In my journey switching from Canon to Fuji I have been slowly buying lenses. It’s a long haul selling off gear and purchasing new or used gear. I had been struggling with the fact that I did not have a long lens for the X-T3 yet and it was a struggle at times having to use my Canon 70-200 and 7D Mk ll instead of a Fuji lens.
A friend, John Barclay, who has been using the Fuji system for quite awhile suggested the Fuji 55-200. I was hesitant to even test it out because it is fairly slow and is a variable aperture lens. I’m a part time photojournalist so I was thinking I needed the 50-140 f2.8. Since I am transitioning to teaching workshops and shooting more landscape/travel work this lens was suggested instead of the 50-140. I will still own this lens but not at the moment.
I started looking for the 55-200 used on Fred Miranda’s site. I did find one after missing out on two of them. It was only $445. WHAT! Yes and in mint condition. It sells new for $700. It just so happened that I was on my way to an assignment when I picked it up. So outside the assignment I opened it up and brought it inside with me to shoot some images.
I was immediately blown away at how sharp this lens at 134mm (202mm equivilent) @f4.4. Incredible performance at ISO 2500 1/125s. So this got me thinking I could pretty much use this lens for more assignments even though it’s kind of slow.
I was wondering what it was going to be like inside of a dark gym and I was not disappointed. It performed incredibly well. Now let me say that in the situation above I would probably have used the 50-140 if I had it but I was pleasantly surprised by what this little beauty can do.
In this situation I needed to shoot both ends of the rink instead of at ice level which is what I usually do. Again the lens was great. The autofocus was right on the money!
Shooting against the light with my Canon 70-200 is incredible no ghosting no flare perfect. So I had no idea what this lens would do. It matched up really well with the Canon giving me great contrast and shadow detail along with great autofocus performance. This image was made at 1/1250 @ f4.2 so wide open.
Next I needed to see how it would do for landscapes and again I was surprised at the color rendition and sharpness of the lens.
Overall I am really pleased with this lens. The biggest reason I purchased it is because it will be a great lens to travel and hike with when doing my workshops. For a little day hiking etc. and for working with students. My kit will be the Fuji 10-24 f4, 55-200 f3.5-4.8 and possibly the 16 f 1.4 along with the X-T3 and the X-T30 or I may leave the 16 out although it focuses so close it’s almost a macro lens.