X-PRO1 – open letter to Fuji: bugs and suggestions. From Pedro Kok
Bom dia!
Pedro Kok (click here to see his home page) published a long open letter addressed to Fuji (click here to read) . After using the X-PRO1 he made a list of all the bugs he noticed and also suggests some features he misses on the X-PRO1. I’ve just picked out some issues here. There is much more to read in his letter.
Software
The Q-Menu
There is no live-view image while you change the settings in the Quick Menu, and so he feels like making “blind decisions over White Balance, Film Simulation, Dynamic Range, Image Aspect Ratio and other parameters.” He suggests to lay all the icons horizontally in the bottom and choose the settings with the thumbwheel and/or the directional arrows.
Focus
“There should be an option for a manual override when in Single AF mode. Half-press shutter activates AF; then keeping it half-pressed, turn the focus ring to the desired distance (as a bonus, the focus distance scale could automagically appear!)…. And bring focus peaking to live view and image playback.”
Indecent exposure simulation:
“The Fujifilm X-Pro1 could certainly gain exposure simulation in all PASM modes. In PAS, metering should be activated with a shutter half-press, and stay on even if it’s released. All information displayed in the screen, including Auto ISO’s choice, varying the parameters as light changes. In M mode, display exposure as is; if the exposure values selected under or overexposes the image, let the screen blackout or whiteout. I’ll know what to do…. Also, please honor exposure compensation when in M mode and Auto ISO, by throttling up or down sensitivity. [DPR]”
Thumbwheel:
There are cases of inconsistent behavior: A) “Fn set to ISO [DPR]: in OVF mode, pressing Fn and scrolling the thumbwheel will change ISO. In EVF/Live view the thumbwheel is inoperable, up and down arrow changes settings”. B) “Focus modes: in AF modes, the thumbwheel button is inoperable. In Manual Focus, press the button to have the focus area magnified (to an absurd amount of magnification!).” [… personal note: by using the command dial, with the new firmware v 2.0 you can switch from 3x to 10x magnifications.]
The thumbwheel should be engaged also in the following functions: Drive, AE, Fn menus, General menu. “One might think that it’s a case of making menu orientation consistent (menus are sorted vertically, while the thumbwheel travels horizontally). But even when there are horizontally sorted settings (such as those in the AE and Drive menus) the wheel doesn’t work.“
He also would like that “in all AF modes, thumbwheel button presses would cycle between 1x, 5x and 10x magnifications, with the directional arrow buttons moving the enlarged area around.” [… see personal note above.]
Buttons
A nice feature is, that you can customize the buttons. “Hold button” on Fn and you can customize it. There are many other buttons that could benefit from it. He suggests: “HOLD DRIVE: could be customized to trigger the self-timer menu, selection by arrows and/or thumbwheel. Or instantly go to Movie Mode. HOLD AE: could be customized to trigger White Balance menu, selection by arrows and/or thumbwheel. This could be very helpful, as the current Q menu won’t let you preview how WB looks on the live image. HOLD AF: could trigger special focus behavior (…HOLD AF button could set focus to hyperfocal! If the DOF scale becomes meaningful, then this can be achieved when using the camera in Aperture Priority and Manual modes. Set the aperture, press and hold AF button and … voilá! I’d be in hyperfocal heaven….)”
While in image capture, there’s one button that does absolutely nothing: the down arrow. A perfect candidate to be a Fn2 (I’d choose it for DOF Preview)!”
Override
“The camera should honor my decision to change aperture whilst keeping the shutter half-pressed [DPR-AW]. If in Manual / Auto ISO, compensate exposure accordingly.”
The OVF
The OVF is great, but there are some problems that could be solved with firmware updates. So for example he asks Fuji to “calibrate the OVF framelines to the current XF lenses. They’re wildly conservative and inaccurate.”
Hardware
He says that the X-PRO1 is a beautiful camera, build with good materials. But there are some things that Fuji could maybe correct in future versions of this camera:
– The battery slides in the camera in every position possible. “You might ask who is stupid enough to insert the battery this way … well, I am. And probably you’ll too, some dark night, succumb to this, and likely think the camera has died.”
– The hood’s rubber cap [RR]: “it won’t stay put… a light nudge… will knock it off.”
– There is no diopter adjustment [personal note: there is one on the EVF of the X-E1]
– Aperture ring [RR][LL-MR]: Early reviewers noted the very light aperture ring: “It’s far too easy to knock the aperture from “A” to f/16, and equally to any other setting.” Now other reviewers noted that “the Fujinon XF 18mm f/2.0 R had a very STIFF aperture ring”.
This were just some extracts of his letter. Read the whole letter here. My summary can’t do justice to the very clear step-by-step argumentation of Pedro Kok. And according to his to-do list, there is much work waiting on Fuji. And something has already been done with the last firmware update. As always, leave a comment, and tell me if you agree with the problems that Pedro noticed on his X-PRO1 and what do you think about his suggestions.
Make a list of the bugs you would like to have resolved and suggestions in order of importance! My list would begin with… 1) focus peaking…
tchau!