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After resisting the urge to buy the Fujifilm X-T2, I finally gave in to the temptation last Friday as the offer was too good to be true. Black Friday sales have made me its victim today. Black Friday sales are very new in Australia, I remember only last year some of the stores started to have them but this year seems like everybody is having them.

So I thought I’d share some of my reasons for the upgrade.

Don’t pass a good deal

Almost twice a year Fujifilm predictively will run cashback offer on their flagship cameras and lens. But what made today’s offer so special is that DigiDirect one of the camera stores in Australia was offering 15% off all the Fujifilm Camera which is a huge discount, pair that with a $150 off via redemption from the cashback offer, the savings add up. In addition to this, I’d probably be able to claim GST refund on the camera as I’d be traveling overseas in a few weeks which should get me another 10% off. If you want to understand better how you can claim GST when you travel overseas, check out some of the tips I covered in my article.

The camera that retails for $2000 with 15% off  (on Black Friday sale) comes down to $1700. Then you claim the $150 cashback and you are down to net value of $1550.

Then you claim the GST on the camera which is another 10% of the $1700, that’s another $150 saving. Of course, this is only possible if two people are traveling as each would have $900 limit.

So, in the end, the camera will only cost me $1400 which is a whopping $600 off the original price. It is too good of a deal to pass on, right?

Focus Stick

This was one component that was missing on the Fujifilm X-T1 that was added to Fujifilm X-T2. Selecting a focus point is so much faster and easier on the X-T2 with this dedicated lever. Move it either up or down, left or right to choose the focus point and then simply press in to select the focus point.

In the X-T1, you had to press the Up button, then move the individual buttons to move the focus point and then finally press ok. The maneuver required fiddling with 5 different buttons and you had to do it quickly so that you can compose and shoot.

Yay!!! For the Fujifilm X-T2 which has this sorted in one single button/lever. You can also use this lever to navigate easily when browsing the Menu of the camera.

Zoom in to Patterns

Tripod Mount Thread

This was a bit pain in the butt actually, the genius Fujifilm engineers didn’t consider that practical usage of the Tripod mount thread and inconveniently placed the damn thing in the way. If you attach a tripod mount bracket, you can’t access the battery cover to change the battery. And of course you could shoot all day with the camera and you don’t need to change the battery but as you reach sunset or night time and you attach the tripod bracket, soon enough your camera will alert you that the battery needs changing soon mate!! That bloody Murphy!!

Now on the X-T2 its been repositioned so that it will not get in the way and we can easily access the battery cover to replace the battery.

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Exposure Bracketing

This was one thing that I wished and wished that Fujifilm would fix it with a firmware update in the X-T1 but since they had fixed it in X-T2, why would you release this feature on the X-T1? All I wanted was the ability to change the step of the Auto Exposure Bracket. By default, its only 1-stop and you can’t change it to 2 steps. Even though it lets you shoot 3 images in bracket mode, I’m happy with that. 99% of the time 3 images is all you need. But you couldn’t change this on the X-T1. It’s only software that they need to extend, trust me I’m a computer engineer and I am certain that they could if they wanted to. But why would you do that when you actually want people to upgrade.

So if you put your marketing hat on, then you’d think yeah why should I. I want you to spend more money and buy the latest camera after all.

But nonetheless, it’s possible on the X-T2 to change the bracket step increment and also shoot more than 3 exposure brackets.

Zoom in to Patterns

Conclusion

There are many more features that are better on the X-T2 then its predecessor but these have little significance for me. Auto Focus is much improved and especially for a fast lens that has apertures of 1.2 or 1.4 etc. 4K video is also available and autofocus for video is there. The increased megapixels to 24 instead of the 16 is good but I was happy with 16 already.

However, as I mentioned above, for the price point the X-T2 was being sold at this Black Friday sale it was crazy not to buy it!

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