Yesterday, I did a photowalk around Gilbert, Arizona, with my Fujifilm X-E4 and Fujinon 27mm f/2.8. Inspired by the Route 66: Sun n Sand Motel — Trying Recipes (That Are Not Mine…) article that I published a couple of days ago, I loaded five Film Simulation Recipes that I didn’t create into my camera to try out. This post is the result of that exercise.
I found these recipes at various places across the web. The first is “Classic Neg Fade” by Luis Costa, which can be found on his website, Life, Unintended. The second is “Chrome Urban” by Jamie Chance, which can be found on his website, Jamie Chance Travels. For his recipe, I set Color Chrome Effect & Color Chrome FX Blue to Off and Clarity to -2. Next is “Diffused Chrome” by Toqeer Sethi, which can be found on the Fuji X Weekly Community Recipe page. Then there’s “Soft Cinnamon” by Justin Gould, which can be found on his website, Film.Recipes. Finally, there’s “AstiAmore” by Thomas Schwab, which can be found on the Fuji X Weekly Community Recipe page. There are, of course, many other sources on the internet where you can find Film Simulation Recipes.
I chose these specific ones simply because they seemed interesting to me, so I wanted to try them out for myself. And they’re each good. I don’t know if I used them in the situations where they work best—for example, “Diffused Chrome” seems to be more intended for night photography (yet, in daylight, it produces a soft Kodak-negative-like aesthetic). I ended up using “Soft Cinnamon” the most, although not necessarily on-purpose. “AstiAmore” is one I’ve tried before, but wanted to use again.
I’ve been thinking about community a lot lately. Oxford Languages defines “community” as “a feeling of fellowship with others, as a result of sharing common interests….” Within the photographic realm, I do believe there’s no greater feeling of fellowship than that of those who share the common interest of Fujifilm X cameras. Yet we’re all strangers—perhaps you know a few other Fujifilm photographers, but most of us have never met. I want to do my part to foster this Fujifilm fellowship, but I’m not exactly sure what that means right now. Like a surfer who feels the wave building even before it can be seen, I feel that something is brewing, but I just can’t see it yet—I don’t have a clear vision of what it will look like.
All of this was in my mind as I received feedback from yesterday’s post, Is Fujifilm Losing Its Soul? Because that article got shared around the web (I wouldn’t call it “viral” but it did receive a lot of attention), there were non-Fuji X Weekly people commenting and messaging me. Some of it was good input, but some of it was just downright mean and nasty (you won’t find it because I deleted it). Websites like PetaPixel, DPReview, and even sadly Fujirumors, are crawling with trolls, yet this website has largely remained troll-free (yea!). Occasionally one comes along, but it’s pretty rare; however, when articles get shared to the general photographic community, sometimes nasty parasites come with that, unfortunately. I almost let that negativity stop me from sharing this article; thankfully, I didn’t. I’m privileged and honored to be part of this community, which is you guys and gals, because you are good people.
I hope that this “feeling of fellowship” can grow stronger. I think it has to go beyond the anonymity of the internet, beyond our phones and computers, and be more personal. I don’t have the “how” worked out, but perhaps that’s just around the corner. I feel the first step that I can take right now is this article, which is an impromptu casual collaboration with you. I’m always quite busy, but I hope to do more of this in the coming days, weeks, and months if I can. If there’s a particular Film Simulation Recipe that you’d like me to try, post a link to it in the comments.
Classic Neg Fade by Luis Costa
“The first recipe on my camera right now….” —Luis Costa
“This setting has grown without doubt into my favorite, every day, go-to simulation.” —Jamie Chance
Diffused Chrome by Toqeer Sethi
“This recipe has been created to be used with a fast prime to keep the noise level down….” —Toqeer Sethi
“A gentle recipe with a subtle cinnamon tone to the neutrals. Delicious!” —Justin Gould
“This recipe is a modification of Ritchie’s original Kodak Ektar 100 recipe.” —Thomas Schwab
If you don’t have the Fuji X Weekly App on your phone, download it for free today (Android, iOS)! For those who are Fuji X Weekly App Patrons, you can use the Blank Recipe Card feature to manually input recipes into the App, so if you like any or all of the ones above, you can save them to your phone and take them with you on the go. Also, if you have an iPhone, check out RitchieCam!
Hey Ritchie, with you blog, your recipes (of course your invaluable recipes), your pics, but mostly your closeness, accessibility and easy communication with all of us, you are doing A LOT for that task. Of course you are not the only one (happily), but you are creating community here. Keep going my friend!
Thank you! I’m really not trying to create a community (if that makes any sense), but be a part of this community—foster and grow this community—that began well before I even purchased my Fujifilm camera. I’m just one of tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, worldwide. I want to “do my part” for the benefit of others (so many have knowingly and unknowingly helped me along the way, and it’s important to “give back” in order to keep it going), and perhaps to indirectly benefit myself as well in the process. I really appreciate your kindness and encouragement!
Inspired by your recipe that resemble the low key advanced filter I decided to shoot my X100S with the pop and toy camera filters. The recipes you used are wonderful choices to get moody tones of the golden light. “Da bayou” has quite a nice richness of gentle colors.
Trolls are a measure of how alive is a community, fandom or consumers group, because where there is passion there is better chances to troll people, I doubt we will see many trolls looking in Pentax blogs. You have few of the simple trolls that try to provoke a ridiculous reaction, because they try your polite angle; and you don’t have the other type of troll, which can be both the commentator or the author of a post, the angry person trying to push his opinion (I saw a couple of them when they objected that your app had a paid option). This type of troll is rarely here because you take disagreements in a normal tone as part of the conversation.
Thanks so much! I would love this website to be kind, helpful and civilized in all aspects—an oasis on the web, if that’s even possible. I hope that it is. I appreciate your kind words, insight, and encouragement!
Firstly, thank you for including my Soft Cinnamon recipe in your selection. It’s rewarding to see how it works for others, and I love your results.
Trolls and unthoughtful comments are an unfortunate reality in this world of shielded identities and remote communication. I really don’t think you can do more than handle it as well as you do. I certainly support the approach of embracing the good in our community and using that as a force to push aside the negativity.
And as for how to further that community collaboration, I’m all for helping out. I’m a small fish in this pond, even though I’m churning out recipes like crazy. I’m also from the new cohort of Fujifilm heathens that has come to Fujifilm via iPhone and am super happy with my PASM X-S10. That said, I am full of enthusiasm and keen to offer what I can to the project as it takes shape.
Have you even seen my YouTube video with the Mini Cooper? In that video is James, a friend of mine. I bring this up because if we didn’t know each other in-person, and only knew each other on the internet, we probably wouldn’t be friends (due to opposite opinions on certain things); however, because we met in-person, and spoke eye-to-eye, we get along quite well. James is a great guy! My point is that the internet has a way of bringing out the “worst” and hiding the “best” because of anonymity, because all the nonverbal queues are missing, and because humanity is hidden. We need less of that, and more of the connections that happen when you meet in person. Of course, being worldwide, that’s an impossible expectation, but there’s got to be something that can be done. I hope that you can somehow be a part of it in whatever way that it happens. I appreciate your kind words, enthusiasm, and encouragement!
That’s a great way to describe it, Ritchie. In a previous job, I actually travelled to the US quite a lot and could have arranged a photowalk on a stop in AZ. But times have changed (as well as my job), and travelling anywhere is more complicated now. Anyway, I’ll keep an eye out for community developments and if I can help from afar, I’ll do my best. Thanks again.
Much appreciated!
Hi Ritchie,
I am really overwhelmed (in the most positive sense of the word) with all the film simulations that you created and keep coming up with more. They indeed give us a chance to travel back to film times and play with the image looks. I personally love many of them. In fact I am sorry that my camera only allow me to save 4 customized film simulations :c)
One question came to my mind recently though. I know you don’t like to spend time in front of the computer doing post-processing (same here, actually), but (!) I sometimes do simply because I want to see what the photo would look like in, say, black-and-white, or with more grain, with more of a chrome look, etc.
I have found that CaptureOne’s Express (free) version for Fujifilm’s raw files (RAF) work quite well where one can easily change the look of the photos and I was wondering… do you think it would be possible to create the same looks/simulations in CaptureOne? These settings can be saved among your individual “profiles” and applied with a click to any raw file. Now, maybe you’re not working with CaptureOne at all, but perhaps one of your followers does? Just a thought…
Thanks, as always, for the effort, the time and energy you put into this! Greatly appreciated!
Cheers,
Barnabas
I have Capture One on my computer. My wife uses it, actually (she shoots with recipes, then tweaks them slightly in software—that’s her preferred workflow).
It’s actually pretty complicated to replicate the film simulation recipes with software as presets or luts. A year ago I worked with this guy who is one of the top photo-software gurus out there (no kidding!) to try and make presets of these recipes. It didn’t end up working out for various reasons, but what I learned is that, while you can make adjustments to pretty closely match a RAW to the SOOC JPEG, when you save those adjustments as a preset and apply them to a different RAW file, it’s not as close of a match as you’d expect or hope it to be (if everything is equal it will be close, but if not, it won’t). A lot of it has to do with how the software reads, interprets, and applies its version of some of the JPEG data (but not all, it ignores some parameters)… it’s not the same as what the camera does to create the JPEG.
This probably isn’t the answer you were hoping for. Sorry. I appreciate your kindness!
Hi Ritchie,
thanks for your reply. Maybe it isn´t what I had hoped for, but it does answer my question 🙂
Best, Barnabas
Hey Ritchie! I love the Classic Neg Fade, it is my current go to color sim on my X-Pro3, along with my go to b/w sim which is the Kodak Tri-X. Waiting for you to revisit the Classic Negative sim, it would great! Classic Neg is definitely the color sim that appeals to me the most. I really appreciate all you do for the community, thank you so much!
Classic Negative is my favorite color film simulation, too. There will definitely be more recipes, including that revisit. I appreciate your kindness!