Fujifilm announces new XF 10-24mm f/4 WR OIS lens, successor to the popular original from 2013
posted Thursday, October 15, 2020 at 9:00 AM EST
To say we've loved the XF 10-24mm f/4 OIS lens here at IR is an understatement. It's been used countless times across so many camera reviews, for both stills galleries and video testing. It's just a terrific lens all around, and now it seems that our friends at Fujifilm have found ways to make it even better.
XF 10-24mm f/4 WR OIS: What Is It?
This lens is designed for X-series cameras from the X-T and X-Pro lines and yields an equivalent FOV in 35mm terms of 15-36mm, with a constant maximum aperture of f/4. While not as bright nor as wide as the highly acclaimed XF 8-16mm f/2.8 lens, this offering comes in at half the price of that lens ($999 vs $1999) and weighs less than half the weight (385g vs 805g), and is, therefore, a much different type product offering.
The lens supports the same basic optical formula as the original XF 10-24mm f/4 from 2013, but that's not a bad thing considering what our lens reviewer had to say about its sharpness potential:
"The Fuji 10-24mm ƒ/4 R OIS offers excellent results for sharpness across all its range of focal lengths, with a slight bias towards the wider angles, which is good, as it's probably the reason people will get this lens." - Andrew Alexander
He also reported build quality to be excellent and things like distortion to be kept to a minimum, and these are factors we've concurred with in our various camera Field Tests while using the lens in the wild. For his entire review please click here for more details on how this new lens should fare optically. You can also click here to see how that lens fared in the OIS department, for a gauge of how to expect this new one to perform if indeed one stop better.
For the technically minded among you, the lens boasts 14 elements in 10 groups, including four aspherical elements and four extra-low dispersion elements. There is a special lens coating to minimize ghosting and flare, and a minimum working distance of 24cm or 9.5 inches. The lens also accepts 72mm filters.
XF 10-24mm f/4 WR OIS: What's new?
Now we know what the lens is... how about what's been upgraded?
For starters, it's now weather sealed. Anyone who doesn't shoot much in the great outdoors may not care about this, but those who do certainly do. It's not just rain we're talking about here, it's random splashing, random waves, random coffee spills! (I don't mean myself, of course, I'm just speculating...) Anything that might damage the precious lens is a caution, and weather resistance is key here.
Optical image stabilization is also a big deal these days, and especially with the growing desire of so many to shoot more video. Fujifilm states that the new XF 10-24mm f/4 has a one-stop increase in OIS prowess, which is a welcome addition. The new Fujifilm X-T4 now has IBIS onboard, and the improved OIS of the lens will surely help, yielding a reported combined 6.5 stops in tandem. But it's an even bigger deal for X-Pro shooters who have no IBIS as yet, all the more critical to have onboard.
The engineers at Fujifilm also promise "fast, reliable and nearly silent AF" which certainly sounds like a good combination for video. They've also added the now-customary f/stop scale, which is a big bonus to having to check on the LCD or EVF. We can't wait to try it for you in the field!
XF 10-24mm f/4 WR OIS: Image Quality
We don't yet have a production sample of this lens in-house, but we have plenty of examples from the field with the previous version. And since the optical formula is reportedly the same, here are a few examples from an excursion I had in 2019 with the X-Pro 3 body to give you an idea of the overall image quality you should expect from the newer version.
For more examples shot with this original version please see our Fujifilm X-Pro 3 Gallery as well as our X-Pro 3 Mountain Escape video. And stay tuned, as we'll surely bring you plenty of images, and video, once we receive a sample of this latest version!
The new Fujifilm XF 10-24mm f/4 WR OIS will be available in November 2020 for US$999 & CA$1350.
More Fujifilm lenses coming soon!
If the news of the upgraded XF 10-24mm f/4 isn't enough to fill you up and you need a little Fujinon desert, we have some of that for you as well. It turns out that the new lens roadmap has also just been unveiled, and we're told that a new XF 18mm f/1.4 and a new XF 70-300mm f/4.5-5.6 will be forthcoming within the next year. Lots to be excited about for Fujifilm fans around the world!
