The Fujifilm X100V After 2 ½ Years

What's going on? This is another video I wanted to do, and I've been wanting to do this video for quite some time. I think for a lot of folks that are on the Internet, watching YouTube videos about cameras and hearing about gear and getting excited about those kinds of things, one of the biggest things you're trying to do is find what camera works for you. And I think we do that in reading and listening to other people's opinions and thoughts. And I think that kind of shapes, for better or worse, what we want to do. So if you're out there looking for a camera or you're watching this video and you just want to hear more about the camera, I want to spend just a little bit of time today looking at some photos that I've taken with this camera, instead of me sitting here babbling on about why I like it or what I wish it had. And I also want to point out some things that I haven't heard out there as much. So let's start with what is it that we're talking about? So if you've seen the title of this video, we're talking about the X100V. This is the 2020 kind of premium compact point and shoot camera from Fujifilm. It was a camera that they put out pretty much in the midst of the pandemic. And it was something that was long revered and long sought after by members of the community because the previous versions of this camera were just so good. The one thing that really stuck out about every single version of this camera that everybody universally did not like was the really soft, close focus distance. And almost sometimes when the camera was wide open in F2, which I'm not going to run through the spec sheet, but as you probably already know, this is an F2 camera, 23 millimeter fixed focal length. It's about a 35 millimeter equivalent, but at F2 typically, and I was a previous X100T owner, I would see, hey, these images were a little bit softer up close due to the sort of wide, ish standard field of view. You had to get a little bit closer to your subject and nicely the camera would focus pretty closely. I don't have the number off the top of my head, but it did a really good job. The problem is it would kind of halo, it would get really soft. But ultimately it was still an amazing camera. When they came out. The X100F, which was the version before this camera, the fourth version, it still exhibited much of the same issues. Newer sensor, but still some of those issues so this camera coming out solved that. And I think that's something that a lot of folks are like, hey, it's a great camera. But they're not pointing out how sharp this lens is and just how close it is to the 23F2 from Fuji. But I would say the 23F2 from Fuji has plenty of problems. I'm currently not an owner. I've sold it last year because it was just one of those lenses I hated using because of that close focusing issue. I couldn't really trust it out in the field. But I've moved on to the new 23 millimeter 1.4, which is a phenomenal lens. Maybe I'll make a video about that someday. But going back to this camera, you've heard all the amazing things about it. I'm not going to go through that. But I want to let you know that this lens is super sharp, it focuses relatively closely, and it gives you some really great results. Obviously the other big addition to this camera is the flip screen. Right. Having that two way tilting screen is really nice. Now, don't know why they weren't able to add the hinge in here to get it going up the third way. But it sits flush with the camera, which is really nice, right? So like you get that nice flush view to it. And sometimes I even forget to take out the display because I'm like, oh, I forgot that it actually will adjust. I'm so used to the old one. But I'm going to show you some photos here in just a moment of what I've taken with this camera over the past couple years. Going on three years with this camera, I want to talk about some of the issues I've had. One of the biggest ones, and I don't know if the video is going to really show up here, but underneath the ISO dial, I'm going to try to get the light perfectly there. It's hard to see, but where that ISO dial is right here, there's actually some liquid in there. I don't really know what that's from. I took it to a party once, which is really stupid. Don't bring your premium Fujifilm gear to a party. Set it on a table, picked it up, noticed it was a little sticky. Someone probably spilled beer or something on it, I don't know. But that now is kind of in there. And again, I don't know if that comes out on the video. But the other thing is the focus ring here has some issues too. It's a little bit sticky over time. I've kind of WD40 a little bit, and it's a lot better, but you can still kind of tell it's not stock. Other than that, the camera's held up really well. I hate how dirty it gets on top here, see if this will be able to come through in the video. Just the dust that travels in there is really crappy. But in terms of the hardware, it's an amazing camera. It feels really good in the hand. You can see that I have this square hood on there. This is a cheap. I think it's by a company Hoke, I don't remember. I'll link it below. Really, really cheap, cool square hood. That's not 80 bucks like the real one. So. So let's look at some pictures of this or, you know, what I've taken with this camera, and I want to really show how important it is. All right, so let's look at some photos from the X100V. Again, I'm only going to choose, I don't know, 20 or so. And these are not my best work over the past two, two and a half years. But I want to be clear that this camera, again, is just going with you a lot of places, right? So you're going to take pictures of things that maybe you don't think are incredible, but there are photos and there were moments in time that you enjoyed. So starting off here, really just street photo, right? I'm walking down the street. I was like, what a bizarre kind of setup, right? We got this construction site and house in the background and this nice Mercedes with newspapers underneath. And again, the colors that come out of this sensor, I mean, you've heard me wax boy about on other videos, but, you know, Fujifilm has the best colors in the game. I mean, there's no other way to describe that. So a lot of fun. This next image here, we've got a foggy morning in Newport Beach. You can see kind of the breakwater here. But I thought this was interesting. Again, just a kind of photo that you would take. I use lightroom. And yes, you can kind of see some of the artifacting and issues with the X Trans sensor. But ultimately it's an incredible image. It's fun, it's kind of cool. And normally what's here, if you know, is this is actually the Pacific Ocean and the breakwater goes out. So it's kind of this ominous image. And again, something that you're just taking when you're walking down the street. If you have a family or if you have a young child, I mean, there's no better camera, right? I would take last fall, you know, walks with my daughter, and just the kind of fidelity that you're getting out of it. And the moments that you can capture are really fantastic. The colors that come out of it are playful and fun, and it's just a really great camera to have with you at all times. You know, there was even nights when in the winter I was really bored and there wasn't any good video games out or whatever, and I hadn't finished my work and would kind of walk down the street to Beach Boulevard here in Huntington beach and just start doing some long exposure, right? And it's kind of a typical thing. And long exposure is not setting the bar any higher, but kind of saw this ambulance go by and did a long exposure of it. The camera's with you. It's just unbelievable that this kind of fidelity. I mean, even look at the liquor sign here. We're in it probably 200% here, and it looks fantastic. Really, really, really great sensor that's in here. By the way, if you're finding this video interesting, useful at all, or you're vibing with it, whatever, please hit the subscribe button, click the like button. You know, the drill would help grow this channel. Really appreciate that. Back to the photos. You know, dynamic range, nighttime shots, they're always going to look good. This is handheld, probably, you know, 1/30 of a second or so, and it's just a really, really good image. No ibis. If you've got a steady hold. I usually use a strap around me to kind of, you know, keep it steady, but it's. You can get some great results. I mean, look at the windows up here. Pretty sharp. Blown out here, right? So you're gonna get some of that dynamic range. Not perfect, but dang, pretty good. You know, street stuff. I always went on the Huntington beach pier and did some street work. And it's just fun, you know, and the camera's with you. And I would say this lens resolves detail pretty well for the size. You know, I would definitely say that the 23 millimeter 1.4 that I have on my XH2s now is going to provide a lot better photo. But do I want to bring that with me? Right, that's. That's the question again. Families. I have hundreds of thousands of photos of my daughter sitting in her car seat in her stroller when she was much younger. And you see the progression of time with this camera when she was even younger and maybe a little Bit older and bigger. It's a really cool thing to document your life around you. And even just walking down the street like hey, this is a really cool dumpster. We are lucky here in California. Definitely paradise. Paradise. Paradise. But just cool shot and something fun and that I would have gotten on my phone. You wouldn't have gotten, gotten this dynamic range and this, this, this, this feeling. I would drive to work early in the mornings and take the sunrise and you know, just some of the gradients you get out of this camera. I mean just look at the detail here. You know, I've added some grain for taste, you know, and we've lost some detail here. But I mean this is out of my moving car by the way through the windshield. So you see some of that windshield down here in the left. But pretty fantastic, you know. And as my daughter got got older it's like that's the camera I want to grab because it's right there. I don't want to grab my phone because I want to show depth, I want to show quality, I want to show clarity. And as she got older when put headphones on her one day and was like, hey, it's super cool, let's take a photo. And it comes out pretty cool. Even things like bath time with kids. It's like do I want to go grab my whole kid or do I just want to grab my X100V? That's why it'll be hard for me to ever sell this camera. Maybe I'll give it to my daughter. But you know, definitely on like photo walks and places I've been, it's, it's kind of a no brainer if I want to travel light to bring this camera. You know, I would say again with the 2314, you're going to get much better resolution here on the X trans 5 sensor at least even the high resolution version that's in the x h2 and x t5 but dang, not bad at all. And will stand the test of time at 26 megapixels. I do believe that this, this camera and sensor will. And even some of these high key scenes where I'm on the beach in Huntington beach and it's super sunny outside and I've got a guy flying by. I'm just walking. You can see some of the environmental haze. I mean the image quality is awesome, right? And it's just a fun camera to have. I would go into the pier quite a bit and kind of do some dynamic range testing. This is again a super, super bright day with Some haze in the distance and environmental elements weren't too kind to me, but really happy with what this camera is able to put out, right? You see a little bird flying here, and it's always nice to have that with you because you're gonna get that kind of dynamic range, right? You're gonna get fun shots that, you know, I could have spent more time in lightroom and played around with this more and gotten more detail out of the highlights and shadows. But again, for a two to three minute edit on this photo, I was really happy with that. You know, I've even done event photography with it. You know, going to an event, walking around, capturing people. You know, certainly lighting is challenging with an F2 lens. I really think the F1.2 lenses are much better suited for indoor photography. But F2, you can definitely get away with it if people aren't moving too much. You know, even shooting from a 23 millimeter lens all the way up on a. On a stage here, you know, with some CIO executives talking, it's, you know, even at a lower shutter speed, you know, you get a little bit of blur in the crowd, but for folks that are talking far away, you know, it's. It's a pretty dang good image. And again, you get that depth of field. And just again, everyday shots walking around, shooting a palm tree like this, it's like I get blown away by the level of detail on this camera. It's just so good. I've done a lot of landscape with this camera too. I know it's not really well suited to that, but I mean, the level of detail is pretty fantastic. For being such a small camera, I've been so happy with it, you know, and I'll leave it on this photo here, which is nothing special, just a photo of my daughter. But taking these photos of your family and people that you know and people that you love and memories that you want to have. That's what photography is all about, right? Printing photos and having these photos and sharing the photos, it's fantastic. But again, having this conversation with my friend recently is, hey, do I need this camera with me at all times? I would hope you do, and I think you do. Yes. Take photos, get happy with it, learn photography. And X100V is an amazing camera to learn on, albeit it's very expensive. But again, you get an amazing portable kit. I don't think there's anything else like it in the market. So, yeah, that those are some of the photos. Leave you with some final thoughts. So, yeah, I hope these Images have kind of given you a good look at what this camera can do. And in the past several years of me owning it, I've been so happy with it. Mainly, obviously, you can see lifestyle portrait stuff that I've done with my family and friends. But I think where this camera's real strong suit is, is that you can carry it with you anywhere. And that's the biggest thing. And I think you'll see some people online talk about that, but I don't think it's talked about enough. So I want to leave you with this thought of if you had a camera like this that you can bring anywhere. I'm filming this on the XH2s and the Viltrox 13. Not really going to carry this everywhere, right? It's a big camera. It's a little bit heavier on the heavy side. And comparatively to other cameras that are just as capable, it's obviously a lot smaller and a lot lighter. But a camera like this, imagine, right, you take it with you where you want to go and really get to enjoy it. And I think that's the biggest selling point for this camera, is taking it with you. I was having a conversation with a friend today. Before I go, I'm gonna. I'll share this. And he was saying that his daughter's, you know, a year and a half going on two years old, and he's really frustrated with the fact that he hasn't taken enough photos of her in the last year and a half, almost two years. And I said, why not? He's like, oh, I just use my phone. And I'm not happy with a lot of the images. And he's a photographer, has a big kit. It's an old Canon DSLR that he uses a lot of, has invested a lot of time and money into. But I said, hey, imagine you had something like this. Imagine the pictures that you would have got. And who knows, maybe in 10, 20 years, our kids and our friends will have 8K displays, right? And so these phone images won't look that great, but 26 megapixel sensor on this is fantastic. It's an amazing camera. Definitely should buy. Even if the new one comes out next year, who knows? I think it's still worth it. So, X100V, that's my review.