Along with digital photography came a new way of thinking. Old concepts and designs were abandoned and new, high-tech designs emerged. I remember recently talking to someone who had just bought the latest SLR and started reading the manual. He was in awe – his camera could take photos even faster than he could blink his eye. His camera could make movies, share photos, communicate with devices, design photo albums … the list went on and on. This camera could do it all but … at a cost. Light, composition and subject were moved to one side – they were no longer relevant. It was the camera that had now become the centre of attention. Menus, options, pixels and speed were the new game in town. And we all started playing it. As a result, we used large cameras with unintuitive, complicated and cluttered menus. We learned to fiddle with the camera in order to set up something that should be at your palm, like the shutter speed or aperture. We got used to a shutter click that might have given my grandma a heart attack and certainly all the wildlife racing for the horizon. We got used to the way these cameras were made and we stopped asking for better. Then the Fuji X100 arrived. This camera could happen because those who designed it started from scratch. They didn’t want another “me too” SLR-like product. And it became an instant classic. We (photographers) suddenly woke up and knew what was missing and how things should be……

See more great black & white pictures on olafphotoblog.com

Black and White Fuji X100s Olaf Sztaba Sample Images