PetaPixel published a couple of articles recently detailing an interview with Fujifilm at CP+. Phototrend also interviewed Fujifilm at this event, which resulted in some interesting answers. PetaPixel’s conversation was much different, so let’s talk about what was said and what it means.

For one article, PetaPixel asked, “How will Fujifilm fix its video autofocus woes?” Fujifilm answered, “There are two improvements we can make, one based on the algorithm and then one based on the device itself. So we have the fifth-generation device now, and so to make an improvement here, we just need to improve the algorithm. That’s the maximum we can do.”

The basic takeaway from the interview is that for fifth-generation cameras, which are the current models, Fujifilm is working on potential firmware updates for autofocus improvement. My guess is that they are taking their time to ensure there are no issues. They want to avoid something like a couple of years ago when the firmware update had a significant AF bug. Maybe this update will be released soon or maybe it will never see the light of day, who knows? Fujifilm did say, though, that they are actively working on it. Also, they are planning to improve autofocus through hardware (think faster readouts, quicker processing, increased memory buffers, better heat dispersion, etc.), which will benefit sixth-generation cameras, which will be here before you know it.

I’m really tired of talking about Fujifilm’s autofocus. For the majority of the last 10 years, this wasn’t a top topic within the community. It’s really only over the last few years that it’s become a big deal, and I find that very odd and quite telling. I’ve discussed this all at length numerous times, so I want to avoid rehashing everything, but some things need to be re-said, I suppose. I’m sure you’ve seen the hyperbolic, troll-like statements that flood the comments section of any article or video even slightly related to this topic.

It’s important to keep expectations realistic. Let’s ground ourselves in reality. The Canikony brands had a major head start in developing AF (going back to the 1970’s), have a much larger R&D budget, can better attract the best and most experienced experts in the field, and have put the majority of their eggs in the AF basket, ignoring image quality improvements or even sometimes to the detriment of IQ (as reported by PetaPixel). Those who expect Fujifilm to have “class leading” autofocus, or at least to have it be on par with the big three camera makers, are living in a fantasy land. It’s not going to happen outside of a major paradigm shift (perhaps AI is that paradigm shift). When you buy a Fujifilm camera, it’s important to know that it’s not going to have AF as good as the Canikony brands—that should be your expectation, because it’s the truth, and it only makes sense if you think about it for a mere moment.

That doesn’t mean Fujifilm’s autofocus is bad. Of course it isn’t bad! If you were to take the lowest-end, bottom-rung, entry-level X-M5, which costs only $900, and hop into your DeLorean, blast some Huey Lewis, go back in time 10 years, and show people that this is what Fujifilm’s autofocus will be in a decade, the camera would impress a whole lot of people. The community would be all excited for the eventual autofocus performance that the X-M5 demonstrated. Hurray for Fujifilm’s future AF! For some reason, the perspective that a lot of people who complain about Fujifilm’s autofocus seem to have is that photography has only been around for a few years. Do we not remember autofocus from any brand 20 years ago? 30? 50? I guess we don’t, because we lack an appreciation for how incredibly awesome even so-called “bad” autofocus is today. That AF system that you call garbage can run circles around the best AF from not terribly long ago, and yet our photography and cinematography isn’t any better than it was back then. I think a lot of people just don’t appreciate how good they have it today.

With that said, there is certainly room for Fujifilm to improve autofocus. I think all of the Canikony brands have reached a point of diminishing returns. They are quickly approaching, are at, or are maybe just beyond the peak of an inverted U-curve. The practical benefit of an AF improvement from (say) Sony helps a tiny fraction of their customers, while for 99.99%, the AF capabilities are already beyond what they need. Now for Fujifilm, who isn’t quite as far along, an AF improvement might have a practical benefit for (say) 15% of their customers, and maybe the next improvement benefits 12%, perhaps 7% for the following one, and so forth, as they climb the inverted-U. They are working on this right now. For the majority of people, though, Fujifilm’s AF is already plenty good enough for most subjects and situations.

Fujifilm’s autofocus is nowhere near as bad as some on the internet would have you believe—not even close—but there is something that Fujifilm could do that would have an immediate major impact on this perception: intuitiveness. It took me awhile to figure out that this is likely the number one issue. People apparently want to take their camera out of the box, throw in a freshly charged battery, and shoot amazing pictures, without ever setting it up. Some of this might be explained by beginners who just purchased their first camera, but I believe the majority are not beginners. In fact, I think (quite ironically) that most are the same people who would tell you that you must shoot RAW, and only amateurs shoot JPEGs. Perhaps this is because those who use Film Simulations and Recipes are constantly in their camera’s menu, so making adjustments and customizations is normal and no big deal. Whatever the reason, there are those who just want the AF to “work” without setting any of it up first. So if Fujifilm were to make a major stride in how intuitive their AF is without improving any other aspect, it would be seen as a big upgrade.

Fujifilm allows you to customize how autofocus works on your camera; however, I think a lot of people don’t realize that not only can they do this, but they’re expected to do so. Even if someone does realize, they probably don’t know how, or what the most ideal settings are for their use case. This is something Fujifilm could have done a much better job communicating to their customers; sadly, in recent times when they have tried, they were heavily mocked for doing so. Far too often, people would rather blame something else than take any sort of responsibility for a failure. Telling people that they’re the problem is never well received. But the truth is that those who complain about Fujifilm’s AF have the power to fix most—if not all—of their woes, and they’ve had this power the whole time. An example of this is Camera Conspiracies, who constantly mocked Fujifilm’s AF until he figured out the right settings for his needs. I think there are merits to Fujifilm’s approach, but either they need to do a much better job getting the word out on how to best use their system, or they need to make it work well for everyone—no matter someone’s individual needs—as factory-default settings.

In the next PetaPixel article, Fujifilm stated, “What we want to do as a company is make sure the photography culture remains for the foreseeable future. If we don’t continue to offer something exciting, fun for the users, then people won’t be really interested in photography itself. That would be a nightmare for us, we believe photography is such an important part of everyone’s lives. We think that’s our mission, to make sure everybody understands and knows that if they ever want to try something related to photography, we’d be there to offer as many options as possible.”

I find that fascinating. If camera makers don’t offer exciting and fun-to-use gear, photography itself is in jeopardy, says Fujifilm. And that makes sense. If the pros and hobbyists get burned out because photography is no longer enjoyable, they’ll quit. If potential newcomers are satisfied with their cellphones and AI-generated images, and no “real” camera seems interesting or fun to them, they’ll never even explore photography in the first place. It’s possible that cameras like the X100VI, X half, X-E5, and GFX100RF are actually saving photography, and are not just gear existing within the industry. It’s interesting to think about, and maybe something that other camera makers should pay more attention to.

This article is already longer than I wanted it to be, so let me wrap this up real quick. The way these two topics relate is that Fujifilm could make a variety of the most exciting gear ever released, but if a bunch of trolls and Negative Nancies (my apologies to anyone named Nancy) complain about it, will those products actually save photography? Maybe, maybe not. I think it’s important for Fujifilm to address the first topic aggressively—not because their AF is bad, but because people can’t accept that it is good just because it isn’t quite as good as the Canikony brands (which apparently makes it trash). Fujifilm’s two options are to better communicate how to best use their AF, or to make it more intuitive and work better out-of-the-box at factory-default settings. The latter is the path that will be best received. The firmware and hardware refinements that Fujifilm mentioned to PetaPixel I’m sure will be welcomed and appreciated, but it doesn’t address what I think is the largest problem, which is intuitiveness. Once fixed, when the fun gear is announced, there will be fewer negative comments that unfairly scare away potential buyers. Or maybe trolls will be trolls, and none of it matters.