Tag: Soft Tones

Winter

Underexposed

November 5, 2025

Kodak Portra 400, Classic Film Recipe

Justin’s Kodak Portra 400 Film Recipe for X100V, X100VI and Fujifilm X-Series cameras

Kodak Portra 400

I’ve take a few passes at the Kodak Portra look in my experiments with film recipes. These have included my first version, Kodak Portra and a stylised variant, Kodak Portra Grainy which works well in sunny conditions. I also published Kodak Portra Daily, which was more usable in a wide range of conditions, and has a lovely film-like tone and character.

But of course, film can have a varied character, and in the hands of different photographers and in different environments the results can be different. I follow a number of film photorgaphers and film photography groups, and began to see more and more Portra photos that had a look that was softer and not as creamy as some of the other Portra recipes out there.

Inspired by these sophisticated and soft toned examples, my interpretations evolved and I published my Aged Kodak Portra recipe, a Kodak Portra 160 film recipe, and now, this revisit of the Kodak Portra 400 look. In these latest three, I have switched to Eterna as the base simulation, finding that it more accurately matched the samples that I most enjoyed.

The result of all this time and testing is my Kodak Portra 400 film recipe, with a cinematic film-like feel, lots of versatility, and a wonderful output that has a sophisticated analog vibe. I’m very pleased with it, love shooting with it, and am happy to add it to the recipe collection.

Kodak Portra 400 Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Eterna/Cinema
Grain Effect	Weak, Small
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Weak
White Balance	Fluorescent 1, ‑2 Red, ‑4 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR200
Highlights	0.5
Shadows	0.5
Colour	2
Sharpness	‑2
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	‑2
EV Comp.	+1/3

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🔒 Eternal Portra

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Milestone

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Kodak Portra 400 Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Kodak Portra 400 Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Kodak Portra 400 has been tagged with.

Kodak

Film Like

Cinematic

Print Like

Eterna

Forest & Woodland

Beach

People

December 16, 2024

Tirolean Mono, Black & White Film Recipe

Monochrome film recipe for easy to use tones in landscape and travel photography

Tirolean Mono

Towards the end of Summer, I ttok some vacation time in the mountains of Austria. As is typical for me, I thought a bit about which film recipes I might like to use when away, and thought that it was overdue the I tried out some black and white photography.

I’m not a particularly skilled photographer when it comes to black and white imaging, feeling that there is a different skill set, where people see more in the patterens of light and shade, than my usual territory of colour. For this reason, I tend to make mono film recipes that work well for me, who basically uses them to take exactly the same shots as I might in colour.

The advantage of these recipes perhaps is that they are easy to use for everyone, and will deliver decent results in a wide range of situations.

As it turned out, I found an additional benefit when using this look. The views across the mountains had quite a lot of haze, and often this washed out the colour of the more distant peaks, and could be distracting. With no colour in the image, this haze was magically erased, and any distracting colour wash was gone.

Features of this recipe include softened highlights, for easy use in bright conditions, and a strong grain, which adds a little extra character to shots. This grain doesn’t really show at the size of the images below, and of course is optional, should you prefer a smoother look.

Tirolean Mono Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Monochrome
Grain Effect	Strong, Small
White Balance	3900K, 0 Red, +9 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR200
Highlights	‑1.5
Shadows	0.5
Sharpness	‑1
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	0
EV Comp.	0
Mono Colour	WC +0, MG +0

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Tirolean Mono Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Tirolean Mono Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Tirolean Mono has been tagged with.

Mono

Film Like

Cloudy Rainy & Bad Weather

Misty & Foggy

September 14, 2024

Birkenstock, Flat Tones for Photo Walks

Nostalgic flat tones film recipe with a cinematic Fujifilm feel

Birkenstock

You may have seen in some recent film recipes that I took a trip to Paris this Summer to watch the Olympic Games Tennis. I created a number of new recipes that would hopefully suit the hard light conditions, perhaps work well in the streets of Paris, and bring something uniquely Fujifilm to my images.

Of all the recipes that I explored, this one is perhaps the most characterful, with a strongly nostgalgic vibe, very flat tones for a soft look, and warmth in a subtle way. It’s a cinematic look film recipe with a summer vibe. If you’re guessing ahead, you’ll know that the Eterna Cinema film simulation shares many of these features, and that is indeed the base for this recipe.

The real magic though comes from the somewhat unusual colour balance based on a Fluorescent setting. There are three of these, which are intended to bring artificial light back to something more neutral, but I personally find that they can be a wonderful starting point for a film recipe. Matched to Eterna with its mellow undertones, we get a unique new look.

I quickly became addicted to using this, and took all sorts of photos before my trip to Paris, and whilst there I took my personal favourite image from the tennis tourament. This shot of Iga Swiatek preparing to serve had such a retro feel to it that I just love, but it also shows me that tennis is an individual sport with the player alone in the arena battling for the win.

Birkenstock Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Eterna/Cinema
Grain Effect	Off
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Weak
White Balance	Fluorescent 1, ‑3 Red, ‑4 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR400
Highlights	1
Shadows	‑1
Colour	‑2
Sharpness	‑1
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	0
EV Comp.	0

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🔒 Nostromo

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Birkenstock Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Birkenstock Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Birkenstock has been tagged with.

Cinematic

Muted Tones

Eterna

Beach

September 2, 2024

Albariño, Soft Fresh Film Recipe

A soft and cinematic film simulation look for Summer days and sunshine

Albariño

Here’s a film recipe creation that started life as a glass of wine. The Albariño wine hails from Northwest Spain and Portugal and is a crisp and fresh tasting wine that I enjoy on occasion. As well as a lovely taste, it has a pale colour that is atonce cream and pale green in subtle ways. Now you begin to see where the film recipe idea is coming from, a look that in part, captures the character of this flavour and look.

At the heart of the recipe is the Eterna Cinema film simulation, which produces a lower contrast look that can be cinematic and soft look at the same time. But for this look, it’s the character of greens that with Eterna have a green brown tone which I am particularly fond of.

For this film recipe, I wanted to build on these characteristics to produce a look that I could use in a range of weather and light conditions, with warmth and nostalgia to the resulting pictures. The white balance, boosted highlights and shadows, and the use of a -2 setting for clarity, all work together towards this goal.

The result is comforting and calm, which works well for outdoor shots and my tendency to use the golden hour. It’s compatible will all X-Trans IV and V cameras, so you can give it a go on X100V or VI, X-T4 or 5 and X-T30II or 50 and many other cameras in the Fujifilm range.

Albariño Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Eterna/Cinema
Grain Effect	Weak, Large
Col. Chr. Effect	Off
Col. Chr. Blue	Weak
White Balance	5500K, +1 Red, ‑3 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR200
Highlights	2
Shadows	2
Colour	2
Sharpness	‑2
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	‑2
EV Comp.	0

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🔒 Sunny Standard

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Albariño Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Community Photos

Photos taken with the Albariño film recipe by members of the Film Recipes community.

Photos by Bert Broekhuis

Albariño film recipe photo by Bert Broekhuis

Using the Albariño Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Albariño has been tagged with.

Muted Tones

Eterna

Beach

August 25, 2024

Olympic Pro, Versatile Pro Recipe

Pro Neg film simulation recipe with a versatile ‘go everywhere’ set-up for travel and trips

Olympic Pro

Earlier in the summer I took a trip to Paris to watch tennis at the Olympic Games. Regular readers will know that I’m a big fan of the sport, perhaps almost as much as I am of making film recipes. So, of course, I put the two together and took a number of new recipes with me to try out.

I’ve already shared a few of these, such as my all round high achiever, Olympic Ace for X-Trans V sensors, my Classic Negative for travel, Paris 24, and the creamy warmth of Paris Gold.

For this recipe, I wanted to compliment the others with a sophisticated and controlled look that brought a slightly flat, film like look to images. The results you’ll get are wonderfully analog and comforting, with a warm colour balance that adds just enough tone without heading into sickly territory.

Take a look at the sample images below, and then why not load up Olympic Pro into your camera and test it out on your next photo session?

Olympic Pro Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	PRO Neg. Std
Grain Effect	Off
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Weak
White Balance	Daylight, +2 Red, ‑5 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR200
Highlights	‑1
Shadows	0
Colour	2
Sharpness	1
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	0
EV Comp.	0

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🔒 Deep Standard

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Settings laid out clearly, with sample photos and similar recipes

Olympic Pro Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Olympic Pro Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Olympic Pro has been tagged with.

Film Like

People

PRO Neg

August 22, 2024

Daydream Believer, Summer Dream Film Recipe

Summer vibes film recipe with a warm and cosy feel

Daydream Believer

Summer days can spark creativity, and at the least, get you out and about with your camera in the sunny weather. This is a film recipe for these warm days, with a cosy look that is dreamy and soft and set to make the most of golden sunny light.

There are already several takes on this concept that are available on this and other sites. You may already know of Vibrant Arizona and Bright Summer from Fuji X Weekly, or perhaps Classic Cuban Negative by Osan Bilgi. On this site, Summer Story and Kodak Portra 66 are also good choices.

But, as we all know, there are a huge range of styles possible with our excellent Fujifilm cameras, so there’s always room for one more. So here we have another contender. Daydream Believer looks to capture the summer vibe with hazy softness from -4 clarity and sunny colour from (ironically perhaps) the Shady colour balance.

Note that if the -4 clarity makes you uncomfortable (as I know it can for some photographers), then this recipe will also be just as happy with a mist filter to give a similar dreamy feel.

Daydream Believer Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Eterna/Cinema
Grain Effect	Off
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Off
White Balance	Shade, +2 Red, ‑2 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR400
Highlights	‑1
Shadows	‑1
Colour	4
Sharpness	‑2
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	‑4
EV Comp.	+1/3

Similar Recipes

Albariño

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🔒 Feeling Nostalgic

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Daydream Believer Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Daydream Believer Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Daydream Believer has been tagged with.

Low Contrast

Eterna

August 19, 2024

Acroscape, Landscape Acros Recipe

Mono film recipe tuned for landscape photography using Acros simulation

Acroscape

I shoot almost entirely landscape and natural scenes, and really love soft tones and muted colours. As a result, I find that I don’t use many mono recipes. Personally, I find it harder to ‘see’ scenes that will work well in mono, and I think that some of this is how most mono recipes have shadows that appear deeper than I expect, and this puts me off using them.

So, I have made a couple of landscape friendly recipes that are great for all around outdoor shooting. These have tone profiles that feel more natural to me, when shooting landscapes, forests and so on. Firstly, I made Monographic, then Kodachrome Mono, and now a third take on a landscape mono, which I call Acroscape. Of the three, this one has the deepest shadows, but is still a highly usable recipe in everyday outdoor conditions.

The main element for this look is a single step of over-exposure, with the dial set to +1/3. HIghlights are preserved with a DR400 setting and a -1 setting for highlights. In my test, I enjoyed a little hazy softness with a -2 clarity setting, but this does cause a short saving delay, so do leave this off if that bothers you.

Acroscape Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Acros Green Filter
Grain Effect	Weak, Small
White Balance	Auto, ‑4 Red, ‑9 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR400
Highlights	‑1
Shadows	0
Sharpness	0
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	‑2
EV Comp.	+1/3
Mono Colour	WC +1, MG +0

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🔒 Black Eye

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Acroscape Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Acroscape Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Acroscape has been tagged with.

Film Like

Forest & Woodland

Mono

Cinematic

Beach

Winter

Misty & Foggy

August 18, 2024

Olympic Ace, All Round Reala Recipe

The Summer Olympics are upon us, and a trip to watch the tennis event has got me inspired to prepare film recipes for capturing scenes at the event. I’ve got a number of these in the works, including the first to be added to this site, Paris 24, based on Classic Negative.

Olympic Ace

For this look, I wanted to do two things; make a great looking film recipe with the Reala Ace film simulation, and also create one that I could use just about everywhere under whatever weather and lighting situation that might arise. Reala Ace is a good choice for this because, like Provia, is has a good all round performance without a strong style of its own.

The adjustments from standard Reala Ace include a softening of the tone curve to be kinder to shadow detail and strong highlights, a DR400 setting to futher enhance this tonal flexibility, and a reduction in saturation to give a more natural overall feel. The white balance is warmed, but still retains a natural colour look.

I’ve added plenty of samples below to show the versatility of this recipe, including sunny and grey days. I will add further images from my trip to the Olympic Games in the coming weeks.

Olympic Ace Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Reala Ace
Grain Effect	Off
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Weak
White Balance	Daylight, +2 Red, ‑4 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR400
Highlights	‑1
Shadows	‑1
Colour	‑1
Sharpness	‑1
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	0
EV Comp.	0

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Olympic Ace Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Olympic Ace Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Olympic Ace has been tagged with.

Natural Colour

Reala Ace

Blue Tones

Try at Night

Low Contrast

People

Red Tones

July 26, 2024

Paris 24, Pour les Voyages

I’m a huge tennis fan, and around this site you might find recipes made for trips to tournaments such as Wimbledon (Centre Court and Kodak Portra Daily), and Barcelona (Clay Court and Pale Barca). It’s a fun exercise that I enjoy; to consider the types of photographs I might be able to take, and then to prepare a recipe to try. Similarly, these trips inspire new creations during and afterwards too.

Paris 24

At the time of publishing, the Paris Olympics are just around the corner and I have been lucky enough to get some tickets for the tennis event being held there at Roland Garros. I’ve been thinking about the shots I might capture. And, with warm sunny weather and creamy Paris architecture, I’ve created this dreamy Classic Negative as one of the recipes I will take along.

Of course, it’s not just limited to tennis tournaments or trips to Paris! This flexible recipe has a sunny day colour balance that will work all around the world, but especially nearer the golden hour.

It works well on any camera that includes Classic Negative, such as X100V or X100VI, the X-S10 and X-S20 or X-E4 and X-T50. Here are my sample images from the creation phase, along with scenes captured at the Olympics with this Paris 24 film recipe.

Paris 24 Film Recipe Settings

Film Simulation	Classic Negative
Grain Effect	Weak, Small
Col. Chr. Effect	Weak
Col. Chr. Blue	Off
White Balance	5000K, +2 Red, ‑4 Blue
Dynamic Range	DR200
Highlights	‑2
Shadows	‑1
Colour	‑1
Sharpness	1
ISO N.R.	‑4
Clarity	0
EV Comp.	+1/3

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CN24

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Paris 24 Film Recipe: Sample Photos

Using the Paris 24 Film Recipe

Each film simulation recipe has its own character and style. These features mean recipes are more suited to certain situations, or when seeking a particular look. Here are the categories that Paris 24 has been tagged with.

Film Like