FRGMT B&W | FUJI X WEEKLY

5 B&W Fujifilm Recipes to Try Today

*Route 66 in Rural Arizona* – Seligman, AZ – Fujifilm X-E5 – Agfa Scala

For much of the last 200 years, photography was largely in black-and-white. Early photographic processes couldn’t capture color, so black-and-white became the foundation upon which the medium was built, shaping how photographers learned to see light, contrast, and form. Once color processes arrived, it was expensive, inconsistent, and slow, making it less practical than B&W. When color film finally matured, the photographic community was slow to accept it. It wasn’t until the 1970’s that color photography really gained a foothold, yet black-and-white persisted for decades as the top choice for many photographers. When I learned photography in college in the late-1990’s, B&W was a much more major part of the program than color. In the age of digital cameras, where the standard profile is color, B&W seems to be significantly less popular than it was just 25 years ago, and much less popular than it was 50 years ago.

Personally, I love B&W photography. By removing one layer of reality (color) to emphasize another (form), it’s inherently abstract. Shapes are more important, light more deliberate, and emotions less tied to the literal. Oftentimes it’s a more intentional way of seeing. Viewers engage differently with B&W images, reading the photographs rather than simply recognizing the subject and location.

*Leaning Fence* – Buckeye, AZ – Fujifilm X-E5 – Kodak Tri-X 400 (captured this morning in my backyard)

There are 50 B&W Recipes for Fujifilm cameras in the Fuji X Weekly App. Something that I’ve noticed for a long time now is that B&W Recipes tend to be much less popular than color. Anecdotally, when I post B&W photos on social media, they tend to get noticeably less attention than color images. There just seems to be less interest in it than there used to be. Still, if I could only ever use one Recipe for the rest of my life, it would be black-and-white. And I’d love for Fujifilm to make a monochrome-only camera—I’d be first in line to buy it.

For today’s article, I thought I would encourage you to shoot black-and-white. Find a Recipe—such as one of the five below—program it into your camera, and create something interesting. Look for contrast and design rather than colors. If none of the ones below interest you, there are a bunch of others in the Fuji X Weekly App, and you can easily find them by Filtering by Black and White. Also, be sure to let me know in the comments which B&W Recipe is your favorite, whether one of the ones mentioned here or one that’s not in this list.

Kodak Tri-X 400

My personal favorite B&W Recipe is Kodak Tri-X 400, which was created by Anders Lindborg. With this Recipe, the higher the ISO the grainer the results. It has compatibility with X-Trans III, X-Trans IV, and X-Trans V cameras, as well as GFX. It can be modified a few different ways, which is discussed in the Recipe article. This is by far the most popular B&W Recipe.

Classic B&W

Classic B&W is a newer monochromatic Recipe that I really like. It’s compatible with fourth and fifth-generation X-series cameras, as well as newer GFX models. I could see this becoming a lot of people’s favorite.

Agfa Scala

Agfa Scala is a new adaptation of an old Recipe for use on fourth and fifth-generation X-series cameras, as well as newer GFX models. I’ve loved the Agfa Scala Recipe for a long-time, and it was long-overdue for an update for the latest cameras.

FRGMT B&W

Fujifilm’s first official Recipe, FRGMT B&W—created by fashion designer, producer, and artist Hiroshi Fujiwara—was included in a limited edition of the GFX100RF. I asked for and received permission to publish it on Fuji X Weekly. This is a contrasty and grainy black-and-white Recipe that produces dramatic results. It’s compatible with fourth and fifth-generation X-series cameras, as well as newer GFX models.

Kodak Plus-X 125

The Kodak Plus-X 125 Recipe was made by Dylan Van Matre with some help from Anders Linborg. It’s just a little less contrasty and grainy than some of the other options, which makes it preferable for some subjects and situations.

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There’s a Built-In FRGMT B&W Recipe on the Fujifilm GFX100RF??!!

Posted on November 21 by Ritchie Roesch

A couple of days ago I saw that Fujifilm is releasing a limited run special-edition of the GFX100RF, designed by fashion designer, producer, and artist Hiroshi Fujiwara, called the GFX100RF Fragment Edition. It looks pretty much the same as a regular GFX100RF, except with smoother leather and a different engraving on the top plate. There’s also a few accessories, including a strap, lens hood, and more. The GFX100RF Fragment Edition will only be available in Japan. It’s pretty cool, I guess.

I didn’t think much of it until yesterday, when a reader emailed me to take a closer look. Aside from a couple of physical changes, there is one internal change to the camera. The Monochrome Film Simulation was removed, and in its place is a custom black-and-white Recipe called FRGMT BW created by Hiroshi. It’s Acros with “stronger grain, tweaked highlight and shadow tone curves, reduced sharpness, less noise reduction, more clarity, and a bit of positive exposure compensation.” This Recipe, instead of being found in C1-C7, is in the Film Simulation Menu.

This is quite interesting. First, before we let this fact slip by, the Recipe includes an exposure compensation boost, which currently isn’t possible to program. You have to adjust the exposure manually, which makes sense, but Fujifilm just demonstrated that they have the ability to include an exposure adjustment within a Recipe. Is this something we’ll see in the future? Perhaps so. Fujifilm also demonstrated that it’s possible to replace a Film Simulation with a Recipe. Maybe you don’t use PRO Neg. Std or Eterna Bleach Bypass or Sepia—wouldn’t it be nice to replace the ones that you don’t use with a Recipe? Or maybe you replace all of the Film Simulations in the Film Simulation Menu with Recipes? There’s a lot of room for customization, and Fujifilm just showed us that it’s possible for them to do it.

I think this is also an indication of what’s to come regarding the future of the Film Dial or Film Era Dial. I suspect that Fujifilm will open up the Film Dial to allow Recipes for all of the positions, and not just FS1/FS2/FS3 (on the X-E5 and X-T30 III, anyway). I suspect that the Film Era Dial will be hard-set Recipes designed by Fujifilm (or photographers they have partnered with), similar to FRGMT B&W. This is speculation, of course.

*FRGMT BW Recipe — Fujifilm GFX100RF — Photo by Manabu Nakanishi via Fujifilm*

I don’t want to read too much into this. It could be a one-time thing, and we’ll never see anything like this again. Nothing may come of it, other than this one special-edition model sold only in Japan. But it is intriguing to consider what it could possibly mean for future models.

So for those wondering what the FRGMT B&W Recipe is, well, here you go! It’s found on Fujifilm’s webpage for the GFX100RF Fragment Edition.

Film Simulation: Acros
Grain: Strong / Large
Highlight: +4
Shadow: +2
Sharpness: -4
High ISO NR: -4
Clarity: +5
Exposure Compensation: +1/3

Obviously not every setting is included, so let’s take a guess on the blanks. Most likely it is Dynamic Range Auto, White Balance Auto (0R & 0B for the WB Shift), Color Chrome Effect and Color Chrome FX Blue Off, Toning Off (WC 0 MG 0), and ISO up to 12800 (based on one of the sample pictures). So if you’re interested in trying it yourself, you absolutely can. In fact, here are a few of my photos, which look pretty good, reprocessed on my Fujifilm X-E5 using the FRGMT B&W Recipe (choosing DR200 in lieu of DR-Auto).