Nikon DF or Fuji X-Pro2?

[Jollyclub]

Obviously two very different cameras.

One FF one Crop. One DSLR one mirrorless.

Anybody owned either and have any real life criticisms or feedback?

About me. Grew up with a Nikon FM, have been using M rangefinders since the late 90's. Prime lenses only. Mainly Street & Travel. 24mm 35mm & 50mm most used.

Sold all my old M kit recently for close to what I paid for it and not prepared to pay the prices Leica are asking these days.

How good are the Fuji X Series lenses at manual focussing?

At the moment I'm erring towards a DF and getting some old Nikkor MF primes for next to nothing.

Anybody here used either or both ?

[ian in lancs]

Df sensor wins hands down! A D4 sensor for such little money?! The negative apparently is the (lack of) focus point spread.

Besides I'm getting fed up with Fuji bombarding about how we should all switch to their mirrorlesss systems. Bit like brexit! Rolling out 'celeb' after celeb to persuade. Amateur photographer has two substantial articles - one an advertorial and the other supposedly journalistically independent / in-hourse splurging out the same old. Fuji is fast becoming the loon on the bus ranting.

Loosing a mirror looses a little weight for sure but you gain a god awful electronic viewfinder and batteries that don't last five minutes. Anyway its the sensor size and lenses that dictate the majority of the weight and as yet fuji are nowhere near the Can-Nik L / nano lenses.

[K12beano]

I've been Df-ing for about 18 months now.

There are times when it comes out to play in preference to my D800. Often it's in play with 50mm, 45mm, 85mm or 105mm.

It's a bit quirky in some respects, some things fall easily to hand - others are even deeper in menus than the ("regular") D800 menu system.

Overall the (relatively snap) decision to acquire it (secondhand; Grays; "reasonable" haggle-down) was up against D3, D3s, D3x as a second body. The allure of the D4 sensor was just too much, although it's really limited on the AF abilities compared with the full D4 experience, the low light and overall quality of the RAW files is brilliant. It "feels" a good tool and overall it's quite a pleasure - but it really seems to me a "Marmite" choice. You may just hate it. And there's unlikely to be anyone who hovers in some sort of balanced manner between love and hate.

Worst case scenario? I think you may get a good price if you sell it on after a short spell ......

[Jollyclub]

Thanks chaps for kind of confirming my thinking..

Is using non-AI/ AI-S lenses a pain?

Do you have to program the lens data in manually each time you change lens? And is this buried deep within the menu system or fairly quick and easy? Or can you set up a profile for each lens , eg Lens 1, Lens 2 and just click on the profile.. etc?

Guess i'll go and have a look at one and have a play around with it.

I wont be buying one until after Photokina anyway.. Just incase they bring out a DF2 or a digital SP.

Thanks again for the feedback

[K12beano]

I don't use manual lenses (except for one Ai-P) so haven't experienced programming in lens details.

I would recommend a magnifying eyepiece and hood combination for ALL Nikon dSLRs though, whether you manually focus through viewfinder or not. But the Df does also have the Live View option, which for static work is just brilliant in getting critical focus. Although I'm quite comfortable with a couple of f/1.4 lenses on AF (although typically I'd go to f/2 as a max unless the risk is worth taking) once fine tuning is carried out....

[Gad-Westy]

Jollyclub said:

Thanks chaps for kind of confirming my thinking..

Is using non-AI/ AI-S lenses a pain?

Do you have to program the lens data in manually each time you change lens? And is this buried deep within the menu system or fairly quick and easy? Or can you set up a profile for each lens , eg Lens 1, Lens 2 and just click on the profile.. etc?

Guess i'll go and have a look at one and have a play around with it.

I wont be buying one until after Photokina anyway.. Just incase they bring out a DF2 or a digital SP.

Thanks again for the feedback

You'd put the lens data in manually more or less as you describe. Basically you tell the camera what the focal length is and maximum aperture and save that as lens 1, 2, 3 etc. When you change the lens, you'll need to tell the camera which lens is fitted each time or the aperture will read incorrectly (if that matters, doesn't affect metering) and the exif data will be wrong. Not much you can do about that but probably not a massive concern unless you change lenses a lot. One other thing to bear in mind is that you won't have the same focusing aids as a rangefinder. You do get a handy focus confirmation dot though. That is one area where electronic view finders win hands down (including Fuji). You get magnification and focus peaking on the fly. Very handy. Out of interest, have you considered a Sony A7? I love Nikon DSLR's, fully signed up member but if you're going down the manual lens only route, the A7 in all its variants seems tailor made. Excellent full frame sensors with the manual focus benefits of an electronic view finder.

[TheGuru]

Would have thought the Fuji XT1 would be a better comparison. For manual focussing the Fuji is better than the Nikon IMO, the split image system is excellent.

Lens wise Fuji are very well regarded, better than Canon/Nikon in many cases and that includes the L series. In fact they are regarded as better than the Zeiss glass. Some are quite pricey new though. But lots of 2nd hand options.

Ultimately its about image quality rather than tech specs and I've been very impressed with what I've seen from Fuji phitographers.

[ian in lancs]

TheGuru said:

Lens wise Fuji are very well regarded, better than Canon/Nikon in many cases and that includes the L series. In fact they are regarded as better than the Zeiss glass. Some are quite pricey new though. But lots of 2nd hand options

Really! Thanks for brightening up my morning!

[K12beano]

ian in lancs said:

TheGuru said:

Lens wise Fuji are very well regarded, better than Canon/Nikon in many cases and that includes the L series. In fact they are regarded as better than the Zeiss glass. Some are quite pricey new though. But lots of 2nd hand options

Really! Thanks for brightening up my morning!

I resisted posting about that (especially as TheGuru's other two points seemed so relevant).

As I currently have seven Nikkors (and two TCs) I wonder which four or more would be better if I switched to Fuji?

On a side note, I remember the Fujis of the 1970s. I'm sure I coveted them because they had fancy LED indicators in the viewfinders.....

[ukaskew]

No real duds in the Fujinon lens lineup so it's just a case of picking your preferred focal lengths. The original 3 are slow focussing (18mm f2, 35mm 1.4 and 60mm 2.4) but pretty much everything since then is top drawer. Even the cheap zooms are very good optically.

The 16mm 1.4, 23mm 1.4 and 56mm 1.2 are all stunning, and in my opinion the newer 35mm f2 is much better than the old 1.4

[ian in lancs]

K12beano said:

ian in lancs said:

TheGuru said:

Lens wise Fuji are very well regarded, better than Canon/Nikon in many cases and that includes the L series. In fact they are regarded as better than the Zeiss glass. Some are quite pricey new though. But lots of 2nd hand options

Really! Thanks for brightening up my morning!

I resisted posting about that (especially as TheGuru's other two points seemed so relevant).

As I currently have seven Nikkors (and two TCs) I wonder which four or more would be better if I switched to Fuji?

On a side note, I remember the Fujis of the 1970s. I'm sure I coveted them because they had fancy LED indicators in the viewfinders.....

Quite! And I resisting referring to my earlier reply in response to "Ultimately its about image quality rather than tech specs and I've been very impressed with what I've seen from Fuji photographers." I suspect the 'Fuji' photographers would have got the same shot with many other cameras assuming the same post processing. Fuji is no magic box that makes outstanding or crap pics - same as every other decent camera. I know - I have an X100s. All this fake praise is just that - marketing. The tog creates the image and I have to work hard whatever make the lightproof box!

Edited by ian in lancs on Sunday 18th September 09:19

[ac13]

Hi,

As this is my first posting, I'm not sure on the rules on adverts etc, However, Calumet the photography supplier will loan out an X-Pro2 and a lens for a weekend to anyone providing you can put a refundable £1000 deposit onto a credit card. If you Google Calumet and X-Pro2 test drive, it should come up.

I took this test drive and I have to admit I liked the handling of the X-Pro2 very much, however it is a very unique feel, in some ways very old school, I loved the optical viewfinder, but it might not be for everyone.

Incidently, DPreview quotes the Nikon DF as having a body only weight of 760g whilst the xpro2 has a weight of 495g

[Jollyclub]

Thanks for all the feedback chaps.

Looks like no SP Digital or DF2 from Nikon at Photokina.

hmmm decisions decisions...

[K12beano]

Jollyclub said:

hmmm decisions decisions...

Nah - you don't want a "Df2" or anything.... just take it form me, get to try out (beg, borrow, steal, hire, whatever) and let your heart take over in terms of what works for you.


It's too easy for us all to pontificate on a thread like this what is "good". What is good is whatever works for you!!! I LOVE my D800, my Df and my lenses, but that's allowed too!