FujiFilm X-T3 Review – A Do It All Camera.

Body & Design

The Fuji X-T3 is an ICE Breaker for sure, a sort of a conversation starter. The Classic, retro look of the Fujifilm X-T3 often get you the eye balls of everyone around. People often mistake it for a old school Film camera. Many times people passing by would just say : “Hey awesome camera !”.

Not only is the X-T3’s design absolutely beautiful, but pretty functional too.

The camera sports three separate analogue controls for ISO, shutter speed, and exposure compensation. While only the former two are lockable, the exposure compensation dial is pretty sturdy, so you won’t have to worry about accidentally rotating it.

There are two additional – front and rear – command dials, which can be customized to your needs. I personally use the rear dial to fine-tune the shutter speed when necessary, and the front dial to switch between different custom-range ISO auto modes.

The rear side of the camera features a joystick (which you can use to select your focus point when shooting) and a dial pad with four arrows, each of which can be customized. I personally disabled the arrow shortcuts, as I found myself accidentally clicking on them a bit too often. Still, it’s good to have options.

The X-T3 also boasts a touch-enabled screen, which you can tap to focus on your subject. This was admittedly one of the changes I was most curious to test out, but I found the joystick much more reliable when it came to focusing. The 3.2-inch screen tilts up or down, as well as side to side; unfortunately for vloggers/YouTubers though, it doesn’t flip to the front. A missed opportunity for Fujifilm.

Technical Specifications 

The X-T3 comes with Fujifilm’s new X-Trans CMOS 4 sensor and X-Processor 4 image-processing engine. Fujifilm claims the new tech delivers 3X the processing speed of earlier models – and after reviewing the X-T3, we would agree with these claims.

The X-T3 is an APS-C format camera, and it’s easily one of the best crop sensor alternatives out there in 2019.

While not getting too much into it, here is a brief run-down of the XT-3’s Specifications.

•          26.1 million pixels (up from 24.3 million pixels for the X-T2)

•          Maximum resolution of 6240×4160 pixels (3:2 aspect ratio)

•          New base ISO of 160 (capable of shooting RAW up to ISO 12,800)

•          The 425-point hybrid autofocus system

•          The high-resolution 3.69-dot electronic viewfinder (EVF)

•          4K video 10 bit 4:2:2 video recording capabilities (30p full width, 60p at 1.18 crop)

•          11 frames per second when shooting in burst mode with the mechanical shutter (20 when using the electronic shutter, and 30 when shooting at a 1.25x crop with the electronic shutter)

•          Dual UHS-II SD card slots

•          USB-C connector

•          Dimensions: (W) 132.5mm x (H) 92.8mm x (D) 58.8mm

•          Weight: 489g (excluding battery and SD memory card)

If you are looking at the XT-3, I’m sure you know the specs, but the big question is what do they mean? Extremely Fast AutoFocus performance for starters. The company claims AF improvements in low-light situations where usually AF systems struggle. We took the Fuji XT-3 while on a road trip from Goa to Dandeli and the AF system on the XT-3 never let us down. On the rare occasions that it struggled but then we were shooting on the kit lens which was slower, to begin with.

The Base ISO of 160, and the new image sensor and processor combination seems to have also brought improvements in the overall camera IQ, especially in the low light scenarios. In the yesteryears Fujifilm was known for its amazing 35mm variety of films, Fuji has also implemented the colour science of its 35mm films in their Digital Cameras as Film Simulation Profiles. The out of camera Jpegs were excellent and the film simulation profiles really shine through in the XT3.

The Battery life on the XT3 was about average, company claims around 390shots on a single charge, we could not test this as we were capturing video on the XT3 as well. But in terms of battery life, there are better cameras out there.

The Fuji XT3 shoots Video and not in just 1080p, Fuji has given the XT3 a full gamut of Video features, you want 4K/60 its there, 10bit 4.2.2 yes that’s available too. This is where the XT3 shines over its competition. A lot of cameras can take good pictures while they struggle with video. What if you had to have one camera that does it all? Sure, we did miss a flippy screen and In-body stabilization (IBIS) while vlogging.

All said we feel the Fujifilm’s XT3 strikes the perfect balance of size, style and usability, and while we missed IBIS and would prefer a bigger battery, we wouldn’t want them if they made the body any larger. We found the XT3 one of the most satisfying to shoot with: attractive looking retro camera, tactile controls, small enough to never leave at home, and more importantly delivering images and now also video files that look great right out-of-camera, requiring little or no post-processing.

The FujiFilm’s X-T3 has easily become one of my favourite all-round cameras and one that easily takes-on full-frame rivals.