NJMatsuya Photography

My precious D90 was just turned in yesterday for repairs at the Nikon store in Ginza, and it will be out of commission for the next 3 weeks. 🙁

However, I can't be without a camera that long – not after initiating the 366 project which starts on January 1st! So, knowing that I would have to be without my D90 for a while, I splurged a bit on myself and ordered a Fuji X10 on the 23rd and it arrived on Christmas day 🙂

I haven't actually taken many photos with it yet, though when I stepped out yesterday to drop by the office and the Nikon service center, I snapped a few shots along the way. The X10 is remarkably full-featured, and certainly gives more control that your typical point-and-shoot. From my (very) brief use of it, what I like are:

Pros
– Fast F2.0 lens
– Great selection of manual options, from ISO, shutter speed, specific focus point, and more
– Easily accessible menu options
– Small form factor (too big for pants pocket, but will slip in a jacket)
– Super quiet – the shutter "click" is whisper silent

Cons
– Manual focus is quite crappy
– Battery life is not great (main reason I didn't take more photos yesterday)
– Even though menu items are easily accessible, they're not always necessarily intuitive

Overall, I'm pretty happy with it. I wanted a camera with NO interchangeable lenses – don't need it, since I already have a great DSLR. I also wanted something relatively small, that I could carry with me every day, to make it easier for me to stick to my 366 project. Finally I wanted something with decent macro capabilities since I don't have a macro lens for my D90. The X10 fulfilled all those requirements nicely.

My only main gripe so far is how quickly the battery drained – I'm used to my D90 being able to last a whole day (without video) or at least take a thousand shots or so, but the X10 barely got 200+ photos before the battery died.

As a result, I've bought a spare battery, and that should cover all my needs. I definitely need to familiarize myself a lot more with the menu layout and the camera features (my manual was in Japanese, so I've had to resort to reading the English PDF version online).

Below are a few shots, straight out of camera (aside from the shot of the X10 itself, which I cropped and brightened a bit).

In album X10 miscellaneous snapshots (10 photos)

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