Tag: Fuji X-T20

Customisation

I’ve always considered the facility to customise buttons on a camera to be slightly irrelevant and a bit of a gimmick.

Until I got serious about Fuji.

I have large hands and one of the slight concerns I had with my move towards the Fuji system was the small size of some of the cameras and in particular the camera controls. The buttons on my Fuji X-T20 for example are tiny compared to my Nikon DSLR and it’s taken me some time to teach my muscles how to reach some of the buttons without nudging any of the others. It was a small inconvenience however compared to the very big benefits, which I’ve written about before.

(C) Dave Whenham
Scenes like this call for manual control – which I often facilitate through the exposure compensation dial

So it has come as a bit of a surprise to me to realise that one of the attributes of the X-T20 I have come to appreciate the most is the ability to personalise several of the buttons. Who would have thought! The four way selector on the back for example came preprogrammed for moving the focus point but I found I was rarely using these because of the touchscreen with its touch-to-focus ability which I use 90% of the time. So I reprogrammed the 3 o’clock button for image format and 9 o’clock became picture style for when I’m shooting JPEGs. The 6 o’clock is used to enter focus selection mode and until recently 12 o’clock was not used.

(C) Dave Whenham
Another image that called for manually adjusting the exposure

There is a function (Fn) button on the top plate next to the on/off switch and the exposure compensation dial. I use exposure compensation a lot, keeping the camera in aperture priority and using exposure compensation to manually adjust exposure settings. This button came programmed for wireless communication and as I do enjoy being able to transfer images to my phone/tablet I left it alone.

All was well with this arrangement until recently when extended use of the camera has meant I no longer need take my eye away from the camera to change the exposure compensation setting. This meant my right hand was barely leaving the camera body as I turned the exposure compensation dial with either my thumb or the edge of my forefinger. In the past few weeks I have inadvertently triggered wireless communication countless times as my forefinger has depressed the button whilst turning the exposure compensation dial.

Amused I have not been.

So, this evening I changed the Fn button so it now does – absolutely nothing.  It’s a shame to lose the use of the function button but with the Q menu containing most of the things I change regularly and with the four way selector customised to my way of using the camera, everything I need is to be found in that small area on the back of the camera. I moved wireless communication to 12 o’clock by the way, I just hope I can quickly get used to its new position!

So, bravo Fuji for making this lovely little camera so customisable, it does make a huge difference to this users experience!

Buckstones Edge

Shot over three days and using a mixture of video from the Fuji X-T20 and Mavic Pro, stills and time-lapse sequences together with a slideshow finale prepared in Pictures to Exe this video records three days of very trying weather and light!

I have been a stills photographer for many years but as my reader will know I have only started to make the transition into videography in the last few months. For this video I have decided to move away from a scripted voiceover (my wife said I sounded too “posh) and try to record a more spontaneous narration whilst out taking pictures.  Audio recording is a big challenge for me however and this video mixes two sources of voice-over/narration. The first is the iPhone and the second a handheld audio recorder (Zoom H2n) with a Rode  microphone. To me there is no doubts as to the first choice audio capture moving forward.

The usual YouTube link below but at the foot of the post is the link for an alternative version on Vimeo which I actually prefer.

Music: “On hearing the first cuckoo of Spring” by Frederick Delius
Fuji X-T20 and Fuji X-T1
iPhone 7 & Zoom Hn2 audio recorder
Mavic Pro
GoPro Hero Session 4 and Hero 3+ (Silver)

 

Alternate version on Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/228978590

 

 

Buckstones Edge

The final video from my July shoots. I made a bit of a muddle of the aspect ratios for this but it’s all part of the learning process. It’s the first video where I’ve recorded the narration/voiceover in the car using my iPhone and with no script or any other prompts whatsoever. It has a more spontaneous feel I think – and lots of “ums”.