Lately I’ve been really itching to get back into street photography. For work I tend to shoot on a number of different cameras. Most often though is either the Blackmagic Ursa Mini Pro or the Sony A7s II. Obviously the BM can’t be used for photography and from my experience the A7S II is great, but it doesn’t really inspire me to pick it up and go and shoot.
So in comes the Fujifilm X-Pro 2. I did some research on some decent photography cameras and somehow kept coming back to the X-Pro 2. Yes, that’s right, the 2.
From what I understood the X-Pro 2 was the best of the X-Pros and the most similar to the very popular X100 line.
You might be wondering why didn’t I go with something like an XT5, XH2S, X100VI etc. The honest answer is that I’ve never shot on Fujifilm before and didn’t want to invest a tonne of money into a system I wasn’t sure I’d enjoy. I did initially want to pick up one of the X100 cameras but they’ve been overhyped at the moment and the prices are a bit nuts.
I can now honestly say that I am absolutely in love with fujifilm and will be investing in different bodies and lenses in the near future. At the moment I’m working with the Fujinon XF 23mm F1.4 R LM WR, the Fujifilm XC 35mm, and the Samyang 12mm MF.
I’m still experimenting with street stuff and seeing which focal lengths I prefer.
I find it so so so different to being a cinematographer on a narrative project. Lately in that regard I’ve been loving using a 25mm or a 32/35mm and getting really close. However I find that you can’t really do that with street photography, or at least I can’t. The social anxiety just doesn’t allow me to get that close.
I usually flip flop between 2 different mindsets regarding which lens to use. Mindset 1 is to stick with one lens for the day, even if it’s not going well, to force yourself to shoot within the limitations and find something good. Mindset 2 is to immediately swap lenses the second that you’re feeling frustrated and need a creative shift.
With the X-Pro 2 I’m able to swap lenses. Which I’m not sure if it’s a good or bad thing for street photography. I wonder sometimes if I’d ended up with an X100, would I love being stuck at 23mm and feel as free as a bird?
Anyway, for the first real outing I ended up in Bristol, about a 40 minute drive for me. I wasn’t really sure where to go. What I did know is that I was meeting my girlfriend for ramen later in the evening at the fantastic Tomo No Ramen. So I chose somewhere around that location and hoped my feet would find something.
I was initially very nervous. Both of shooting people in the street, and also the fact that I was battling the midday sun. Two things that I usually try to avoid. That being people and the midday sun.
Unfortunately my fears were pretty immediately realised as a jogger ran past and gave me a really weird look, thus triggering intense social anxiety. However I managed to survive and press on.
For this shoot I ended up using a JPEG recipe from Fuji X Weekly. The Fuji 160NS. I was initially drawn to Fuji because of the JPEG recipe film simulations. However I couldn’t stop myself from shooting RAW as well because I really wanted to have a play around with the images in Lightroom and see how they hold up.
For the past month or two I haven’t really been using the JPEGs much as I do really enjoy the ritual of editing the photos at the moment. However that comes and goes and I know I’ll hate it again very soon. So I might end up shooting JPEG only.
However for me, my film (35mm and 120) process utilises negative lab pro. I’m such a control freak that I don’t know if I could let go and just shoot JPEG. The times I did test using the JPEGs I couldn’t stop myself from running them through snapseed. So who knows if I’ll ever be able to join the SOOC revolution.
Because I wasn’t sure if I was going to use the JPEGs at the time I ended up treating my ISO more like a film stock, setting it to 800 (for better Dynamic Range options in the Fuji sim) and forgetting it. I have two things I want to talk about here. First is how rubbish the ISO dial is on the X-Pro 2. It’s the worst thing about the camera in my opinion. It’s tied to the shutter dial and you have to try and clasp it between two fingers, pull it up, and twist. It’s honestly awful. I’m used to rolling the control wheel on my A7S and being able to change ISO incredibly fast. I’ve hated using the ISO dial so much that I’ve resorted to shooting in auto ISO mainly.
The second thing is something that I learned on the Wandering DP podcast about ISO and how it changes your dynamic range. From what I understand, the higher your ISO the more latitude you’re given in the highlights. Yes, that’s right. It’s strangely counterintuitive.
Basically imagine you have a certain number of stops of dynamic range, on something like an ARRI ALEXA it’s 14. At the native ISO for that camera (800) you have an even split of 7 stops for the shadows and 7 stops for the highlights. However if you jump up to 1600 ISO that shifts to something like 9 stops in the highlights and then 5 stops in the shadows. It all still equals 14, it’s just divided up differently.
That’s my understanding of how it works in cinema cameras and I’m not too sure if that’s translatable to shooting RAW stills cameras. All that to say that I don’t really mind shooting higher ISO in bright conditions because in theory it should help with my highlight retention.
Anyway, sorry about that neurodivergent rant. For the latter half of the day I decided I wanted to play with a black and white simulation. I used a cool pushed Tri-X one that I found on FUJI X Weekly again.
This was probably the most fun I had all day. Being able to shoot black and white and view that on the LCD screen is wonderful.
The last image I got of the day was probably my favourite. It was two guys working in a car garage. I initially walked past with my girlfriend and saw the scene with my eyes and decided to double back and shoot a sneaky one with my camera. However I wasn’t very subtle and they definitely saw me and I heard them shout something but I got too scared and ran away. The image looks great, but I’m not sure how I feel about that interaction. I was technically shooting into their private space and probably encroached a little bit more than I’d like. The garage location would look fantastic for a short film though.
Anyway those are my ramblings on the Fujifilm X-Pro 2. I don’t know if ANYONE is going to read this, but it’s been nice getting my thoughts out of my head. I really really want to pursue street photography a lot more in 2024. I’d love to get a POV setup and do some videos like that.
I’m really wrestling creatively over what it is I’d like to bring to the youtube videos I want to create. At my core I’m a DOP/Cinematographer and ultimately that’s my end goal. But I do still love photography and want it to have a place in my life. Something like a youtube channel might help to keep me accountable and to go out regularly even when I don’t feel like it.
If you’d like to see my first street photography video on youtube I’ll link it below. There aren’t any POV shots which is a shame. I’ll have to try and strike a nice balance between cinematic and POV.