X100 Pro

GSharp87 wrote:

Zinch wrote:

GSharp87 wrote:

It would be awesome if Fuji would start developing a Pro version of the X100 series with the following features

- 18mm f1.4 lens

- New high MP sensor rumoured for the X-H2

- X-Pro body ergonomics and build quality

- NP-W235 battery

- IBIS

- Priced around $2.5k

Would anybody else be interested in such camera? I’d take that over something like a Leica Q2 every time. It’d be the ultimate street/documentary camera.

You are defining an X-Pro (with IBIS, maybe the Pro4) with the 18mm f2 attached.

A 18mm f1.4 would still be too big for a compact camera. You can always attach the XF 18mm f1.4 to an X-Pro

A fixed 18mm f1.4 would protrude less from the body as some of it will be hidden within the body as with the X100. With a redesign they would probably make it half the length of the current XF 18mm f1.4.

This would make it Leica Q competitor and I’m pretty sure it would sell well enough for it to be worthwhile.

Whether it would sell well enough to be worth the investment for Fuji (R&D, marketing, etc.) would require some fairly detailed market analysis, but if we're just speculating here, I would bet that a larger, heavier, and much more expensive X100 would sell in meaningfully smaller numbers than the current X100.  Maybe with significant margins that could still make sense for Fuji, but it seems unlikely to me.

Also, from an ROI perspective, you have to consider whether it would mostly be cannibalizing existing X100 sales.  Fuji probably isn't interested in launching a new camera to primarily compete with itself.

And as a practical matter, I don't see this theoretical X100 Pro as a Leica Q2 competitor.  The Q2 is a 47MP full-frame camera with an f/1.7 Leica lens on it.  If someone wants and can afford that camera, then they're going to buy it.  And if they can't afford the Leica, then they're probably already looking at the existing X100 as an alternative, which brings us right back to cannibalizing existing X100 sales.  There may be a small group of folks who can't afford a Q2 and aren't considering the X100V, but who would consider an X100 Pro, but now we're talking about a very small, niche market...