Thinking of Switching to Mirrorless? You Need to Watch This

There are a lot of people switching from DSLR to mirrorless these days. But while Sony has the full frame side of things pretty much locked down, a ton of people, including Fujifilm X Photographer and Fstoppers tutorial makerElia Locardi, are recognizing the great, more compact, systems that Fuji is producing. In this video, Photographer and YouTuber Mark Duffy explains why he moved from Canon to Fuji.

While most of the talk these days is around Sony and all its innovations, there’s also Panasonic’s GH5 range and Olympus’ OM-D E-M1 Mark II. OK, so the last two are Micro Four Thirds, but unless your shooting high-end commercial or fashion, do you really need a full frame? Last March, Eric Brushett wrote an article detailing why he made the giant leap from a 10-year love affair with Nikon to a new whirlwind romance with the Fujifilm X-T1.

Later, in December 2017, Duffy made a video of a shootout between his 6D and a borrowed X-T2. In that video, you can see his mind changing, and in this video, Duffy, after probably the most satisfying unboxing I’ve ever seen, details his experience about his big switch from a Canon 6D to a Fujifilm X-T2. He gives great kudos to Fuji for their UX and UI design as well as their super aesthetics. He also shows us a behind-the-scenes shot from his Instagram feed taken with the Fujifilm X-T20 and a kit lens. It looks great and I honestly don’t know if I would be able to tell the difference between that shot, handheld at 1/10 of a second at ISO 3,200, and a similar shot with a full-frame DSLR, unless I was really pixel peeping. But, a point that he makes a couple of times is that he loves the focus peaking feature that was included in Fuji’s latest firmware update. And this, at least to me anyway, highlights the big issue for Canon and Nikon: they’re moving too slowly. They’re not reacting as fast as their competitors and if they don’t cop on they’re going to left in the dust by all these (kinda) new innovators.

[via Mark Duffy]

Mike O'Leary's picture

Mike is a landscape and commercial photographer from, Co. Kerry, Ireland. In his photographic work, Mike tries to avoid conveying his sense of existential dread, while at the same time writing about his sense of existential dread. The last time he was in New York he was mugged, and he insists on telling that to every person he meets.

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24 Comments

Great video Mark, welcome in the wonderful world of Fuji!

Dear Mark Duffy, a warm welcome to our elite Club of Fuji XT 2 and dear Mike O'Leary, thanks a lot for sharing this beautiful Video... My world is now only with Fuji XT 2 and XT 1 and it's outstanding lenses...

Yeah, I picked up a xt20 because Sony doesn’t understand that mirrorless should also be small. Can’t say I’m disappointed in my decision one bit. Wanna get some more lenses for it, just not sure I’m gonna mirror my zoom trinity just yet.

Great video, Mark! My partner switched from Nikon to Fuji as well and hasn't looked back. Me, I can't let go of my Canons...yet!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LzT30Lul_eQ&t=3s

Don’t use Lightroom for that stuff on a fuji

No it’s not. A developer that can properly demosaic the the raw data produces great results without any of the issues you state above. Iridient developer produces great results.

Fuji are nice compact cameras but will not replace my Nikon D4s,D850,D810 set anytime soon. Still not there with focusing and being snappy enough for low light events I do... and Yes I am a Fuji shooter and had multiple of them and currently using only X100T for family fun :) Let's see how next gen fuji AF brings the gap closer :) Good luck, big fan of them just for me not there yet :)

Like it or not, the mirrorless market is the wave of the future, increasingly in smaller form factors. The net value of this is probably where we see a more smartphone-like system with interchangeable lens options.

Samsung entered and exited just as quickly from the mirrorless market, perhaps with great insight to how it all goes down. We shall see.

I highly doubt Canon or Nikon are going to shrink into obscurity, but I do believe they're going to be the last two camera manufacturers to truly embrace mirrorless full stop. Most likely because they are still well funded by consumers, so where's the incentive to change? Just like Apple, they can ride those legacy waves for a long time to come with minimal effort.

Want more innovative cameras? Speak with your wallet. Support those companies that are hungry.

Sure, but I qualified my statement with the smaller form factor bit.

This wave is also happening in video/film. Even RED is slated to release a smartphone in Q1 2018 (Hydrogen) that they claim has the image quality to replace all current mirrorless lineups and has slightly less IQ than their much more expensive cinema cameras. The system is modular to add focal length and sensor size options.

Whether all this ends up to be true or not we shall see. If it is true, that's going to open up some interesting conversations and challenge a lot of current conventional thinking. We could potentially see other manufactures follow suit as hybrid systems gain more popularity.

I still shoot photo/video on my NX1. I cant see myself going back to reflex or Csnon or Nikon for video any time soon. I honestly don't see a lot of advatanges to justifty it. The AF and color science on my NX1 is right up there with Canon's best. My EVF is more than capable. All the touchscreen options are superb. What's to miss?

I have Canon 5DMKIII with L lenses and putchased an amazing x-100f. I really love to carry this small camery with me all the time. Across filter is great. But files from Canon are on a different level. I am happy I have both, but will continue investing in my Canon system. Planning to get 5Ds MKII when it is out and maybe the new 85 and 135 mm. I love how people react to Fuji when they see it in my hands:-)
Some of my Canon work: www.dylikowski.com

Wow, your images are stellar! Love it!

"I don't like Sony because the menus are bad". Oh, ok. So the stellar image quality, the great lenses that are growing day by day, the 20fps from the A9 plus the AF abilities of that and the riii, the high ISO quality etc etc. None of that matters because the menu's are bad.

I don't get it. I've had the A7rii for about 2 years now and I've had no issues with the menu? I don't spend enough time in there to worry about it. I assign the buttons to what I want to use most, the quick menu has most of everything else and I take pictures...

That's a good workflow considering Sony but not all ppl work or think that way. Part of the overall user experience of what makes a camera great is how well one can handle it.

Yes, image quality matters, but it's not the only consideration. Anything that technically stumps somone can impede creative flow. The idea of a good tool is to enhance creativity, not get in the way of the user.

I can tell you as a UX designer by day Sony's menus are consistently some of the worse in the business, and that goes for some of their other products too. It seems you are comfortable or unhindered by it but a great many consistently complain about them.

There are a lot of nested and sub-nested features arranged illogically and that increases interaction times and falloff rates. Some of this is probably the difference of how many Asian sentence structure builds vertically and that doesn't always translate 1:1 with English. And culturally it's just not something they put a lot of importance in. We see some of these odd UI practices with Canon and Nikon as well.

Have you seen the UI systems of Blackmagic, RED and Samsung? Delightful. Intuitive. Fast. They just make sense (to western sensibilities) and get the user shooting instead of fumbling through convoluted menu options.

In the case of Samsung they followed western-centric design until they came into their own matured language. Both Apple and Google helped them to develop this over time, but now they can hold their own, and they embrace it.

However, other Asian-centric brands are still behind the curve, sorry to say Sony dragging it's feet the most. Panasonic is coming up the rear but much work still to be done there too. I haven't seen more recent Fuji, Pentax or Olympus. The most complaints I see are from Sony and Canon users.

As a designer I believe camera UI could be simplfied across the board even more. Don't assume it doesn't matter or make a difference.

Is Sony IQ really leaps and bounds the IQ of other brands? Sure, Sony has it's own character, but is it the King of all IQ in the land?

I say no brand is. Because to a certain extent IQ is subjective and relative to the beholder. People truly get emotionally attached to their consumerism and that's how blind fanboyism is created.

I can as a UX designer inform you that Sony consistently ranks low in the useability of their UI system. I'm pretty senior in my position and have built products you may be using right now but any junior designer fresh out of design school could tell you the same. Way too many nested sub menus spread out in an illogical structure. It's exactly everything we designers try to avoid.

In my industry, Sony is notorious for bad UI design not just in their cameras but other products as well. It's pretty remarkable.

zebra and af peaking i think are also limited because of processors that are used (canon/nikon)

Does't Magic Lattern enable peaking in Canon cameras?

I went Nikon film - Nikon Digital - Fuji (XPRO-2) - Nikon Digital. Am I focused?, of course, what else 😁.

Reason number one to switch to mirrorless:
You've confused weight savings with flange distance, not sensor size and equivalent aperture like you should have.

Reason number two:
You never really needed the image quality that full-frame offered in the first place.

Reason number three:
You actually "need" the bells and whistles that a mirrorless system offers, most of which could have just been implemented in live view on a DSLR anyways...

I’m $20k vested into Canon. Almost ready to make the switch though. I had the x-t10 which underwhelmed me in performance. I understand the x-t2 is much further along. In the18 years I’ve had Canon gear I’ve never had to send anything in for service. I still have my 10d that works great. I’ve read a lot of comments about the Fuji’s having to be returned multiple times by other Canikon owners who regret making the switch. I realize there are horror stories with all manufacturers. I know what I got in Canon but the size difference is SO appealing the older I get especially on a long wedding day. Can anybody speak to this or is it a case of the squeaky wheel gets the oil?