware updates improved that performance, however, and I was actually quite impressed by the time that I did my X-H2 review (about 4 months later) at how well the updated lens did when tracking basketball action on the X-H2. Then last month I reviewed the E-mount version of the 75mm and was blown away by good the autofocus did there. I was able to easily nail bird in flight shots and quick action photos, though at least part of that is for the simple reason that Sony’s autofocus is just more sophisticated that Fuji’s.

The STM motor here in the 27mm F1.2 does not come with the early issues of the X-mount version of the 75mm. You can tell that there has been some refinement to autofocus during those 9 months since the release of the 75mm. Focus here is almost as good as the recent Fuji 23mm and 33mm F1.4 LM lenses. I found it able to keep up with tracking mild action like an indoor cricket demonstration at a recent men’s event that I attended.

Autofocus speed isn’t instantaneous (there is sometimes a split second pause while inertia builds), but overall focus changes occur quickly and smoothly. I love this particular focal length for “people shots”, or photos capturing ordinary life, and I found that the autofocus was always able to keep up and capture those unplanned moments.

In an event setting, I found that focus consistently grabbed the eyes of speakers or attendees even shooting from a distance at F1.2:

It’s the ability to trust a lens in those settings that make it far more likely to be a lens that you reach for. I think this lens would work just fine for someone who did weddings or events.

I also found that Eye AF could be trusted for narrow depth of field shots like this cute one of Nala sprawled in the summer grass.

As you’ve probably already picked up, this is a lens with beautiful optics, so accurate autofocus is huge for allowing those optics to shine even at F1.2.

I didn’t have an opportunity to shoot a portrait session with the lens due to traveling and being otherwise busy during my review period, but I did shoot photos at a golf tournament and saw expectedly good results when shooting a “portrait” like this:

This should work very well as a complimentary lens to the 75mm for someone who shoots portraits.

I got repeatable well focused results for general purpose shots. I shot at lot at F1.2, and this is a lens perfectly capable of taking advantage of that large maximum aperture in focus accuracy.

I expected good focus results for stills, but I was curious as to how the lens would hold up for video work. Focus pulls were relatively smooth and and fast, but there was almost always one pulse before a final lock on the subject was achieved. That’s not unusual for any lens on Fuji (again, that’s more due to Fuji’s focus system than anything else), but there is also some focus breathing (more than the Fuji 23mm F1.4 LM), which does draw your attention to focus changes.

Focus transitions from one subject to another when moving with the camera were relatively smooth, though if a larger focus change takes place the visible focus breathing makes it more obvious. My focus test where I face the camera and then block the camera’s view of my face with my hand went quite well. Focus was also quick and accurate back to my eye. I’ve found that Fuji’s most recent AF system/algorithm works best when there is an obvious trackable subject. There could be a tiny pause before focus returned to my hand when blocking the view of my face, but I attribute that more to the camera’s instinct to stay focused on the eye. I consider that test to have been very successful, with my only complaint being that the focus breathing makes that focus transition appear a little more abrupt than it actually is.

The next frontier for Viltrox will probably be to transition to linear focus motors or even multiple focus motors like some of the higher end Sony and Canon lenses employ to achieve snappier autofocus. Adding that power from dual motors is what enables that near-instant autofocus change that the best lenses are capable of. But other than a tiny pause while inertia builds during big focus changes, autofocus was pretty much the “bee’s knees”:

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Image Quality Breakdown

Viltrox has been able to dramatically improve their optical glass with recent releases. I noticed not only an improvement in sharpness and contrast, but also an improvement in the quality of the color rendering. Time has revealed at least part of the reason for that improvement: Viltrox has started to source some of their optical glass from Japanese company Hoya…and it shows. The lens has a fairly complex optical formula of 15 elements in 11 groups, and this includes 2 ED (extra-low dispersion), 5 high refractive, and 1 aspherical element. The MTF chart suggests a very sharp center, strong midframe (about as good as center), and a mild dip in the corners though with continued high performance at F1.2. The F8 chart is truly flawless.

I’ve noted that Fuji’s 40MP APS-C sensors are the most demanding platform that I’ve tested on. A full frame sensor would need to be over 90MP to have similar pixel density. Not all lenses are capable of looking truly good on such a demanding sensor, but you can add the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 to that short list. Even wide open the F1.2 lens produces beautifully sharp, contrasty images.

Stopped down to F2 for this shot and the amount of detail captured is impressive.

But before we get to sharpness and contrast, let’s take a look at other potential issues like vignette, distortion, and chromatic aberrations.

Distortion is essentially a non-issue. Adding correction in either direction just creates distortion; the 27mm F1.2 is essentially distortion free. Vignette is another story, however, requiring a +69 (nearly three stops) to correct the vignette. The vignette itself is quite linear, moving gradually into the frame rather than being concentrated in the corners, which actually makes for more visually compelling results when you choose to not correct the vignette. The result below is uncorrected, and you can see the vignette draws your eye towards the subject without appearing obvious.

The low distortion result sets this lens apart from the competition, and the vignette isn’t any more extreme than most competing lenses despite the larger maximum aperture. Nothing too troubling here.

How about chromatic aberrations? I could see the faintest amount of fringing in some extreme situations, but LoCA (Longitudinal Chromatic Aberrations) were mostly well controlled. You can see just a bit of green fringing here.

I saw extremely minimal amounts of LaCA (Lateral Chromatic Aberrations) along the edges of the frame at smaller aperture where they typically show up. No issue here.

As an aside, I pulled a JPEG of the shot of my test chart earlier and found that it looked pretty much identical to the RAW file shown above. I do not believe any in-camera correcting is taking place.

Here’s a look at my test chart that the crops came from (40MP images from the X-H2):

Here’s a look at F1.2 crops (about 175% magnification) from the center, mid-frame, and corner:

That’s a great performance, particularly for an F1.2 lens at F1.2. We have great sharpness across the frame, with the center and mid-frame being particularly strong. The Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR is one of the sharpest lenses that I’ve tested on the platform, and we can see that the Viltrox is about the same in the center (also in the midframe) even if I compare F1.2 to F1.4:

I do think the Fuji delivers slightly sharper corners, however.

The Viltrox is definitely delivering the sharpness, however, particularly in the areas of the frame where it will matter the most at large apertures. Contrast levels aren’t quite as intense as the 75mm, but there is plenty of resolution and contrast in real world images:

Stopping down to F1.4 produces two things: 1) more contrast and 2) a different shutter speed (1/300th vs 1/400th). The latter is important as it shows that the lens is legitimately F1.2. I’ve seen some lenses that claimed a larger aperture size but didn’t meter any differently when stopped down a bit. That’s not the case here.

That contrast advantage becomes even more obvious at F1.8, which looks intensely sharp everywhere but the extreme corners now.

The corners are starting to look excellent in this range (F1.8 to F2). They look noticeably brighter and crisper than they did at F1.2:

Expect real world results from F2 to F8 to look impressively good. Here’s a scene from the golf course at F4:

Diffraction sets in pretty early on my X-H2, so by F8 images are starting to soften slightly, and by F16 the effect is very pronounced. On the new higher resolution bodies with the 40MP sensor, I would try to stay at F8 or larger as much as possible, as you can see even at F8 that the center has started to lose a bit of the pop:

$42-Diffraction$

Minimum aperture is F16, but I wouldn’t recommend using it on the high resolution bodies. The massive maximum aperture is very useful on high resolution bodies, however, as you have a lot of aperture options long before you start to hit the diffraction level. That’s not true of lenses with smaller maximum apertures.

I noted that the weak link of the Fuji 23mm (and the Sigma 23mm F1.4) is that the bokeh rendering isn’t particularly nice. Both lenses are high resolution and high contrast, but the out of focus suffers somewhat. I prefer the rendering from the Fuji 33mm F1.4 LM even though that lens isn’t quite as sharp as the 23mm. I feel like the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 splits the difference between those two lenses, achieving similar high contrast and detail to the 23mm but while retaining a more pleasing rendering of the defocused area. Even the foreground blur looks great in this shot:

This shot has a fair bit in the transition zone, but the quality of the blur is still very smooth.

This basic shot of a cup of tea shows how nice rendering can make the ordinary special.

I think a lot of photographers will enjoy the great blend of sharpness and rendering. It does nice things with Fuji’s film simulations, including the monochrome looks (Monochrome + G, here):

Flare resistance in lenses with extra large maximum apertures is often an area of weakness, but the Viltrox does hold up reasonably well here. The ghosting/veiling effect in this shot is one of the worst offenses I saw during my tests:

I purposefully moved around for this low angle shot to try to induce flaring against the sun, but this rather artistic prismatic effect was all I got.

Overall I think that flare resistance should be good enough for most people in most situations.

Color rendition has really improved along with the improvements to Viltrox’s optical glass. I generally found that the colors were about what I would expect from a similar Fuji lens.

Skin tones of people of varying ethnicities looked accurate and pleasing to me.

Here’s me with a few buddies (and my son), and I think that colors and skin tones look good.

This is a lens that has a lot going for it optically. It combines those great optics with a great focal length. I suspect this lens will be a favorite for those that don’t mind a slightly bigger lens. Check out the image gallery here to see more of those images for yourself and to draw your own conclusions from them.

Conclusion

As soon as I saw the proposed focal length for the second entry in Viltrox’s PRO series for APS-C I was excited. I love the 40mm focal range for its versatility and the very natural and approachable feel of the focal length, and adding a usable F1.2 aperture to that great focal length had the potential to be special…and I think the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 is just that. It’s just the kind of lens that I wanted to pair with my great X-H2 body. It is fast, accurate, and renders beautifully.

This is a natural lens to grab for those moments of life that you want to capture. Not too wide. Not too narrow. This is a “Goldilocks” focal length: just right.

The price point of right under $550 USD makes this a great value (buying it from Viltrox and using the code DUSTINABBOTT will get you an additional 8% off starting September 5th, 2023). It’s more lens than the similarly priced Sigma 23mm F1.4 and undercuts either the Fuji 23mm or 33mm F1.4 alternatives by more than 300 dollars. That makes it a really compelling option, as it gives you the sharpness of the 23mm paired with the nicer rendering of the 33mm…plus a faster maximum aperture. It is larger lens that what some would like, and that is a perfectly legitimate reason to choose an alternate option (as there are some good ones). If you don’t mind a slightly larger lens, however, then the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 is going to be a new favorite that you may have a hard time taking off your camera.

Pros:

Great build quality
Level of weather sealing compares to better Fuji lenses
STM focus motor provides accurate focus even at F1.2
Faster maximum aperture than competing lenses
Excellent sharpness at F1.2
Excellent control of aberrations
Essentially no distortion
Very nice bokeh
Great focal length
USB port for firmware updates
Amazing price to performance ratio

Cons:

Vignette a little heavy
Some may find the lens large and heavy
Large focus changes aren’t instant

Gear Used:

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 8% off) | Adorama | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Pergear

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 10% off) | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Pergear Store

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo | Amazon | Adorama | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Buy DA Merchandise https://bit.ly/TWIMerch

Keywords: Viltrox, Viltrox AF, Viltrox 27mm, Viltrox 27mm, F1.2, f/1.2, STM, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2, Viltrox Pro AF 27mm Review, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2 Review, X-mount, Fuji, Fujifilm, Fujinon, Review, Fujifilm X-T5, X-T5, X-H2, Bokeh, Portrait, Dustin Abbott, Tracking, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, Autofocus, Build, Real World, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 (X-Mount) Gallery

Dustin Abbott

August 22nd, 2023

I completely raved over Viltrox’s amazing Pro AF 75mm F1.2 lens for Fuji at the end of 2022. It delivered pro-grade build, good autofocus (that got better via firmware updates), and one of the finest optical performances I had seen from any X-mount lens. I expressed hope that it would be the first in a series of such lenses for Fuji X-mount and other platforms, and that is indeed the case. Next up is the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 STM, and this is a lens that may excite even more people for the simple reason that 27mm translates to right over 40mm full frame equivalent – an extremely useful general purpose focal length and one that I find incredibly useful for many, many subjects.

There really isn’t any direct analog to this lens on the Fuji platform. Fuji (and other brands, including Viltrox), make both a 23mm and a 33mm F1.4 lens (essentially 35mm and 50mm full frame equivalent lenses), so the 27mm F1.2 falls right in between those two in terms of focal length. Fuji does have one F1.2 lens (the 56mm F1.2 WR), but Viltrox is pretty unique in making these high performing F1.2 options. Both the 27mm and the 75mm are wonderfully sharp even at F1.2, but also preserve really nice bokeh and overall rendering.

I’ve recently spent time with both the Fujifilm XF 23mm F1.4 WR and the Sigma 23mm F1.4. They are both very sharp lenses that rival the 27mm F1.2 for sharpness, but I feel like the Viltrox excels at combining both the excellent sharpness with a nicer general rendering.

The tradeoff is that the Viltrox is considerably larger and heavier than alternative lenses. That larger maximum aperture and high optical performance come at the cost of some bulk, which will obviously turn off some who want to travel light. So should you add one to your kit? You can find my thoughts by reading my text review or watching the video review.

Follow Me @ YouTube | Patreon | Instagram | Facebook | DA Merchandise | Flickr | 500px Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a prerelease sample of the lens for evaluation. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

Images of the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2

Images taken with theViltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2

Gear Used:

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 8% off) | Adorama | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Pergear

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 10% off) | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Pergear Store

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo | Amazon | Adorama | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Buy DA Merchandise https://bit.ly/TWIMerch

Keywords: Viltrox, Viltrox AF, Viltrox 27mm, Viltrox 27mm, F1.2, f/1.2, STM, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2, Viltrox Pro AF 27mm Review, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2 Review, X-mount, Fuji, Fujifilm, Fujinon, Review, Fujifilm X-T5, X-T5, X-H2, Bokeh, Portrait, Dustin Abbott, Tracking, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, Autofocus, Build, Real World, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji

I completely raved over Viltrox’s amazing Pro AF 75mm F1.2 lens for Fuji at the end of 2022. It delivered pro-grade build, good autofocus (that got better via firmware updates), and one of the finest optical performances I had seen from any X-mount lens. I expressed hope that it would be the first in a series of such lenses for Fuji X-mount and other platforms, and that is indeed the case. Next up is the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 STM, and this is a lens that may excite even more people for the simple reason that 27mm translates to right over 40mm full frame equivalent – an extremely useful general purpose focal length and one that I find incredibly useful for many, many subjects.

There really isn’t any direct analog to this lens on the Fuji platform. Fuji (and other brands, including Viltrox), make both a 23mm and a 33mm F1.4 lens (essentially 35mm and 50mm full frame equivalent lenses), so the 27mm F1.2 falls right in between those two in terms of focal length. Fuji does have one F1.2 lens (the 56mm F1.2 WR), but Viltrox is pretty unique in making these high performing F1.2 options. Both the 27mm and the 75mm are wonderfully sharp even at F1.2, but also preserve really nice bokeh and overall rendering.

I’ve recently spent time with both the Fujifilm XF 23mm F1.4 WR and the Sigma 23mm F1.4. They are both very sharp lenses that rival the 27mm F1.2 for sharpness, but I feel like the Viltrox excels at combining both the excellent sharpness with a nicer general rendering.

The tradeoff is that the Viltrox is considerably larger and heavier than alternative lenses. That larger maximum aperture and high optical performance come at the cost of some bulk, which will obviously turn off some who want to travel light. So should you add one to your kit? You can find my thoughts by reading my text review or watching the video review.

Follow Me @ YouTube | Patreon | Instagram | Facebook | DA Merchandise | Flickr | 500px Thanks to Viltrox for sending me a prerelease sample of the lens for evaluation. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

Images of the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2

Images taken with theViltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2

Gear Used:

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 8% off) | Adorama | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Pergear

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 10% off) | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Pergear Store

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo | Amazon | Adorama | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

Buy DA Merchandise https://bit.ly/TWIMerch

Keywords: Viltrox, Viltrox AF, Viltrox 27mm, Viltrox 27mm, F1.2, f/1.2, STM, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2, Viltrox Pro AF 27mm Review, Viltrox AF 27mm F1.2 Review, X-mount, Fuji, Fujifilm, Fujinon, Review, Fujifilm X-T5, X-T5, X-H2, Bokeh, Portrait, Dustin Abbott, Tracking, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, Autofocus, Build, Real World, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR Review

Dustin Abbott

August 15th, 2023

Fuji’s move to the 40MP resolution point on some of their higher end cameras has been pretty punishing on many of their existing lenses, but it also really makes it clear which lenses are exceptional. I reviewed one such lens earlier this year in the form of the XF 33mm F1.4 R LM WR, and immediately people began to tell me that I needed to try out the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR as well, as it was even better. Well, they were right; this lens is awesome! It’s a clear and easy choice for those looking for a premium prime lens covering the classic 35mm angle of view (23mm is 34.5mm in full frame equivalence due to Fuji’s 1.5x crop factor). The XF 23mm has been out for roughly a year and a half now, but it feels like it was made for these new high resolution bodies. This is an easy lens to produce lovely photos with.

Fuji has opened up their platform to third party lenses, and there are a number of lenses that look pretty much identical on paper, but aren’t in practice. This includes a Tokina ATX-M 23mm F1.4 ($299 USD), Viltrox 23mm F1.4 ($299 USD, and the Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN that is rumored to soon be coming in Fuji X-mount ($549 USD). The Sigma, in many ways, will prove the most competitive (based on my findings with the Sony E-mount version), but I think there are still a number of ways where the Fuji XF 23mm F1.4 is operating on its own level. It’s got solid features, great autofocus, and gorgeous optics.

But that does come at a cost. The Fujifilm XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR retails for $899, which means that you are going to pay for that goodness. If we were all made of money, we would all choose the absolute best gear regardless of cost, but in the real world the reality of a lens costing hundreds of dollars more than the competition is going to be a factor. My review will remember that tension that you, as the consumer, have to deal with as a part of my assessment.

So should you add one to your kit? We’ll try to answer that question in this review. If you would prefer to watch your reviews, you can choose watch my definitive video review below…or just keep reading.

Thanks to Fujifilm Canada for loaning me the 23mm F1.4. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

Fuji XF 23mm Build and Handling

Fuji likes to essentially build the feature list of their lenses right into the name, so if you learn to “speak Fuji” you can quickly get a sense of what a lens does and does not have right from the name. In this case, the name includes R, LM, and WR, which is a robust feature set.

R = Ring, or specifically an aperture ring.
LM = Linear Motor, Fuji’s premium focus system
WR = Weather Resistance

That adds up to a fairly premium lens despite the compact size of the lens. This lens is slightly larger and heavier than the previous generation 23mm F1.4, but the tradeoff is that it is better at everything. The Fuji XF 23mm F1.4 is pretty much identical to the 33mm F1.4, having very pleasing proportions that look very nice when mounted on the camera.

Now, to be fair, I tested both of these lenses on one of Fuji’s largest APS-C bodies – the X-H2, so if you are using one the very small bodies and want to travel as light as possible, there are smaller/lighter alternatives (the XF 23mm F2, for example). To me, however, this is a great size lens on the X-H2.

The dimensions of the XF 23mm F1.4 are 2.6 (D) x 3.1″ (L) / 67 x 77.8mm with a 58mm front filter thread size. The weight is a very moderate 13.2 oz or 375g. That makes the 23mm very slightly larger and heavier than the 33mm, but barely; it is just a few millimeters longer and about 5 grams heavier. As with the 33mm options, the two competing lenses from Viltrox and Tokina are identical in their own proportions and specifications. Both are 2.6 x 2.8″ (65 x 72mm) though the Viltrox weighs in at 260g while the Tokina is slightly heavier at 276g. But there’s more – they both have the same optical design (11 elements in 10 groups) and the same MFD (30cm) and maximum magnification (0.10x). Same filter thread size (52mm) and same number of aperture blades (9). That’s weirdly similar. The Sigma (in Sony form) is more unique at 65.8 x 79.2mm and 330g in weight, making it the most similar to the Fuji. Here’s a look at a comparison chart between the for lenses:

Bottom line is that while the Fuji is the heaviest of this group, it is also the best made, has full weather sealing, and has a slightly larger/more robust linear focus motor. The weight is still very light and I found the camera and lens effortless to carry around even without a strap for hours while exploring the Notre Dame campus in South Bend, Indiana.

The aperture ring is the Fuji standard. It moves nicely with defined detents at the one third stop marks and with markings at the full stops (F1.4. F2, F2.8, etc…). Rotate the lens all the way to the right and click the little button on the ring if you want to move into A (automatic) mode and control aperture from within the camera.

The manual focus ring works fairly well. I could focus with fairly good precision and didn’t notice visible stepping despite being a focus by wire system.

The Fuji XF 23mm is a very nicely made lens despite its light weight. It feels very “metal” and dense. The lens has a classic semi-glass black finish to it and is completed with thorough weather sealing (as already noted) that has a rear gasket and internal seals.

The included lens hood is is made of plastic but feels more substantial than the one on the 33mm that I tested.

There are no switches on the barrel, as AF/MF is handled via a lever/button on Fuji camera bodies. But many other lensmakers are including things like a focus hold button and/or declick option in lenses in this price zone, and it feels like the standard has been raised and Fuji isn’t quite meeting it. There is also no lens based optical stabilization. I used the X-H2 for this review, which has good in-camera-image-stabilization, so I didn’t actually miss it, but if you are shooting with an older camera, you might.

There are nine rounded aperture blades and I felt like the aperture did quite a good job of retaining a circular shape when stopped down. Here’s a look at the geometry at F1.4, F2, and F2.8:

There is significant lag in the aperture when trying to do aperture racking for video (already difficult because of the clicks) along with visible “steps”. There will be no smooth opening and closing of aperture for an aperture rack.

The minimum focus distance is 19cm, which allows for a reasonably high 0.20x, which is the best amongst these competing lenses (Viltrox and Tokina have 0.10x and the Sigma has about 0.14x). Here’s a look at MFD:

Up close performance is good, and this real world shot shows both the magnification level and the detail available.

Contrast certainly isn’t at macro level, but there’s enough detail there to make up close shots with strongly blurred backgrounds a definite strength.

Overall, the build and features of the lens are very nice, and, as noted in the intro, the compact nature of the lens makes it easy to bring along.

Fujinon XF 23mm Autofocus Performance

The Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 Macro is equipped with a linear focus motor, and that motor does the job of moving focus quickly and smoothly. It was also very accurate on my X-H2, which gave me more confidence using it than I typically feel when using Fuji. I really felt like I could rely on getting accurate autofocus in a wide variety of situations. I was a guest at a wedding, and when the bride and groom came through the door I only had a quick moment to turn and take a shot. They were backlit, there were about 10 rows of people between me and them, and I shot at F1.4. Autofocus was accurate despite all these factors.

General portrait work was very good, with consistently accurate focus.

Autofocus up close was good as well, allowing for lovely close shots:

Focus was quiet and quick, allowing me to grab shots even during action, like on the golf course.

As odd as it may seem, I was also relieved to see good focus at smaller apertures, like for landscapes or architecture. Sometimes lenses focus fine at wide apertures, but not at smaller apertures.

The XF 23mm F1.4 was also quite good for video work, though I continue to see a few Fuji quirks. Focus pulls were good, with no visible steps. Focus breathing is extremely low, which helps focus transitions look very smooth. But on the negative side, touching a new focus area on the screen doesn’t always produce a reaction, or sometimes the move to focus to a new area is delayed. I think that is largely on Fuji’s focus system and touchscreens, which just aren’t as responsive as some competing brands, but there is clearly the potential in the lens for strong performance for video.

When doing my hand test (blocking focus on my face with my hand and then removing it to allow focus to return to the eye), I saw mixed results. The problem was never focus on my face, but rather sometimes the focus system didn’t move to my hand. It would focus on the background beyond me instead. Bottom line: there’s still room for improvement on the video AF front for Fuji, but I actually don’t think that the lens is the problem.

Autofocus was definitely better than average, however, so I’m satisfied. Most of the time focus very – ahem – sweet:

This is the kind of lens I would want to have on my Fuji camera in critical focus situations.

Fuji XF 23mm Image Quality Breakdown

The Fuji XF 23mm has a complex optical formula of 15 elements in 10 groups, which includes 2 aspherical and 3 ED elements – essentially an identical optical design to the 33mm. The MTF chart shows very sharp center performance, a dip in the midframe, and then a minor correction where the edges of the frame are slightly sharper.

It’s worth noting that Fuji displays their MTF charts at higher values than usual. Most MTF charts use 10 and 30 lines/mm, but Fuji shows their MTF charts at 15 and 45 lines/mm. That’s actually useful since the release of their 40MP sensors, as the more demanding MTF chart (at 45 l/mm) is a more accurate representation of how lenses will perform on a high resolution body. As noted in the intro, I feel like the XF 23mm F1.4 has joined a very short list of lenses that I feel really thrive on the 40MP cameras.

Fuji’s correction profiles are typically quite good, but I’ll turn them off to take a look at the actual lens performance when it comes to vignette and distortion.

We can see that there is some barrel distortion and fairly heavy vignette present. If I do a manual correction I find that the distortion pattern is quite linear and is corrected with a value +13. The vignette is heavy, requiring a +81 to clear it up (about 3 stops). The correction profile does all of this easily either in camera for JPEG/Video or in software for RAW files.

Nothing too troubling here. How about chromatic aberrations? First of all, nothing jumped out at me in real world testing. When I went looking for longitudinal chromatic aberrations, I really could not find much of anything. Bokeh highlights were neutral, and there was little fringing to be seen. In this shot I don’t see any fringing either in the crystals or in the bokeh highlights beyond.

I saw next to no lateral chromatic aberrations near the edge of the frame either on my chart in on bare branches in real world shots, so nothing to worry about on that front.

Here’s a look at my test chart that the crops came from (40MP images from the X-H2):

Here’s a look at F1.4 crops (about 175% magnification) from the center, mid-frame, and corner:

The XF 23mm F1.4 has more consistent sharpness, contrast, and detail across the frame than the 33mm did, making it one the sharpest Fuji prime lenses that I’ve yet tested. The results look very much like a good lens on one of the full frame platforms that I test, which is, frankly, very unusual on APS-C. I was very pleased to get high contrast, detailed results even at F1.4:

That’s very big deal when you are talking about this level of resolution. A full frame camera would have to be roughly 91MP to have a similar level of pixel density, so the XF 23mm F1.4 is being held to a higher standard in these tests than on any other platforms, and the fact that a compact lens is succeeding so well under these demands is very impressive. Don’t expect anywhere near this level of performance from the Viltrox or Tokina 23mm F1.4 lenses. I don’t have either of them on hand to compare to, but when I looked back on my review of the Viltrox, it didn’t deliver as good of results on Sony even though I tested it on just an 18MP resolution point. The Sigma will likely be the strongest competitor based on my Sony E-mount test, and I’ll revisit this comparison when I do a review on X-mount.

Even a mild stop down to F1.8 produces improved contrast across the frame and brighter corners.

Stopping the lens down to F2 adds a bit more contrast in the mid-frame and corner, with the center mostly staying the same. Stopping on down to F2.8 improves contrast and clarity to fantastic levels across the frame.

Real world images in this range are crisp and detailed all across the frame (this shot at F2.8):

The importance of this cannot be overstated, particularly if you are looking for lenses that are a good match for a high resolution body. Diffraction comes early on high resolution cameras, so being able to get your best results at wider apertures is really important. High resolution bodies also tend to be noisier at high ISO values, so the ability to get crisp results at large apertures allows one to keep the ISO down in lower light situations and get clean results. The XF 23mm F1.4 is one of the best pairings for Fuji’s 40MP sensors that I’ve yet reviewed.

At landscape apertures there is plenty of detail across the frame. Couple that with Fuji’s excellent color rendition, and you have a lens very well suited for landscape work:

Diffraction sets in pretty early on my X-H2, so by F8 images are starting to soften slightly, and by F16 the effect is very pronounced. On the new higher resolution bodies with the 40MP sensor, I would try to stay at F8 or larger as much as possible.

$31-Diffraction$

The 23mm is clearly sharper than the 33mm, but I would give the edge to the 33mm for the quality of the bokeh. It’s not unusual for the lens with wider focal lengths to be less “creamy” in the bokeh region than longer focal lengths. This shot of the morning dew shows what I would consider the biggest “bokeh issue” for the lens – it has more outlining than what I would like to see.

When you arrived at strongly defocused backgrounds (look at the upper portion of the image below), the bokeh looks quite good. But in the early transition to defocus there are still some harder edges.

You can see it here in this shot of votive candles: the defocused region is only okay, certainly not exceptional.

One final image to illustrate the point – this shot of an ornate stair rail shows a lot of outlined circles in the defocused regions; you certainly couldn’t classify it as “soft”.

This is often the Achille’s heel for very sharp, high contrast lenses. It’s hard to turn that contrast off in the defocused area. It’s a rare lens that can combine both intense contrast and sharpness with very soft and creamy defocused areas, so often lens designers have to look for some compromise between the two. The XF 23mm F1.4 is biased towards the sharpness side of the equation.

This isn’t to say the bokeh is bad (it’s not), but it’s just a little busier than I personally would like. When at its best the XF 23mm F1.4 delivers images that have great detail on the subject and fairly nice rendering in the background.

This image is a good segway into a discussion of flare resistance. You can see from the upper right portion of the image above that there was bright sunlight coming into the frame, and yet contrast has held up. There’s a hint of an artistic veiling effect that shows up a little more strongly in this image here:

I’m actually very partial to this effect, as it can add an artistic effect to images. In fact, one of my favorite images from the wedding I (casually) shot with this lens was this “getaway” image of the bride and groom where I intentionally got low to get some flare effectives in the image. Contrast is strong in the image, but there is a very nice sunstar effect. There is a moderate ghosting artifact near the bottom of the frame, but nothing too heinous.

I was very pleased with the look of the sunbursts from the lens. They are nicely defined with blades that end in points.

Color rendition is typically a strength for Fuji glass, and I think that’s true here. Color are rich, nicely saturated, and images have a pleasing “pop” to them.

Here’s another shot of an interior space that shows nice color rendition.

Skin tones were also very nice. I would consider this a great option for wedding photographers for a lot of the reasons I’ve already mentioned.

Like the 33mm, this is a lens that I would personally enjoy owning. I don’t love the bokeh, but it does pretty much everything else very well. Check out the image gallery here to see more of those images for yourself and to draw your own conclusions from them.

Conclusion

Fuji’s transition to the very high resolution point on some of their recent cameras has prompted my own move to the X-H2 as my Fuji camera and test body. I’ve quickly discovered that a 40MP APS-C sensor really changes the calculus of what lenses are going to be acceptable to someone who looks critically at lenses for a living. I’ve been left disappointed by a number of lenses that just don’t seem to ever get quite sharp enough to resolve this sensor, so a lens like the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR is a breath of fresh air. It makes my X-H2 essentially the equivalent of a full frame camera, with great detail and autofocus, but with a smaller, lighter form factor than what most full frame lenses can compare to. I love my Sony FE 35mm F1.4 G Master lens, and have marveled at how compact it is (for what it is), but there’s no arguing the fact that it is 50% bigger and heavier than this XF 23mm F1.4. That is the (potential) advantage of APS-C, and it is nice to see it realized here.

A lens like this is a great option in lower light or at night, as you can shoot with confidence at large apertures and still get crisp, detailed results.

Autofocus performance was also a clear cut above older Fuji lenses, and, while Fuji still has a ways to go to quite match what Sony and Canon are doing, the gap seems to be closing a bit. If you have purchased or are considering purchasing an X-H2 or X-T5 (or some future body with the 40MP sensor), then I can recommend the XF 23mm F1.4 to the short list of lenses that have high enough performance to thrive on that platform. At the same time, the price tag of $899 USD is not cheap, so a lens like the Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN might become the next best thing if you can’t afford the Fuji. I can also say, with confidence, that the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR is the best lens you can get at this focal length in X-mount.

Pros:

Well made lens in a compact package
Good build and weather sealing
Linear motor is quiet and fast
Good stickiness on eyes during focus
Focus pulls are smoothly damped
Very low focus breathing
Good sharpness across the frame from F1.4 on
Low levels of chromatic aberrations
Beautiful color rendition

Cons:

- No declick option or physical controls other than aperture ring
- Bokeh has some outlining
- Vignette fairly heavy

Gear Used:

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujinon XF 33mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

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Keywords: 23mm, 23mm F1.4, XF 23mm F1.4, Fuji, Fuji 23mm Review, Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 Review, LM, WR, R, 33mm, 33, 1.4, F1.4, F/1.4, Fujinon, Fujifilm, X-H2, FujiFILM X-H2, X-H2 Review, X-T5, Fuji X-H2, Fuji X-H2 Review, Fujinon, Dustin Abbott, Review, Sensor, Tracking, IBIS, Stabilization, Eye AF, Viltrox, XF, Review, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, High ISO, Autofocus, Dynamic Range, 40MP, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 LM WR Gallery

Dustin Abbott

August 15th, 2023

Fuji’s move to the 40MP resolution point on some of their higher end cameras has been pretty punishing on many of their existing lenses, but it also really makes it clear which lenses are exceptional. I reviewed one such lens earlier this year in the form of the XF 33mm F1.4 R LM WR, and immediately people began to tell me that I needed to try out the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR as well, as it was even better. Well, they were right; this lens is awesome! It’s a clear and easy choice for those looking for a premium prime lens covering the classic 35mm angle of view (23mm is 34.5mm in full frame equivalence due to Fuji’s 1.5x crop factor). The XF 23mm has been out for roughly a year and a half now, but it feels like it was made for these new high resolution bodies. This is an easy lens to produce lovely photos with.

Fuji has opened up their platform to third party lenses, and there are a number of lenses that look pretty much identical on paper, but aren’t in practice. This includes a Tokina ATX-M 23mm F1.4 ($299 USD), Viltrox 23mm F1.4 ($299 USD, and the Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN that is rumored to soon be coming in Fuji X-mount ($549 USD). The Sigma, in many ways, will prove the most competitive (based on my findings with the Sony E-mount version), but I think there are still a number of ways where the Fuji XF 23mm F1.4 is operating on its own level. It’s got solid features, great autofocus, and gorgeous optics.

But that does come at a cost. The Fujifilm XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR retails for $899, which means that you are going to pay for that goodness. If we were all made of money, we would all choose the absolute best gear regardless of cost, but in the real world the reality of a lens costing hundreds of dollars more than the competition is going to be a factor. My review will remember that tension that you, as the consumer, have to deal with as a part of my assessment.

So should you add one to your kit? We’ll try to answer that question in this review. If you want more information, you can choose to watch my definitive video review or read the text review…or just enjoy the photos below.

Thanks to Fujifilm Canada for loaning me the 23mm F1.4. I’ll be doing this review on my X-H2, which I reviewed here. As always, this is a completely independent review and my conclusions are my own.

Images of the Fuji XF 23mm F1.4

Images Taken with Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4

Gear Used:

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujinon XF 33mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

Want to support this channel? Use these affiliate links to shop at: B&H Photo | Amazon | Adorama | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Ebay | Make a donation via Paypal

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Keywords: 23mm, 23mm F1.4, XF 23mm F1.4, Fuji, Fuji 23mm Review, Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 Review, LM, WR, R, 33mm, 33, 1.4, F1.4, F/1.4, Fujinon, Fujifilm, X-H2, FujiFILM X-H2, X-H2 Review, X-T5, Fuji X-H2, Fuji X-H2 Review, Fujinon, Dustin Abbott, Review, Sensor, Tracking, IBIS, Stabilization, Eye AF, Viltrox, XF, Review, Hands On, Video Test, Sharpness, High ISO, Autofocus, Dynamic Range, 40MP, 40 MP, Lens, Comparison, Test, Dustinabbott.net, APS-C, X-Trans, letthelightin, DA, #letthelightin, #fuji

DISCLAIMER: This article and description contains affiliate links, which means that if you click on one of the product links, I’ll receive a small commission. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

Fujifilm X-M5 Review

Dustin Abbott

January 20th, 2025

Spec List

Build and Features

Kit Lens

Vlogging Mode

Autofocus Performance

Video Autofocus

Video Performance

Image Quality

ISO Performance

Dynamic Range Performance

X-M5 Color

Conclusion

Pros:

Cons:

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GEAR USED:

Purchase the Fujifilm X-M5 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Nuzira | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

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Fujifilm X100VI (6) Camera Review

Dustin Abbott

May 6th, 2024

Spec List

Build and Features

Accessories

Autofocus Performance

Video Performance

Image Quality

Lens Performance

Converter Lenses

Film Simulations and Color Science

Dynamic Range

ISO Performance

Resolution

Image Quality Summary

Conclusion

Pros:

Cons:

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GEAR USED:

Purchase the Fujifilm X100VI @ B&H Photo https://bhpho.to/3VYCWWe | Adorama https://howl.me/cl2uPHzpB71 | Nuzira https://tinyurl.com/BuyX100VI | Amazon https://amzn.to/49yrTWF | Amazon Canada https://amzn.to/3Q2QNXt | Amazon UK https://amzn.to/4cYJfPE | Amazon Germany https://amzn.to/3xy8UhI

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Viltrox 27mm F1.2 vs Sigma 23mm F1.4 – Fuji Showdown!

Dustin Abbott

September 21st, 2023

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GEAR USED:

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 8% off) | Adorama | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Pergear

Purchase the Sigma 23mm F1.4 DN @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

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Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Portrait Session (on X-H2)

Dustin Abbott

September 10th, 2023

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Portrait Session Photos

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GEAR USED:

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 8% off) | Adorama | Amazon | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Pergear

Purchase the Viltrox Pro AF 75mm F1.2 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Viltrox (use code DUSTINABBOTT for 10% off) | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Pergear Store

Purchase the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-H2 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany

Purchase the Fujifilm X-T5 @ B&H Photo | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Find it Used at KEH

Purchase the Fujifilm X-S20 @ B&H Photo | Adorama | Amazon | Camera Canada | Amazon Canada | Amazon UK | Amazon Germany | Ebay

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Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 X-Mount Review

Dustin Abbott

August 22nd, 2023

Viltrox Pro AF 27mm F1.2 Build and Handling