The smallest aperture is, depending on the focal length from 3.5 to 4.8 - a quite good work with which objects can be well indemnify the background. The lens also has a built-in image stabilizer with which sharp, not blurred images even at long exposures (Fujifilm speaks of up to 4.5 stops less) can be achieved.
All this of course comes at a price in the rather chunky and powerful appearance of the lens - at least for System Camera ratios. Nevertheless, the weight is relatively low with about 580g and lay the lens on my X-Pro1 body, well in hand. The balance is right. Build quality is excellent in my opinion, it was put on a mixture of metal and plastic, the overall objective affects quality, durable and stable. The individual elements not wobble, and yet, the lens does extend supple. Whether that will remain in the long run so I can not say at this point. Impression so far is but top.
The autofocus is very fast and very accurate, the focusing operation barely audible. If required, also focus manually. The lens will be at its maximum zoom position 6cm from - ie relatively moderate. The front filter ring has a diameter of 62mm and rotates not good for your use of polarizing filters!
For imaging performance. Of course I'm not a professional lens tester and Review Case performance not in the lab, but can determine after a few weeks of testing, the lens provides for my taste extremely sharp images, especially zoomed to about 100mm and aperture F8 approx. Only from 200mm one notices a slight drop in sharpness. At low F-values, the lens provides a very nice bokeh, which does not detract from the foreground.
The image stabilization also works very well. I reach still partially sharp shots at 1/50 or 1 / 40s, so rather long exposure times. Great distortion of the image and also annoying vignetting are not noticed noticeably.
All in all, a highly recommended lens, especially since the selection for the X-Pro1 as I said is rather low. Only the price seems a little excessive to me. While the image quality is quite good and a quality image processing, but this price should rather fit into the DSLR segment. But perhaps're here future reductions expected.
PS: My X-Pro1 called for connecting the lens after a firmware update, this was relatively easy to accomplish on a copied to the memory card update. So long as you can access the memory card on your PC and a card reader, for example, this should not be an obstacle.
