New Fuji X100VI announced

[DDoug]

6 hours ago, Harry Harrison said:

I hope I'm not wrong but I'm pretty sure that you preferred your Bayer sensor Fuji for slide copying, that was the first time I really began to wonder about it and I think I bought X-Transormer shortly after that. Do you happen to know what relationship the in-camera jpeg processing has with SilkyPix, if any?

I definitely do prefer the Bayer sensor in my X-A5 for the purpose of scanning film. If they put that in an X-T2, as you suggested, that would be an attractive option. As for the color options, yes, I do believe that Ichikawa collaborated with Fujifilm in developing the color software. If you use the in-camera raw processing, it's basically Silkypix.

 

The main draws to Fuji for me were the "retro" operating system and the lenses. Back in the days when I was a commercial shooter, my standards for wide angle lenses were set by Zeiss Biogon and Schneider Super Angulon. Fuji's 14mm f/2.8 is right up there with them in terms of sharpness, distortion, chromatic aberration, etc., all packed in a tight metal barrel. I'm no fan of the focus clutch, but like everything else about it. With few exceptions, the lenses are a good reason to shoot with Fuji cameras. Of course I'm aware that CA and such can be corrected digitally, but am old fashioned enough to regard computational photography as a last resort.

Edited February 26 by DDoug

[Harry Harrison]

4 hours ago, DDoug said:

The main draws to Fuji for me were the "retro" operating system and the lenses.

Yes, same here, and I imagine that you'll agree that it's not about nostalgia, it's more about being able to glance down and see immediately what aperture the lens is set to and what the shutter speed is, and then chenge either just by feel if necessary, instead of peering into a small LCD screen and spinning dials. Good to know about the 14mm, I need a nice wide angle. My favourite 'legacy' lens is always the old 35mm Summilux on my Leica M2 which is tiny so it's a shame the Fuji 23mm is so large, fortunately the X100 does the job brilliantly for that focal length.

 

Thanks for the confirmation about Fuji and Silkypix, I had thought that was true, I sometimes choose RAW + jpeg just so that I can compare the Fuji/Silkypix version with Adobe's Fuji conversion in Lightroom. I'll give Silkypix Developer 11 a try, it seems very inexpensive currently in its Fuji version.

[DDoug]

2 hours ago, Harry Harrison said:

I'll give Silkypix Developer 11 a try, it seems very inexpensive currently in its Fuji version.

Yes, it's quite a bargain. I was looking at spending a couple hundred bucks for DxO PL7, but decided that Silkypix's fine detail noise reduction was sufficient for my needs and it works with what's actually in the photo rather than filling in detail based on what AI thinks should be there.

 

P.S., This was one of the main influences in my decision to buy the 14mm and other lenses: https://photozone.de/fuji_x/807-fuji14f28

The cheesy plastic lens hood that Fuji supplies was replaced with a nice metal one from Haoge.

Edited February 26 by DDoug
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[Harry Harrison]

1 hour ago, DDoug said:

The cheesy plastic lens hood that Fuji supplies was replaced with a nice metal one from Haoge.

......there are some advantages to flimsiness though,  I have reasons to be grateful for that very lens hood because it is the same as the one on my 18-55. My X-T2 fell 5ft onto a York stone pavement and the lens hood shattered into 3 pieces, no damage to the lens at all! There was a very hard to find scuff on my X-T2 L-grip. I got off very lightly.

[DDoug]

26 minutes ago, Harry Harrison said:

......there are some advantages to flimsiness though,  I have reasons to be grateful for that very lens hood because it is the same as the one on my 18-55. My X-T2 fell 5ft onto a York stone pavement and the lens hood shattered into 3 pieces, no damage to the lens at all! There was a very hard to find scuff on my X-T2 L-grip. I got off very lightly.

Very good point. I had a similar experience with the plastic hood on a Sigma macro lens long ago. The problem I have with the Fuji hoods is that the bayonet mount wears out causing the hood to slip out of position and cut corners off pictures. I thought about it and decided to go with rigid ones, Haoge or Heliopan, depending on the lens. The Heliopan screw-in aluminum hoods match perfectly with Marumi achromatic close-up lenses.

[Harry Harrison]

9 minutes ago, DDoug said:

The problem I have with the Fuji hoods is that the bayonet mount wears out

I really like the square hood on my 35mm f1.4 but several times now it's managed to come partly off the bayonet in my bag and gets jammed in place. It can be very difficult to remove and certainly has to be dismantled. So now I use a round metal hood, shame really. If you've ever come across Canon FD hoods they were the best in my opinion, round admittedly but a really good bayonet and reversible on to the lens itself when in the bag.

[Betty LaRue]

Sticking a toe into the water, here.

When I went Fuji for the first time, it was with the XT-1 shortly after it came out. (XT-4 now)

What I immediately noticed

1 Color rendering was amazing.

2 So much sharper images than the Nikons I came from, the latest being D800 & D7000.

3 The dials, the wonderful wonderful dials at my fingertips.

4 Smaller, lighter, easier for me to carry & handle.

5 The lenses are so good. Even the lowly 18-135, which I found was great for travel, & most of my storefronts on Alamy are shot with it. The 50-140 is astounding, (separation).  The 35mm stays on my camera a lot. I have a lot of the lenses, primes & zooms. I can’t see myself ever changing systems.

I've never used or held any of the X100 series.

[Julie Edwards]

3 hours ago, DDoug said:

The problem I have with the Fuji hoods is that the bayonet mount wears out causing the hood to slip out of position and cut corners off pictures. I thought about it and decided to go with rigid ones, Haoge or Heliopan, depending on the lens. 

I use these guy’s hoods: https://afshoot.com

 

got them on all of my fixed lenses from the 14 through to the 90…

[Rubens Alarcon]

7 hours ago, Harry Harrison said:

I'll give Silkypix Developer 11 a try, it seems very inexpensive currently in its Fuji version.

I've never used Silkypix, but isn't this the same software, but free?

https://fujifilm-x.com/global/products/software/raw-file-converter-ex-powered-by-silkypix/

Edited February 26 by Rubens Alarcon

[M.Chapman]

4 hours ago, Rubens Alarcon said:

I've never used Silkypix, but isn't this the same software, but free?

https://fujifilm-x.com/global/products/software/raw-file-converter-ex-powered-by-silkypix/

And a free Panasonic "Silkypix SE" version appears to here too http://www.isl.co.jp/SILKYPIX/english/p/. Must give it a whirl.

 

Mark

Edited February 26 by M.Chapman

[Harry Harrison]

1 hour ago, Rubens Alarcon said:

I've never used Silkypix, but isn't this the same software, but free?

Thanks, this might be a different version, maybe with fewer features but I'll have a look, it's certainly good value! I'm curious to see the results but I can't really move away from Lightroom and the Iridient X-Transformer plugin, however with respect to 'worms' then presumably this ought to be as good as it gets so it would be useful as a comparison with the odd image. I'm assuming that there is more control than with the in-camera jpegs but I don't know that either yet.

 

They boost their 'clarity' feature but this is not available for X-Trans files in fact.

Edited February 26 by Harry Harrison

[M.Chapman]

I just tried the free Silkypix Developer Studio SE for Panasonic from here and note that it's only Version 8, whereas the latest Version (Paid for) mentioned by Harry here appears to be Version 11 Pro. So it's hard to draw any direct conclusions, nevertheless Version 8 on my 2017 iMac is really slow compared to current LR or ACR CC. Adjustments are far from real time. Move the exposure slider, nothing happens, then 1-2 seconds later the screen updates, sharpening is even slower. Unusable for me. Maybe Version 11 Pro is much better. I uninstalled.

 

Mark 

Edited February 26 by M.Chapman

[Number Six]

I tried Silkypix in my early Fuji X days but found the software 'user violent' - not sure why but it just didn't gel with me. Ended up using Capture One Express until it was withdrawn and now using Adobe Camera Raw with PS Elements for my X-T3's RAW images. Works fine but, that said, I don't do a huge amount of post processing.

[DDoug]

56 minutes ago, Number Six said:

I tried Silkypix in my early Fuji X days but found the software 'user violent' - not sure why but it just didn't gel with me. Ended up using Capture One Express until it was withdrawn and now using Adobe Camera Raw with PS Elements for my X-T3's RAW images. Works fine but, that said, I don't do a huge amount of post processing.

I started dabbling with Photoshop with version 1 and have been a regular daily user since version 2.5. Still, despite that familiarity, there are things I find difficult and fiddly with it. For instance, trying to work with focus stacking of bracketed macro photographs I was really struggling with the process. So I tried it in Silkypix and the process was very simple to learn, the alignment of images worked perfectly even though they were hand-held, and it came out right on the first try. It’s obvious that others’ mileage varies, of course.
P.S., not bad for a one-time purchase of $33 (current offer for the outdated Developer Studio Pro 10).

Edited March 3 by DDoug
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[Mark Scheuern]

On 26/02/2024 at 03:23, Harry Harrison said:

Yes, same here, and I imagine that you'll agree that it's not about nostalgia, it's more about being able to glance down and see immediately what aperture the lens is set to and what the shutter speed is, and then chenge either just by feel if necessary, instead of peering into a small LCD screen and spinning dials. Good to know about the 14mm, I need a nice wide angle. My favourite 'legacy' lens is always the old 35mm Summilux on my Leica M2 which is tiny so it's a shame the Fuji 23mm is so large, fortunately the X100 does the job brilliantly for that focal length.

 

 

I have the Voigtlander Nokton 23 mm f/1.2 for my X-T5, and it's nicely small. Manual focus, of course, but a lot of the time I like that. I also have the TTArtisan 25 mm f/2, which is really small and was less expensive than the lens cap for my Leica Q2m. 

Edited March 3 by Mark Scheuern

[wiskerke]

1 hour ago, DDoug said:

I started dabbling with Photoshop with version 1 and have been a regular daily user since version 2.5. Still, despite that familiarity, there are things I find difficult and fiddly with it. For instance, trying to work with focus stacking of bracketed macro photographs I was really struggling with the process. So I tried it in Silkypix and the process was very simple to learn, the alignment of images worked perfectly even though they were hand-held, and it came out right on the first try. It’s obvious that others’ mileage varies, of course.
P.S., not bad for a one-time purchase of $33 (current offer for the outdated Developer Studio Pro 10).

Drifting off topic some more.

Aligning in Photoshop is indeed bad. However if all slightly blurred images are removed, results improve.

Does Silkypix have some procedure for removing or not taking into account blurred images? Or is it just unnecessary?

 

(Another interesting feature that caught my eye is the impressive conversion of scans of color negative film.)

 

wim

 

[DDoug]

43 minutes ago, wiskerke said:

Drifting off topic some more.

Aligning in Photoshop is indeed bad. However if all slightly blurred images are removed, results improve.

Does Silkypix have some procedure for removing or not taking into account blurred images? Or is it just unnecessary?

 

(Another interesting feature that caught my eye is the impressive conversion of scans of color negative film.)

 

wim

 

Back when I had a film scanner there was the option of specifying the particular negative film stock which was being scanned. Now I digitize film using a digital camera, macro lens, and a nominally 5000K light source. Results with Silkypix negative conversion have been mixed. It might depend on the film stock. If I’d had the foresight, I would have done what I did in the old days, which is shoot a Kodak Neutral Gray Card as a test shot. Whether that would help or not, I can’t be sure.

 

Ichikawa’s team says they have a patent on their image aligning method/algorithm/whatever. It works, as far as I can tell.

 

I'm using focus bracketing on a Fujifilm X-T2, so there wouldn't be blurred images that need to be removed. In one of their YouTube videos, they recommend shooting with at least f/5.6 to avoid the problem. I shot a rose bush hand held with hands that are pushing 80 and none too steady. It wasn't a problem.

Edited March 3 by DDoug
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[MDM]

2 hours ago, DDoug said:

I'm using focus bracketing on a Fujifilm X-T2, so there wouldn't be blurred images that need to be removed. In one of their YouTube videos, they recommend shooting with at least f/5.6 to avoid the problem. I shot a rose bush hand held with hands that are pushing 80 and none too steady. It wasn't a problem.

 

Last time I tried stacking in Photoshop it is indeed wanting in that department. For anyone serious about focus stacking, a dedicated program is highly advisablle. Helicon Focus is excellent, works on raw images (not sure what about Fuji which seem to be in a world of their own), has a Lightroom plugin which exports directly to Helicon Focus, exports a DNG file back which can be further processed in Lightroom (or whatever raw converter you like) and is also on a perpetual licence which is a good thing. I've never tried the other dedicated stacking apps but most reviews I've read rate Helicon Focus as the  best. 

 

As for trying to focus bracketing handheld, especially a subject like a rose bush or closer, I am amazed that you are successful. I would have thought a tripod is essential. I tend to shoot 20-40 images for a close-up or mid-distance shot and I wouldn't dream of doing it without a tripod. But I am shooting at ISO 64, f8 and shutter speeds of around 1/5s to 1/15s You must have very steady hands. Good luck and may your hands continue to remain steady. 

 

 

Edited March 3 by MDM

[DDoug]

1 hour ago, MDM said:

Last time I tried stacking in Photoshop it is indeed wanting in that department. For anyone serious about focus stacking, a dedicated program is highly advisablle. Helicon Focus is excellent, works on raw images (not sure what about Fuji which seem to be in a world of their own), has a Lightroom plugin which exports directly to Helicon Focus, exports a DNG file back which can be further processed in Lightroom (or whatever raw converter you like) and is also on a perpetual licence which is a good thing. I've never tried the other dedicated stacking apps but most reviews I've read rate Helicon Focus as the  best. 

 

As for trying to focus bracketing handheld, especially a subject like a rose bush or closer, I am amazed that you are successful. I would have thought a tripod is essential. I tend to shoot 20-40 images for a close-up or mid-distance shot and I wouldn't dream of doing it without a tripod. But I am shooting at ISO 64, f8 and shutter speeds of around 1/5s to 1/15s You must have very steady hands. Good luck and may your hands continue to remain steady. 

https://silkypix.isl.co.jp/en/how-to/function/compositing-function/

 

“Since this function automatically aligns images according to our image coincidence detection technology (patent No. 4689758), it is possible to combine them without any shift even with hand-held shooting.”

 

Works for me. I was using an XF 70-300mm with OIS.

[MDM]

12 minutes ago, DDoug said:

https://silkypix.isl.co.jp/en/how-to/function/compositing-function/

 

“Since this function automatically aligns images according to our image coincidence detection technology (patent No. 4689758), it is possible to combine them without any shift even with hand-held shooting.”

 

Works for me. I was using an XF 70-300mm with OIS.

 

Whatever does the job I guess. I know you have been a SILKYPIX advocate over the years. I don't think I've come across anyone else who uses it in fact but nothing wrong with being different. What really intrigues me is how you do focus bracketing handheld, moreover with a telephoto zoom.and get sharp images. Goodonya. I'll stick with a tripod for that.  

[DDoug]

1 hour ago, MDM said:

 

Whatever does the job I guess. I know you have been a SILKYPIX advocate over the years. I don't think I've come across anyone else who uses it in fact but nothing wrong with being different. What really intrigues me is how you do focus bracketing handheld, moreover with a telephoto zoom.and get sharp images. Goodonya. I'll stick with a tripod for that.  

As a matter of fact, I’m a risk-averse person and was not shooting for upload here or other publication. I’ve only had a couple of images rejected by QC and would like to keep it that way. Having read their claim, however, I decided to test it and was surprised to see how well the software did.

 

[MDM]

2 hours ago, DDoug said:

As a matter of fact, I’m a risk-averse person and was not shooting for upload here or other publication. I’ve only had a couple of images rejected by QC and would like to keep it that way. Having read their claim, however, I decided to test it and was surprised to see how well the software did.

 

OK this could drag on a bit. Me I don’t see how you can test a feature that requires a completely or nearly completely still camera over the time that would be needed to capture a subject like a bush using focus bracketing (several seconds minimum I would guess) using a handheld camera, using a wide aperture and a tele lens.  The camera has to refocus for each shot so you can’t just fire a burst. If it is not perfectly sharp, you won’t know if the app or the camera is messing up. If it is perfectly sharp then it’s a miracle or maybe it’s some form of advanced AI that can perfectly interpolate areas that are out of focus and bring them into focus but that seems far-fetched even for 2024. In other words, to properly test the app, you need to use a tripod. Then you can rule out the camera if there are areas out of focus or artefacts etc. Of course if it works perfectly handheld then why not show if off - preferably at full size?

 

Edited March 4 by MDM

[wiskerke]

4 hours ago, MDM said:

 

Last time I tried stacking in Photoshop it is indeed wanting in that department. For anyone serious about focus stacking, a dedicated program is highly advisablle. Helicon Focus is excellent, works on raw images (not sure what about Fuji which seem to be in a world of their own), has a Lightroom plugin which exports directly to Helicon Focus, exports a DNG file back which can be further processed in Lightroom (or whatever raw converter you like) and is also on a perpetual licence which is a good thing. I've never tried the other dedicated stacking apps but most reviews I've read rate Helicon Focus as the  best. 

 

As for trying to focus bracketing handheld, especially a subject like a rose bush or closer, I am amazed that you are successful. I would have thought a tripod is essential. I tend to shoot 20-40 images for a close-up or mid-distance shot and I wouldn't dream of doing it without a tripod. But I am shooting at ISO 64, f8 and shutter speeds of around 1/5s to 1/15s You must have very steady hands. Good luck and may your hands continue to remain steady.

And may you stay forever young!

 

Thank you for reminding me of Helicon. It's ages ago since I've used it. And Zerene and PTGui among others. Somewhere in between all those was one that allowed aligning layers by hand with *pins* you stuck through the most important points. I have never found it again.

Helicon does not support lens corrections in RAW afaik. Which for my use case is an absolute must have. Now you could go around that by saving DNGs first and feeding those to Helicon of course.

Anyway, it's early days and I am still waiting for a thinner adapter to arrive to connect my new Makro Symmar to a body. The one I have is about 0.3mm to thick. Yes I know how to shave that off. However it belongs to some other setup so I needed wanted a second one anyway.

My primary and real use case involves RX100 images btw and those are worthless without the baked-in lens profile, which may very well be specific for the individual lens.

No lens profile for the Symmar, and I expect it to be one of the few that can do without.

The Symmar will occasionally be used for focus stacking and maybe copying some old color negative film. The RX100 images are huge stacks (100+) of high ISO hand held shots that need to become high resolution and noise free single images. And some may even some day end up on Alamy.

 

wim

[DDoug]

Although I’m not new to digital imaging, I am very much so to focus stacking. So any comments I can make are newbie comments.

 

As to the time for making a sequence of photos automatically with focus bracketing, I’m using the electronic shutter and nine brackets take about a second. There’s no flipping mirror to slow things down. The initial focus is on the nearest point and the camera focuses on progressively farther points. The complaint I’ve heard about Fujifilm cameras in this regard is that the intervals are too close. I’ll probably have to use a tripod and manual focusing to get a more appropriate spread. Otherwise, the way it works automatically is probably good for getting both ends of a bug. It seems to me that there is some loss in overall sharpness, but on the plus side, high-ISO noise is smoothed out.

 

P.S., The images were what one would expect from hand-held shots, but the software aligned them perfectly.

Edited March 4 by DDoug

[MDM]

51 minutes ago, DDoug said:

Although I’m not new to digital imaging, I am very much so to focus stacking. So any comments I can make are newbie comments.

 

As to the time for making a sequence of photos automatically with focus bracketing, I’m using the electronic shutter and nine brackets take about a second. There’s no flipping mirror to slow things down. The initial focus is on the nearest point and the camera focuses on progressively farther points. The complaint I’ve heard about Fujifilm cameras in this regard is that the intervals are too close. I’ll probably have to use a tripod and manual focusing to get a more appropriate spread. Otherwise, the way it works automatically is probably good for getting both ends of a bug. It seems to me that there is some loss in overall sharpness, but on the plus side, high-ISO noise is smoothed out.

 

P.S., The images were what one would expect from hand-held shots, but the software aligned them perfectly.

 

Fair enough. If it works for you then that's fine. I would suggest experimenting with the camera on a tripod, stabilisation off, different apertures, as well as the interval and number of shots but I don't know how that works on your camera. If you use manual focusing, you lose the benefit of the fixed step sizes  in AF (presuming that is how it works). If wim can get 100+ stacks on the little Sony RX100 handheld, then it must be possible but he has not said what subject matter he is shooting - small or large scale.

 

I am not an expert in focus bracketing (in the Nikon world it is called Focus Shift) but I've experimented enough to have a reasonable idea of how it works. I have never considered doing it handheld at all and would not do so for subjects where the longitudinal movement (towards and back from the subject) of the camera could be similar to or greater than the size of the step interval. I might consider it for larger scale features such as landscapes but I've never tried that yet. It is really a matter of trial and error.