OWH Recipe Pack
3 Fujifilm recipes to cover most use cases
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It’s been 14 months since I switched to Fujifilm. All that time I have been working to get as much right in camera as I can. Not because I have anything against photo editing. More because it forces me to sharpen my skills and think about the final look before pressing the shutter.
I have shared three other recipes (here, here and here) that have different purposes and looks. One thing that’s common with my approach though, is that I couldn’t care less if my images look like a particular analog film stock. Still, I do want my images to not look like they were shot digitally. I’m always looking for a happy medium, not going all the way to something you can’t back out of.
Distilling the look
This is a pack of three recipes that are the culmination of what I have learned about my own taste over the last 14 months. There are so many great photographers I admire and I have been going back and forth, trying to see how close I can get to other images I like. But these experiments have always been short-lived. Whatever I went back to formed a new pillar of what I have come to realize is the style I prefer. A Fujilfim recipe that sums this up has to have:
- Absolutely no digital highlight clipping
- Punchy, but not crushed blacks
- Smooth color gradients and transitions
- Medium color saturation
- Subtle color cast that underlines the ambiance of the scene
- No use of Clarity, because I can’t stand the lag
Why three recipes?
I’m an opportunistic photographer. It is not my day job, so I shoot when I have the chance, using the conditions available to me. I also live I Norway, where we have really long, sunny summer days, lots of overcast weather in spring and fall, as well as long, dark periods in the winter. It made sense to have one recipe for each one of these situations so I can achieve what I like consistently. By the way, the acronym “OWH” stands for my Medium/IG username oyvindwashere. There should be no doubt that these recipes represent my preferences. I make no claims about yours :)