Fuji S5 Pro with the Nikkor 24mm F2.8D

Finding this combo to be a great, light, walk-around system. Color saturation and pop are so off the scale that I had to turn down the vibrance in Lightroom for both of these examples shot over the weekend.

Who says you can't do action with the S5 Pro? Natural light shot at f/2.8.

24mm may produce a 35mm equivalent FOV, but at f/2.8 the DOF is closer to that of a 35mm f/4 lens.

Hope you enjoy the old school Fuji colors.

fPrime

fishy wishy wrote:

fPrime wrote:

Hope you enjoy the old school Fuji colors.

fPrime

Yes I do, but old school? When you discover them late they can be new school!

Haha, true but saying the colors are "new school to me" just didn't sound right.

I went back to Fuji S pros after later Nikon cameras. An old CMOS camera nowadays tends to fall between the stools. It doesn't have the dynamic range or high iso of the newer cameras, and it may not have much of that old approach to color either. So I explored older CCD cameras like this.

Indeed. My Nikon CCD bodies also have their own great color but clip easily. In that sense the Fuji S series is much more forgiving.

I tested m4/3 cameras quite recently, without being impressed. When I went back to browsing thumbnails from cameras like the S pros I was almost jumping up and down in my seat. The difference in color and tone curve is obvious, even from thumbnails.

M4/3, I'm not surprised. I used to read comments on here from users who felt that even their modern APSC Fuji bodies didn't equal the color quality of their old S5 Pro bodies.

But I have tested several s5 and I have seen a problem in all of them with grainy, almost mottled overcast skies when pulling the highlights. It's so tempting to pull those highlights and apply sharpening but one must

With which RAW converter, Fishy? I saw mottling in skies using DXO Opitcs Pro so dropped it for usage with the S5 but LR works beautifully for me.

fPrime

fishy wishy wrote:

fPrime wrote:

With which RAW converter, Fishy? I saw mottling in skies using DXO Opitcs Pro so dropped it for usage with the S5 but LR works beautifully for me.

fPrime

I started off using LR but it's not my thing and now I use Adobe Camera Raw. It's a long time since I used Fuji's own antiquated software, a clunky affair which looked like it came from the Windows 98 era. I looked around for the Fuji software they used to sell but only got an older version. The problem is most obvious on 1:1 viewing and largely on overcast skies where the change in tone in areas is relatively subtle. I suppose I really should post a couple of samples.

Interesting, you really should post an example so others can recognize the artifacts you are seeing when they occur.  You do keep Adobe's RAW sharpening in ACR turned off, I hope?  I've found sharpening on S5 Pro images is best left to more sophisticated deconvolution tools after conversion.

It probably is something to do with the way Adobe has reverse-engineered the way to read Fuji files and the interpolation. This behaviour came from the files of 4 different bodies I tested with ACR and it's so blatant it's unlikely to be the sort of thing Fuji would let pass with their own converter.

Adobe get rightly criticized for being slow to create profiles for some cameras and doing a mediocre job on others.  However, I can definitely tell that their profile for the S5 Pro got a lot of loving care from someone at Adobe... perhaps a fellow Fuji enthusiast themselves.  Colors, tone curves, and relatively artifact free interpolation to 12 MP are near perfect in LR and trumped the output from DXO and C1 Pro when I tested them head to head.  Like you, I wasn't able to test Fuji's orphaned RAW converter for lack of availability.

fPrime

It's a nice combo on those year sensors for sure. I liked it on my D80, but the lens really started to show it's limitations once I stepped up to 24mp files, where I found even a newer kit zoom produced better results. You seem to still be fine with the older bodies, so yes it's a great walkaround for those.

I think color saturation WAS always pretty high due to nature of the lens, being designed for landscapes/film in the 70s.

jjz2 wrote:

It's a nice combo on those year sensors for sure. I liked it on my D80, but the lens really started to show it's limitations once I stepped up to 24mp files, where I found even a newer kit zoom produced better results. You seem to still be fine with the older bodies, so yes it's a great walkaround for those.

I think color saturation WAS always pretty high due to nature of the lens, being designed for landscapes/film in the 70s.

Indeed. The 24D Is still highly regarded by Nikonistas for color and contrast today despite its slightly softer corners versus its 24G cousins. I also have a 24mm 1.4G but it has serious back focus issues on my S5 Pro so I reserve it for use on my full frame.

One thing for sure, the 24D is a small and light optic which makes the S5 extra easy to carry!

fPrime

fPrime wrote:

Finding this combo to be a great, light, walk-around system. Color saturation and pop are so off the scale that I had to turn down the vibrance in Lightroom for both of these examples shot over the weekend.

Who says you can't do action with the S5 Pro? Natural light shot at f/2.8.

24mm may produce a 35mm equivalent FOV, but at f/2.8 the DOF is closer to that of a 35mm f/4 lens.

Hope you enjoy the old school Fuji colors.

fPrime

Have you made prints from the combo? Sometimes the large prints look better than on screen......just my opinion, though.

Bob

I always wanted that lens, but could never find one at reasonable price. I did spend £60 on a used Sigma 24mm f2.8. The Sigma has great close focusing. The real party trick of the S5 pro was its dynamic range - with the right software. Only the Nik D3 got close got close. Using the software - the Raw highly recovery was amazing! See Ken Rockwell's Overexposure and Blown-Out Images http://www.kenrockwell.com/fuji/s5/dynamic-range.htm

BobsYourUncle wrote:

fPrime wrote:

Finding this combo to be a great, light, walk-around system. Color saturation and pop are so off the scale that I had to turn down the vibrance in Lightroom for both of these examples shot over the weekend.

Who says you can't do action with the S5 Pro? Natural light shot at f/2.8.

24mm may produce a 35mm equivalent FOV, but at f/2.8 the DOF is closer to that of a 35mm f/4 lens.

Hope you enjoy the old school Fuji colors.

fPrime

Have you made prints from the combo? Sometimes the large prints look better than on screen......just my opinion, though.

I'm just now getting my preferred camera settings worked out so I have not printed from the S5 Pro yet.  But you do make an interesting suggestion about print quality.  I recall reading somewhere that someone said in prints the softness of the S5 Pro is mitigated and the tonality really shines.  Is that what you meant, Bob?

fPrime

fPrime wrote:

BobsYourUncle wrote:

fPrime wrote:

Finding this combo to be a great, light, walk-around system. Color saturation and pop are so off the scale that I had to turn down the vibrance in Lightroom for both of these examples shot over the weekend.

Who says you can't do action with the S5 Pro? Natural light shot at f/2.8.

24mm may produce a 35mm equivalent FOV, but at f/2.8 the DOF is closer to that of a 35mm f/4 lens.

Hope you enjoy the old school Fuji colors.

fPrime

Have you made prints from the combo? Sometimes the large prints look better than on screen......just my opinion, though.

I'm just now getting my preferred camera settings worked out so I have not printed from the S5 Pro yet. But you do make an interesting suggestion about print quality. I recall reading somewhere that someone said in prints the softness of the S5 Pro is mitigated and the tonality really shines. Is that what you meant, Bob?

fPrime

That's not a bad way to put it.  The gradients in color seem to yield a more life-like print.  13 x 19 is my usual max print size for enlargements and I have been quite satisfied.  In my office/gallery the S5 prints get more "oohs" than others.  Let me know what you think about your prints when you get to that point.

Bob

knows_nothing wrote:

I always wanted that lens, but could never find one at reasonable price. I did spend £60 on a used Sigma 24mm f2.8. The Sigma has great close focusing. The real party trick of the S5 pro was its dynamic range - with the right software. Only the Nik D3 got close got close. Using the software - the Raw highly recovery was amazing! See Ken Rockwell's Overexposure and Blown-Out Images http://www.kenrockwell.com/fuji/s5/dynamic-range.htm

It's a great lens on DX even wide open as you saw.  You should get ahold of one to compare to the Sigma.  My used copy cost me $250 but it's well worth the rock solid AF compared to my focus troubles with the Nikon 24mm 1.4G.

fPrime