My Experience with the Phase One XF 100

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I was in a studio setting, so I didn't get to experience the magical "medium format bokeh." I was shooting at around F/20 so depth of field wasn't too big of a problem.

The Phase has 1 focus point in the middle. I was prepared for bad AF from all the stories I heard. It wasn't bad actually. The Phase emits a focus-assist light every time it tries to acquire focus. Maybe that helped? Because I had such a deep depth of field, focus recomposing was no problem. I also heard that the AF was improved from the old Phase cameras.

I couldn't rattle off shots like I could with my Fuji X-T2. In fact, since the RAW files were around 100 megs each, I could probably shoot about 1 shot a second. Even then, after like 10 shots, I had to stop for the buffer to clear.

That was the main thing I had to get used to. It forced me to slow down. I couldn't catch the model in her moment and keep her moving. She had to pause for each pose. Also I was using 8gig CF cards, and that thing filled up much quicker than I was expecting.

The files are pretty amazing. Using Capture One, it somehow comes out near-perfect straight out of camera. You don't need to touch anything. I was baffled by this. With the Fuji, I usually have to do a lot of things to the RAW files to make it look good. But with the Phase, for some reason, it looks great SOOC. I thought a preset had been added.

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Isn't an aperture of f20 going to give you a very soft image? I wouldn't use any lens below f11-16, certainly not in a studio environment.

If you open up the aperture a bit you'll see a lot more detail appear