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Fujifilm Finepix F50fd (1 Viewer)

John Cantelo

Well-known member
Well just as I finally decided to get the F31 when I go abroad next week, Fuji go and announce the following camera -
"Fujifilm FinePix F50fd, Image Stabilized - The Fujifilm F50fd has a lot to live up to, its the model to replace the F31fd, a camera we have raved about ever since we reviewed it as about the only compact camera you can use confidently at high sensitivities. The F50fd takes quite a jump from the F31fd's six megapixels, it now has twelve megapixels and that only makes us wonder if it will be able to match the F31fd's high ISO performance. The F50fd also features a mechanical CCD-shift image stabilization system, improved face detection, ISO 1600 at full image size and a 2.7" LCD monitor. The F50fd should be available in September at around $300" (dpreview).

Could it be worth the wait?
 
Well just as I finally decided to get the F31 when I go abroad next week, Fuji go and announce the following camera -
"Fujifilm FinePix F50fd, Image Stabilized - The Fujifilm F50fd has a lot to live up to, its the model to replace the F31fd, a camera we have raved about ever since we reviewed it as about the only compact camera you can use confidently at high sensitivities. The F50fd takes quite a jump from the F31fd's six megapixels, it now has twelve megapixels and that only makes us wonder if it will be able to match the F31fd's high ISO performance. The F50fd also features a mechanical CCD-shift image stabilization system, improved face detection, ISO 1600 at full image size and a 2.7" LCD monitor. The F50fd should be available in September at around $300" (dpreview).

Could it be worth the wait?
It could be, although, as the comments imply, more megapixels don't automatically guarantee better results. It will be a lot more money than the F31, to begin with anyway, the improved face detection is irrelevant for digiscoping use and I don't know how useful Image Stabilization is.

It depends if they have corrected some of the F31's shortcomings: lack of a filter thread for easy attachment of an adaptor (unlikely) and inclusion of a User's Settings option. The bigger lcd screen is a good thing.

The F31 is a great camera for the price. I don't know if the F50 will be worth the wait or not. Sorry not really very helpful.

Ron
 
That is the trouble with this market. You have to decide whether to wait for the next great thing or decide to buy today. It really depends, I suppose, on how much use you would get out of it between buying now, what you want to spend and whether waiting a couple of months and spending a bit more outweighs these considerations. For example, I had just about narrowed down my choices for a superzoom until Panasonic announced the FZ18 yesterday.

I have to say I am very happy with my F31 Fd. My only niggles with it are the lack of a custom setting (ala Oly's "my modes"), that it keeps turning itself off after a few minutes (with the superb battery life I could do without this feature) and the fact that you have to keep setting the continuous shooting mode every time it decides to turn itsef off and every time you look at the pictures you have recorded. I also sometimes have trouble with the focus lock when digiscoping and find that most of my images benefit from some post-process sharpening.

I do think that the 12 megapixels will be a great boost for cropping in on subjects where you just can't get close enought to fill the frame, providing the sensor is up to it. I very much doubt you'll get a screw thread on this model. I expect that the high ISO performance will also be improved.
 
I agree 100% with Kittykat.

For me the good thing is that it takes the same SD cards as my Panasonic camera so it saves the hassle of buying another set of cards. Face detection & image stabilisation may not be useful for digiscoping, but I'll not be using it exclusively for this. Anyhow the realling annoying thing is it's put me off getting the F31 when I go through customs en route to Spain next week!
 
I've just had a look at dpreview and there is quite a bit of information about the camera.

I see it now has a full Manual mode with control over everything except focus. The Manual mode on the F30/31 is pretty pointless. There is no mention of a Users or Custom mode which is a pity. The additional memory card options is a good thing.

If you are using it as a general purpose camera as well it still lacks an optical viewfinder which can be useful in bright sunlight. The Image Stablization could be a useful feature for that application though.

Ron
 
or probably they include with hot shoe for external flash then can use it with better beamer too for capturing images in the dark.

don't think fujifilm bother about digiscopers like us but it would be nice if they have custom setting that can be saved as an improvement from the fuji F30/F31d.

th cheapest for those who are interested to get the fuji F31d is from www.shashinki.com only around sterling 109.44
 
I think the biggest shame is that they increased the pixel count so dramatically. People in the forums at dpreview.com are crying murder over this. The big deal about the F30/31 was the high iso performance. When pixel count goes up, high iso performance usually goes down. The suspicion is that Fuji caved into marketing pressures to put pixel count ahead of high iso performance. If so, it is quite possible that the F30/31 could represent the pinnacle of high iso performance and become highly valued in the used market. It seems we are in something of a backslide period in image quality of digital cameras. So much has been made of pixel count by the marketing departments, that IQ has fallen off due to overly aggressive noise reduction required by making such small pixels. This has affected the "superzoom" market as well, where recent models with higher pixel counts have lower image quality than their predecesors (Sony H9 vs H5 is the most extreme example). Lets hope Fuji has figured something out, but laws of physics can only be bent, not broken.
 
There was the F40fd between the F31fd and the F50fd. It had 8 megs and for a split second had digiscopers rubbing their hands but to handle the megs they had to drop the frame rate from 2.2 to 1.3 frames/second, and 3 frames Continuously to only 2. This was not an acceptable trade-off for a couple of extra megs and Face Detection. I expect that the F50fd will also be slow.
Don't give up on the F31fd. It's still very fast and I don't think we really need low noise iso 1600 when we already have iso 800 which is pretty good.
Neil.
 
Well for mine, it is a known fact, that the more pixels you try to get on a small sensor, the more problems it causes, I know that with my Panasonic FZ50 compared with The FZ30, as Neil points out, a reduction in continuous shooting speed, and a big problem with noise. Ernie
 
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