David Pogue
What is a camera, anyway? In the last few years, the definition of a camera has been pulled and twisted like taffy. Some are huge, heavy machines with lenses like telescopes. Others are candy-coloured minis, as much fashion statements as recording devices. Some are specialised for use
underwater or taking hundreds of shots a second. Some are phones.
And the new Fujifilm X100 is?different. Quirky, amazing, baffling, out-there different. For starters, it?s been designed to look exactly like some Leica film camera from 30 years ago. The top portion and bottom plate have been ?die-cast from magnesium alloy? (it?s silver metal, in other words); the grippy part is black and textured. The control dials are physical metal wheels, so you can check the settings even before you turn on the camera.
The retro look gets plenty of stares in public. The joke is that you know you are carrying the very latest, cutting-edge, $1,200 semiprofessional camera, but passers-by think you?re the last Luddite film buff in America. That?s right, $1,200. Pro photographers have been drooling over the arrival of this thing for months; it?s no point-and-shoot, that?s for sure.
You?re expected to know something about photography if you use this camera; for example, there are no scene modes at all, like beach, twilight, portrait. Instead, there are dedicated shutter speed and exposure dials on top and a metal aperture control ring around the lens. If you know how to use aperture and shutter speed controls, no camera on earth gives you quicker and more direct access.
As a further reminder that this camera isn?t for the Wal-Mart masses, this camera also has?are you sitting down?? no zoom. That?s right; it has a fixed nonzooming lens. A nonzooming lens has a bunch of advantages. It?s flat, so it makes this camera small enough to slip easily into a coat pocket or purse.
It never has to extend or retract, so the camera is ready to shoot instantly after you flip its clicky on/off switch. And it ensures that photos are razor-sharp across the entire frame, with little of the distortion that can result at the corners when you use zoom lenses. But no zoom? Really? That seems awfully Cro-Magnon in an age when much cheaper pocket cams can zoom 18 times or 20 times.
Real photo devotees don?t see a fixed lens as a huge detriment. They see it as a limit that inspires compositional creativity, like the 140-character limit on Twitter. And on the X100, the lens is the equivalent of a 35-millimeter film lens, perfect for portraits and a nice balance for landscapes.
Other fixed-lens digital cameras, like the Sigma DP2, embrace the same design philosophy?eliminating zoom for compactness, speed and quality. But one X100 feature in particular sets it far apart. It not only has an eyepiece viewfinder, but a switchable one. It can be either a pure glass viewfinder, as on an SLR, or a tiny TV screen; you switch back and forth by flipping a lever by the lens.
When it?s in see-through mode, you get a bright, beautiful view around you, complete with superimposed electronic information about your settings. When it?s in electronic mode, you see a preview of the actual photo you?re about to take, complete with exposure, depth-of-field and white-balance effects. Each is useful in different situations.
It?s also an f/2.0 lens, meaning that it lets in a lot of light; this camera does exceptionally well in low light, even without its built-in flash. It can also create absolutely gorgeous blurred background effects. The photos have a clarity, a depth, that you?d expect from a still more expensive SLR.
On a spring-break trip to a theme park, this camera produced some of the most memorable photos of my children I?ve ever taken. It also ruined a lot more shots than any camera I?ve used. Part of the problem is just rough edges. For example, the camera forgets its mode every time you turn it off and on again. And every time you enter Playback mode, it starts you back at the first photo instead of remembering where you left off.
Then there?s the macro-mode quirk. The camera can focus up to four inches away, for amazing close-up shots. But when you?re looking through the optical viewfinder, you?re not looking through the lens. The viewfinder is offset from the lens by a couple of inches, so you wind up with parallax problems; that is, the framing you see in the eyepiece is not what the lens will capture. These problems increase the closer you are to your subject.
In some ways, the X100 follows the same path as Sony?s NX5 and Panasonic?s GF2: it?s an effort to pack SLR-style photographic prowess, and an SLR-size sensor, into a much smaller body.
For most people, the Sony is more compelling; it?s smaller, much less expensive ($700) and takes interchangeable lenses, including a nonzooming flat one like the X100?s. But the X100?s controls embrace the opposite approach of the Sony (on-screen, buried, clumsy). In any case, choice is good. And the expensive, radical, retro, eccentric X100 represents a welcome new tug at the definition of ?camera.?