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Fuji's new X70 compact was announced alongside the larger and more powerful X-Pro2, but in many ways the X70 is the more interesting camera. It's the company's smallest camera yet, so small it slips easily into a pocket, but the size is deceptive.
This is a powerful camera with the same 16.3MP APS-C sized X-Trans CMOS II sensor you'll find in the rest of Fuji's X series. Having experimented with most of the micro four thirds compacts and the newer offerings like Panasonic's LX100, I can say without hesitation that the X70 delivers the highest quality image in the smallest package of anything in this size range.
At $700, with an APS-C sensor that fits in your in your pocket, you'd be hard pressed to go wrong with the X70.
At first glance the X70 might appear like a slightly stripped down version of the company's popular X100 series cameras, but dig a little deeper and you'll discover the X70 is an impressive beast in its own right. It is missing the optical viewfinder of the X100, but it blows the X100 out of the water in two very important ways -- autofocus speed and image buffering.
The X70 is extremely fast for its diminutive size, it borrows the AF system from the larger X-T10. It's not DSLR fast, but try shoving the Nikon D800 in your pocket. Trade-offs are always necessary.
The X70's single point focus mode offers a 49-point focusing system while the Zone and Wide/Tracking modes use a 77-point area to capture moving subjects. Both work well and when coupled with the impressively fast shooting speed and you'll rarely miss a shot due to the blackout on the LCD screen.
What the X70 does have is three manual focus modes designed to handle a variety of situations. To switch to manual you just flip the focus switch to manual and use the lens control ring to set the focal distance. The LCD display automatically zooms to help you judge the focus. In bright, backlit situations this can be tricky, but for street photographers who pre-focus at a fixed distance it works just fine. There's also a handy (optional) depth of field scale along the bottom of the LCD.
The second method of manual focusing is Focus Peak Highlight mode, which outlines the subject in focus, much like what Sony pioneered with the NEX line. The third focus mode in the X70 is split screen mode, which taps the old manual focusing methods of SLRs in the 80s (somewhat ironic considering the X70's rangefinder-inspired design, but never mind that).
In all three modes the manual focus ring is exceedingly clever -- turn it fast and the distance changes quickly, turn it slower and it gets more sensitive, moving through the distance scale much more slowly.
The attention to detail in manual focusing possibilities reveals what seems to be one of the X70's target markets -- street photographers (who don't care about a viewfinder). Indeed more than a smaller X100, the X70 feels like Fuji's answer to the Ricoh GR II, which has nearly identical specs, but lacks something key in the X70 -- the articulating touchscreen. The X70's screen can flip up 180 degrees (selfies, yeah) and down 90 degrees, which makes it even easier to shoot discreetly from the hip.
This is also the first touchscreen for Fuji. It's a nice bright screen, 3" with 1.04 million dots and three modes for shooting -- off, touch to focus and touch to shoot. All three work as advertised though I happen to prefer off. Actually the touch to focus mode is handy for moving the focus point around quickly. It's not as nice as the X-Pro2's "nib" focus point controller, but given the space constraints of the X70 it's the next best thing. The touch features also extend to playback mode where it can be used to flip through images and pinch to zoom.
The X70 differentiates itself further from the X100 series in the choice of lens. The X70 comes with an 18.5mm f/2.8 lens (28mm in 35mm-speak). That's a bit wider and slower than the X100, which uses a 35mm f/2 lens. That X70 does offer some digital crop modes for 35mm and 50mm equivalent images, which saves you post-production work. I've always found 28mm an awkward length, it's not quite the landscape-friendly 24mm, but wider than the street-friendly 35mm. That said, it's a compromise lens that makes sense for the X70. It might be less well suited for any one thing, but it's a good general length when you might be shooting a little bit of everything.
The ergonomics of the X70 are quite good in spite of its tiny size. The body is all metal and feels quite solid without being heavy. There are the usual slew of manual controls Fuji is known for, including an exposure compensation dial that covers 3 stops in either direction, a shutter speed dial and an aperture ring on the lens (the latter can be assigned to other functions as well). My main complaint is that all of the buttons are relatively flat and can sometimes be difficult to push. The dedicated video button is the worst, it's nearly impossible to press.
Fortunately Fuji offers the ability to assign pretty much any function to any button so I just swapped the Wifi and video buttons. As with other Fuji cameras I've tested, video with the X70 is good, but not great. The X70 can record in 1080p movies at up to 60fps. The biggest drawback is that a fair bit of lens focus noise often ends up in your videos. This isn't just an X70 problem, it's fairly common in compacts, but it's definitely annoying and can only really be solved by using an external microphone.
The X70 sports the usual compliment of Fuji film modes, though the very nice Acros mode that debuted with the X-Pro2 is not present (it apparently requires the more powerful processor in the X-Pro2). The JPGs straight out of the camera are excellent, though I still ended up shooting primarily RAW (now that Google has made the [Nik filter suite](https://www.google.com/nikcollection/) free, Fuji's film modes save less time than they used to).
tk rest of features.
The X70 has both a mechanical shutter and an electronic shutter for shutter speeds up to 1/32,000 sec. The ISO range extends from 100-51,200, though after 6400 you'll be shooting JPGs only. There's very little noise, even in JPGs, up to 6400, after that you'll start to detect a bit of noise.
The X70 also features all the bells and whistles you've come to expect from today's cameras, including built-in wi-fi connectivity for quick transfers to your mobile device, a time-lapse recording mode, as well as support for all of Fuji's various bracketing options (AE, Film Simulation, Dynamic Range, ISO and White Balance).
The X70 is among the best image quality you're going to find in this compact of a form factor making it an excellent all-around travel camera, street photography camera or as a pocket camera for times when anything more would be overkill.
Rating: 7/maybe 8 up to you.
Wired: Small, light and amazing image quality make the X70 an excellent travel camera. Powerful manual focus modes and the articulated touch LCD screen make the X70 a great street photography camera as well. At $700 the X70 offers a lot of camera for not a lot of dough.
Tired: Physical buttons are difficult to push, video recording is often marred by lens noises. The 28mm lens, while compact, is not for everyone.
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