My career as an elite prime hunter came to an end after my professional work in the real world using an unexpected lens selection pointed me to mistakes in the way I did it. do their own.
After years of just looking for quick, fixed focal lenses from my tool bag, last year I bet on a pre-order for everything, Tamron’s 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3 Superzoom Camera for Fujifilm mirrorless cameras. Upon arrival, although impressed with its original shape and construction, I wanted to reserve my judgment for real-world torture testing. In the end, I gave up my usual two-body, two-focal lens solution for use on a mission to capture a major local festival, and that option opened up to me. the great benefits of a modern superzoom lens.
In the past, I’ve always been interested in not only general-purpose superzoom lenses, but even some of the more advanced zoom lenses on the market, thinking that the purposeful design of a quality fast focal length lens has enhance my abilities as a photographer. to do my job with high polish.
What I do realize is that the Tamron 18-300mm f/3.5-6.3 may have sacrificed some of the things I’m used to getting from lenses like my beloved Fujifilm XF 35mm f/1.4but the complete flexibility, functionality and even image quality makes me feel in fact I am better prepared for a professional event like a festival documentary.
Let’s step back a bit and see what makes this lens a winner in my book. I’d say I’m not the type to rely too much on reviews, preferring to experience it for myself, so when I saw the announcement about the lens, I was intrigued. More than anything else, I’m curious how well Tamron’s first Fuji lens will integrate into the Fuji system. I’ve been a Tamron fan in the past, love their premium primes like epic Tamron SP 35mm f/1.4and while it’s not a prime number, new entries in Fuji’s limited third-party lens support have always intrigued some, so I roll the dice and pre-order the lenses, which are coming. after about a month.
I was skeptical as to whether the new Tamron lens, which was as well-received as a Sony E-Mount lens when it first came out, would satisfy me as I’m so used to the quality and characteristics of the lens. your Fuji primes or not. My two biggest concerns are whether I’ll be affected much by its slower aperture range and whether the image quality will be up to my standards for professional work.
When I first started diving into digital photography, my old Canon camera bodies really needed sharp, fast glass to minimize the downsides of the platform, with high ISO noise topping the list. List what to reduce to get good results from the sensor. Even after upgrading to a full frame Canon DSLR with larger EF glasses, I’ve always been drawn to fast primes like the Sigma 50mm f/1.4, but the system upgrade is heavier and unwieldy. more, reminds me of my smaller camera bodies. Explore the Fuji X System, with its superb high ISO noise handling, brilliant lens lineup and smaller, neater setup, it’s a heavenly match. Despite the excellent noise handling, love for some of Fuji’s killer f/1.4 primes, and the great in-body stabilization from my X-H1 and X-S10, I rarely test its true limits. With the arrival of the Tamron 18-300mm, I expected to have to increase my ISO in darker settings and was immediately relieved to see that the sensor handled it so quickly. With this new knowledge and growing confidence in the camera to make up for the lack of huge iris slits that cast light onto my sensor, my first major concern about using Using the lens in a professional environment was satisfying. I know that any ultra-low-light photography will require a quick lens shift from me, but the built-in lens stabilization (Branded Vibration Control, or VC, in Tamron) -speak) is quite effective, so the lens still gets some extra power for shooting in the dark if your subject is fairly still. Overall, the lens is well-formed for my professional event and photojournalist.
After doing some initial testing to confirm that I didn’t have any major issues with my copy of the lens and the image quality was usable, I was pleased to have discovered the lens actually quite sharp. Only at the furthest end of the lens did I see any real problems with image quality when shooting it with the f/8 aperture that I normally use for daylight documentary works and photography. zooming back in to about 270mm or so seems to fix this. I’m fine, leaving the extremely usable range of 18-270mm at my fingertips. That insane zoom range combined with VC technology, autofocus, and an amazing 1:2 reproduction ratio at the 18mm end has made this a powerful tool as a tube solution. single glass. I was pleased to see that at 230mm, the Tamron actually outperforms the Fuji XC’s 50-230mm zoom lens, which has been praised by many for punching above its weight. This test satisfied my second interest, confirmed that the lens is indeed capable of producing professional images, and I decided my next paid event commission would be a trial basis. its first major experiment.
The day of the Scandinavian Festival in Ephraim, Utah has arrived, and as the event’s official photographer, I’m eager to put the lens through its paces in this real-world setting, capturing along with the second and third cameraman that I have contracted to assist me. with a weekend job of shooting the festival for the city’s use. With a non-stop schedule of events such as concerts, games, races and other exciting content attracting thousands of attendees, the festival has begun and the subject excess has returned. meal for my superzoom camera setup.
Shooting on my Fujifilm X-S10, I always locked the camera to continuous autofocus and was immediately pleased with my easy focusing and tracking as the weekend passed.
By the time the weekend ended, I had taken over 1,000 photos, and my retention rate was extremely high. When sifting through the photos after finishing my work, I found the incredible zoom range has really allowed me to take more amazing photos and use a variety of compositions and scene arrangements. . Essentially, the unprecedented versatility of the lens opened up much rarer possibilities when using my usual two-body combo with the 56mm f/1.4 and 23mm f/1.4. I had no problem moving with the flow of events as it happened thanks to that flexibility and I was wondering if the previous coverage could be improved if I had tried a superzoom lens for well-lit event works like the Scandinavian Festival. .
Happily, the city is extremely pleased with the photos they hired me to take, and I feel pleased about my newfound confidence in venturing into superzoom camera territory. Since then / I have captured a number of jobs that are better suited to Lensand it continues to amaze me with its performance.
