Our travel itinerary was a bit flexible. We thought of scheduling a day trip to Florence (it’s an hour and a half by express train from Rome) and we were glad we did. Florence has history, art, gelato and tons of vintage bikes!

I’m currently restoring a couple of vintage bikes as a hobby and seeing all those vintage bikes in Firenze, as well as the stylish men and women riding them, made me wish I lived there.

Cute girl riding a step-through:

I came upon this abandoned roadster frame at an alley and I wanted to take it home.

Hands-down, the best handlebar accessory a guy could ask for:

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We arrived in Rome just in time for the EuroPride 2011 parade, the biggest Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade in all of Europe. We didn’t know there was a parade until we heard the loud house music outside our hotel. It was like the UP Lantern Parade on steroids.

Fabulous, yes, you are!

Allan Caidic shorts:

Sorry, back focused… I couldn’t concentrate.

What’s a parade without Ancient Egyptians with glitters?

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I must admit that after the first few times of using the X100, I had buyer’s remorse. The controls are much different from the Canon 5D mk II. There are quirks like how the ISO also changes when I switch modes from M to Av (fixed using the new firmware) or how I need to turn on the in-camera ND filter when shooting outdoors at f2.0.

The hybrid optical and electronic viewfinder is such a new experience that it took me awhile to get a hang of it. The manual focus is unusable and a big disappointment. The AF is tad slower than a DSLR but it is faster than a point and shoot. The auto focus is also not very accurate, I have to refocus a few times when I notice that the image is backfocused. This focus problem is similar with the first Canon 5D and I guess it just takes time to master a focusing technique that works.

The thing I like the most about the X100 is its size. It packs the punch of a Canon 5D with a 35mm L lens without the extra weight and size. It is perfect for street photography as the X100 isn’t intimidating as a DSLR when approaching a subject.

Speaking of street photography, I came across Yanidel’s Paris street photography blog before our trip to Paris and it inspired me to dabble a bit in this art form. Below are a mix of travel and street photography for our France leg of the trip.

Our first stop was Nice. We arrived late in the evening and in the morning we went to their famous street market, Cours Saleya.

We tried a local snack, called Socca which was a crepe made of chickpea. It tasted like KFC chicken breading.

The narrow streets of Old Nice:

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I’ve already come to a point in my photography life that news of new photo gadgets barely excite me anymore. That is of course, until Fuji announced the launch of their latest beauty, the Fuji Finepix X100. The retro styling matched by its buttery images made my knees tremble like a school girl meeting Justin Bieber.

I guess a lot of people also felt the same way as it proved difficult to find this camera in stock. On a trip to Hong Kong during the week of the launch, there was no X100′s as the early units were shipped to Singapore and the US. (The waiting list is still insane!) Two months later and on a trip to Singapore, there was still no X100′s at the reputable stores, only the bait and switch stores had them in “stock”. It was a good thing I stumbled onto a local photo forum that said the Fuji YKL Manila had a fresh shipment. The first agenda from the airport was a trip to the Fuji main office in Sto. Domingo.

The first few days with the camera was like hell. Haha! I had to struggle with the controls and the camera’s many quirks. I was only able to fully test the camera during our trip to Europe. The X100′s weight and size is just perfect for travel and having a camera with me at all times made it easier to document my little girl in Europe.

I’ll probably continue the review on another post. For now here are Katy’s photos in Europe taken with the Fuji X100.

Of all the places she could’ve picked to have a break, she chose the Police Station:

My girl, the street artist:

Katy with her Ninong Gerson:

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