Tag: reviews

Review: The GF 45-100mm ƒ/4R WR LM OIS is the Best All-Purpose Zoom Lens for Most GFX Owners

You may be thinking, "what an odd focal range," and you'd be right. It covers approximately 36-80mm in 35mm terms, with a significant overlap with the 32-64mm lens in coverage. Judged purely by the range, it's obvious this lens is designed for handheld portraits, covering the popular portraiture focal lengths of 35, 50 and 80mm. Judged by what the Fujifilm lineup lacked at the time of its release, it's also a potential landscape and all-purpose lens as it fills the aforementioned hole in the range, especially at 70mm, a focal length landscapists use often via the wide end of a 70-200mm or the long end of the 24-70mm. Priced at $2299 USD, just like the 32-64mm and 80mm ƒ/1.7, it's like you're getting stabilization for free. Should you own both lenses? Am I missing out by not owning both the 32-64mm and 45-100mm? That depends. If you deal primarily in portraits, fashion or travel, this could be the ideal, single lens solution. However, if you're into landscapes, astro or urban photography, it may not be wide enough for many occasions. I own all 3 zoom lenses and for the first 2 weeks of using the 45-100mm, I found myself carrying it with the smaller, lighter 23mm ƒ/4 prime lens rather than in tandem with the 32-64mm. For one, it cuts my filter pack to half as the two lenses share the 82mm filter thread, compared to the 32-64's 77mm diameter. Another convenience is being able to share the 23mm's lens hood; while the hood may be shorter, it still offers enough protection from both flaring and impacts to be useful on the 45-100mm, plus it helps to slim down my bag a bit. In the end, what I discovered was that I didn't miss the 32-64mm one bit by carrying this tandem.

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Near Misses…

If you know anything about landscape photography, 99% of your planned shots usually end up as a near miss. Funny, that term "near miss," since it literally means "hit."if you "nearly missed," it means you hit it. Anyways, back on topic. I recently bought the 45-100mm lens for GFX and I usually take new lenses to Rizal Bridge to test them, as long as the focal length permits. Conditions turned out to be nearly what I've been waiting patiently for. The one shot I want from there is with the clouds traveling either northwest or southeast, preferably at a pretty good clip, since movement of the bridge due to buses and trucks traveling over it limits the length of long exposures.

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Comparison: RRS L-Bracket vs 3 Legged Thing Ellie for Fujifilm GFX 50S

A quick comparison between two products designed mostly to perform the same function. In case you're not familiar with an L-bracket, it's function is purely to allow rotation of your camera by 90 degrees while keeping it balanced on the X axis of your tripod. This is especially important for panoramas so the camera yaws directly over the center point rather than circumnavigating it, which alters the perspective enough to make stitching the result more difficult or even impossible.

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I Want to Be An Advocate, Not An Influencer

While I often strayed away from repeatable testing to include a healthy amount of subjectivity, I'm now embracing my biases and forgoing all pretense of being "unbiased," and here's why: I have my skin, aka wallet, in the game. Unlike others who are receiving review units, renting, being gifted items to review or receiving some form of compensation, I'm reviewing stuff that I've actually bought. These are things I've intensely researched, bought, used, and intend to keep. Sometimes I buy purely out of objective needs, like my ND filters. Other times, I'm driven by subjective factors, like my choice to use Fujifilm bodies and lenses. Either way, my purchases are made based on a conclusion I've formed from equal parts objectivity and bias. I am biased. My reviews are biased. I'm not justifying my purchases to anyone but I simply cannot claim to be unbiased when reviewing my own gear. The goal of my reviews are to identify potential pitfalls to avoid the expense of experimentation. It's not my goal to tell you what to buy; my desire is to expose aspects of an item only an owner would notice. There can be things that you're blind to upon purchase, features and issues that can make or break it for you, and this jeopardy goes up exponentially as the price increases, especially if bought used. This is my choice to be an advocate and to avoid being an "influencer."

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Amazon Strikes Again…

So, just like what happened with the deal on the Gitzo Mountaineer GT1542 + GH1382QD kit, I got a price alert on a Gitzo Traveler GT1555 + GH1382TQD kit for 45% off the advertised price of $989. So I bought it, because I have no self control.

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Wine Country Camera Filters: Screw-On versus 100mm

Very simply: Does Wine Country Camera actually use the same glass and coatings between their filters? I wanted my filters to produce the same results between my filter sets to reduce post-processing time. Recently, I replaced my B+W and Haida ND filters with WCC because the results between the two would cause difficulties in post as I'd work to match the output if I used both during the same shoot.

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Updated Flatlay

I've been acquiring more and more stuff to support my photography over the past summer and, since my last flatlay photo was taken back in May, I thought I'd update the image with all of the new gear I've acquired. This is limited to just my Fujifilm bodies and glass. There's far more laying around in support of this, from bags to filters to tripods and everything else in between. At least I've hit a plateau, now owning all but 1 or 2 lenses on my list, transitioning to the acquisition of the filters and platforms I need to support my work.

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Gear Review: Finally, It Took LowePro to Show Peak Design How It’s Done

About a month ago, LowePro began to ship their newly design Freeline 350 Backpack. The one thing about the Peak Design pack was the fully configurable interior using a unique shelf design instead of a series of hook and loop pads. LowePro borrowed this interior design, improving it by making the whole system removable, not only to give the backpack more versatility but to make configuring it far easier. This was the first thing I noticed.

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About My Reviews…

When I review a product, I want to make it plain that I do not receive products to review nor am I paid to do these reviews. When I review a product, it's something I've bought with my own money after days or weeks of research to ensure it will meet my needs. Because of that, my reviews will usually end positively, and that's the only reason why. I don't review things I have never owned, been gifted or am paid to write about. I don't seek out manufacturers or sellers and attempt to persuade them into gifting me a product in exchange for a review and "exposure." I am not a "mommyblogger" or an unemployed housewife with a camera. I will never shake down a product manufacturer nor refer to myself as a "social influencer." I review products because I like doing it, I enjoy trying new products and prefer to use brands that are less popular. It's these choices that I hope give my reviews a little more value due to scarcity. These are my opinions and my opinions only...

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