I had unique opportunity to test new Fuji teleconverter XF2X TC WR one day before official announcement. Here is my short preview and few sample photos.
Converter was a preproduction sample and was used with X-Pro2 body and Fujinon XF50-140mm lens (here is my test of this lens with XF1.4X TC).
New converter extends focal length by factor of 2 so XF50-140mm becomes a 100-280 mm (150-420 mm with crop factor) with constant aperture 5.6. It is slightly larger then XF1.4X, but still much more compact than DSLR converters. It doesn’t take much space in your bag – its diameter is 58 mm and length 32 mm (but almost 60 mm with caps) and it’s weight is 170 g. I have to say, that with X-Pro2 and XF50-140mm it is really compact and lite combo weighting around 1600 g.
As usual, I didn’t make photos of sample patterns, but I took the converter to Prague Zoo. XF50-140mm lens is realy sharp, but converters with factor of 2 typically decrease sharpness. I have to say that it applies to XF2X too. How you can see on attached samples, details are not razor sharp, but if you consider that 1:1 crop from X-Pro2 on your display is the same asi crop from print about 130×86 cm – if you print photos with 300 dpi (size of print around 50×30 cm), details are still very decent.
Just one last note before I show you some samples. I had no issues with speed and accuracy of AF in standard conditions. But in pavilons with lower light level, some AF hunting occured. But I don’t want to jump to conclusions, because it was announced, that all compatible lenses will get firmware update for full compatibility.
So finally after all the words, here are photos. They were made using X-Pro2 and developed in Capture One in my typical workflow including sharpening etc. You can download full size JPEGs released under Creative Commons BY-ND license.
Conclusion
Even if tested converter was preproduction sample, here is my preliminary conclusion:
- if you have XF50-140mm lens already and you need longer focal length, you probably should buy converter. XF2X is quite good and I would consider it in such situation. If you can live with shorter focal length, XF1.4X is sharper and eats less light.
- if you don’t have any telelens and you want some, but size (and lens speed without TC) is important for you, I would recommend XF50-140mm with one (or both) converter again
- but if you don’t care about size so much and you plan use long focal length often, I would prefer to go with XF100-400mm
By the way, new converter officialy supports XF100-400mm lens. Of course, lens speed 11 will be limiting, but I’m still curious, how this combo with 1200 mm equivalent will work :)
Lens and teleconverter was lend me by FUJIFILM Europe GmbH.