Big test of Fujifilm lenses: Fujinon XC 50-230 mm F4.5-6.7 OIS

Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS Lens Test

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The lens comes in black ...

... and silver body

Learn price Fujinon XC 50-230 mm F4.5-6.7 OIS Firstly, the body material. Plastic prevails here. Even the mount is not made of metal. The focus ring is also plastic, the zoom ring has a rubber ribbed coating. Secondly, there is no aperture setting ring: this exposure parameter needs to be changed using the camera’s control disk - all Fujifilm X cameras have it. There is also no separate selector to turn off the stabilizer. You can turn the stabilizer on and off through the main menu of the camera. The country of origin of Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS is China, unlike purebred Japanese - XF lenses. But the build quality is high: the rings go tight and smooth, there are no noticeable backlashes. In the plastic construction, there is still one serious plus: the lens turned out to be light, only 374 grams without covers and hoods. And this is with a focal length of 55-230 mm and the presence of an optical stabilizer!

For all Fujifilm lenses, we shot frames from the same point so that you can evaluate the viewing angle of a particular model. Focal Length 55 mm

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F8, 1/480 s, 75.0 mm equiv.

For all Fujifilm lenses, we shot frames from the same point so that you can evaluate the viewing angle of a particular model. Focal length 230 mm

X-T1 Settings: ISO 200, F8, 1/600 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

We proceed to the shooting ... The first desire, when in the hands of such a telephoto, unscrew the zoom to the maximum and look for new stories! Indeed, a focal length of 230 mm gives a certain freedom of creativity. The photographer has the opportunity not only to capture remote, previously inaccessible objects, but also to play with the composition of the frame. For example, I really like stories where space is artificially compressed, objects are in one frame, in life hundreds of meters distant from each other. Without a powerful telephoto, this simply cannot be removed.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/340 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

Well suited Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS for street sketches. If you are a beginner photographer and are embarrassed to shoot strangers, this lens is for you: now you don’t have to get close to a person, you can take pictures from a distance of tens of meters.

X-T1 Settings: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/180 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS is also suitable for shooting birds and animals. But here I have to make a reservation. Firstly, its aperture ratio at maximum zoom is not as high as we would like - only f / 6.7. For example, when shooting handheld at sunset, I had to raise the ISO to 400 units, and sometimes even higher. And this despite the fact that my models did not move too fast, and shutter speeds were relatively long. Secondly, with fast moving birds and animals, autofocus may not be able to cope. Focusing is smooth and absolutely silent, but, unfortunately, not lightning fast ... When I took my starlings, I first focused on the needed point, and then I waited for the bird to appear in the frame — a proven and reliable shooting technique in photoanimalism.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/340 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F9, 1/250 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

If your subjects are static, a stabilizer can help a lot. For example, I photographed the fountain at a shutter speed of 1/40 s with an equivalent focal length of 345 mm! This shutter speed is almost ten times longer than critical: the stabilizer coped, allowing the water in the frame to be blurred in motion, and the rest of the subjects left sharp. If you shoot the dynamics, then it is better to turn off the stabilizer: with sudden movements of the camera, it can give a negative effect.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F11, 1/38 s, 152.0 mm equiv.

I shot a lot in the backlight. The evening sun provoked the search for such subjects ... But what is surprising, even in the most severe conditions, the lens practically does not give chromatic aberrations. I specifically opened the RAW file in Adobe Photoshop: under the most adverse shooting conditions, thin blue borders appeared only at the edge of the frame. In other stories, they are generally absent. In JPG, chromatic aberration is corrected programmatically, and very efficiently.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/170 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

100% increase, screenshot from RAW converter

But what about sharpness? Unfortunately, miracles do not happen. Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS cannot boast of very high detail on an open aperture. At f / 8-f / 11, detail increases. But such aperture values ??cannot always be put into practice. However, for a budget telephoto lens, this result is quite natural: any of the competitors Fujinon X? 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS is unlikely to provide higher quality.

X-T1 Settings: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/150 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F9, 1/70 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 250, F11, 1/60 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

X-T1 Settings: ISO 500, F16, 1/60 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

Fujinon X? 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS, like any telephoto, can provide a very shallow depth of field in the frame. At the same time, blurring the background is soft and pleasant.

X-T1 Installations: ISO 200, F6.7, 1/210 s, 345.0 mm equiv.

conclusions

Fujinon X? 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS can be safely recommended to novice photographers as the second lens after the “whale”. A telephoto lens will also provide new scenes for shooting, and will help to focus the viewer's attention on the necessary nuances, and will teach you to be more responsible about framing a picture. An indisputable advantage of the Fujinon XC 50-230mm F4.5-6.7 OIS is its low weight at a wide range of focal lengths, as well as an optical stabilizer that allows you to shoot static objects without the need to increase ISO. As for image quality, there is a trade-off between price and quality: you should not expect ringing sharpness on an open aperture from budget optics. However, the sharpness of the lens is still sufficient for most amateur subjects. You can print your masterpieces in a format certainly no less than A3.