While it might look like Lok Cheung is preparing for a viral outbreak in the image for the above video, he’s actually dressed to enter the cleanroom at Fujifilm’s Sendai factory in Japan, where they assemble the sensors for the Fujifilm GFX 100 medium format mirrorless camera.
Lok mentions in the video that this footage was shot a while ago when the Fuji X-H1 was still in production, but it still offers some fascinating insight into Fujifilm’s approach to assembling cameras, with much of the final assembly being done by hand.
In the video, we see part of the assembly process of the GFX 100. We saw another feature of the GFX100 being built last year, too, but Lok is quite surprised to see just how much of it is done by a real living person’s hand and not a machine. Not to mention how many components go towards making up the camera.
For part of his trip, he got to try his hand at helping to assemble a Fuji X-H1 camera, by applying part of the grip material to an almost completed camera body. When you see how quickly the factory worker does it, as well as how cleanly they do it against Lok, who appears to be struggling somewhat, you start to get a sense of the skill involved for these workers in hand-assembling these cameras.
Not surprisingly, Fujifilm didn’t offer to let Lok put together a GFX 100 sensor assembly after seeing his attempt at assembling an X-H1.
When you see videos like this, it also helps you to appreciate just how much work camera repair guys have to do as well. Just to even get inside the camera and then close it back up again afterwards while keeping things looking pristine is quite the task, and that’s without even having to deal with all the other internal components they may need to remove or replace to do the actual repair.
As always, Lok presents the tour in his own unique fashion that makes the video entertaining from start to finish. I hope he gets to do more of these factory tours in the future, as they are very interesting.
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