“…the Fujifilm X-T30 isn’t an especially good or practical way of achieving an out-of-camera Holga look. Can you? Sure, to an extent. The use of a couple of apps improves the results. Even so, there are only a few of these pictures that I really like. I think next time I’ll just load a roll of film into my Holga 120N.”
That statement above is how I concluded Part 1. Put more simply, the Fujifilm X-T30 isn’t a good option for digitally recreating an in-camera Holga aesthetic. Or is it? I’m not one to easily give up. Many of my different film simulation recipes took much trial-and-error to achieve. I failed over and over, but I didn’t give up. I kept trying! Yes, the Toy Camera effect isn’t a good option, but there has to be another way. And there is!
What I ended up doing was punching a hole in some black cardstock, and taping it to the front of the Industar 69 lens. This provided the vignetting that Holga cameras are known for. I added some tape to the edges of the hole to increase the blur at the frame edges. The aperture of the lens had to be preset (I chose f/4) because the cardstock and tape blocked it. I set the aspect ratio on the X-T30 to 1:1 for a square picture.
With this setup I could use any film simulation recipe that I wanted, and I could even do in-camera double exposures. This was a much better way to get an in-camera Holga look! This is a significantly better option than using the Toy Camera effect. It didn’t take very much work to add cardstock with a hole to the front of the lens. While better, this still isn’t the same as shooting film in an actual Holga camera, but it isn’t a bad facsimile, either. This was an interesting experiment that was worth doing, but I probably won’t be doing it again anytime soon.
These are straight-out-of-camera JPEGs using this faux Holga technique:
I think being inside for so long has made you a bit loopy, Ritchie. 🤪
“…punching a hole in some black cardstock, and taping it to the front of the Industar 69 lens” is almost as crazy as sanding down a perfectly good cmaera. 😃
I am goign to paraphrase you.
“…the Honda isn’t an especially good or practical way of achieving the Ferarri racing feeling. Can you? Sure, to an extent. The use of a couple of engine and suspension modifications improves the results. Even so, there are only a few of these modifications that I really like. I think next time I’ll just get a Ferrari.”
Taking sandpaper to a camera was definitely crazier. But, yeah, taping a piece of card stock with a hole punched in it to the end of a lens is a bit nutty. I think the Fujifilm X-T30 might be comparable to a Honda, but the Holga is no Ferrari! Maybe a Geo….
Yeah. Bad analogy. It’s more like dropping a Honda Accord engine into Ferrari. 😃
Exactly! I did like the analogy nonetheless.
The way I see it Ritchie is that you may not have perfectly recreated the Holga film look, but you absolutely created a perfect (enter the style name here) look! The fact that you’re “doing” this experimentation instead of sitting around and just surfing the net while stuck at home, well that tells me I was right to keep coming back and following your progress. And yes that means I’m sitting around surfing the net. DOH!
It’s definitely better than sitting around. I’m trying to stay busy as best as I can. Good ideas are hard to come by, so I resorted to this….