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VSCO Film 04 and New Fuji Presets

It's been nearly two months since I started using VSCO Film 02 to edit my X-Pro1 RAW files. My favorite preset, without a doubt, is Fuji Superia and its many variations. As good as the Superia presets are however, I still missed the Provia, Velvia, and Astia simulation modes of the X100 and X-Pro1. Well, it looks like I no longer have to choose between shooting in RAW and using the film modes because VSCO just released their slide film presets, VSCO Film 04, which includes emulations of these three films. 

Since I just purchased VSCO Film 04 yesterday, I haven't had much time to work with the presets yet. I will say this though, if you're using one of the newer Fujifilm X Series cameras and have been on the fence about VSCO, these are probably the presets to get. With that, I'll leave you with two images I made in San Francisco edited using the Provia, Velvia, and Astia presets.

Original

Fuji Provia 100F

Fuji Velvia 100F

Fuji Astia 100F

Original

Fuji Provia 100F

Fuji Velvia 100F

Fuji Astia 100F

Disney Concert Hall and the Fujinon XF 14mm

The Disney Concert Hall is one of the most iconic buildings in Los Angeles. I've visited the concert hall on various occasions, but I've never spent much time photographing the architectural marvel. Partly because I have never really had the time to do so and partly because it has always seemed quite challenging to create unique images of one of the most photographed locations in Los Angeles. 

Yesterday, during an outing to photograph Grand Park in Downtown Los Angeles, I decided to stop by the Disney Concert Hall to make a few images. Soon after arriving with the Fujifilm X-Pro1 and XF 14mm, I found myself completely immersed in finding interesting ways to capture this fascinating building. Before moving to the Fujifilm X-Series system and getting the XF 14mm, I had always preferred shooting at more normal focal lengths between 35 and 50mm. Since fitting my X-Pro1 with the XF 14mm however, my preferences have changed and I'm truly enjoying the task of learning to compose with this awesome wide angle lens.

 

Catching Waves

Often times, I go out knowing what I want to shoot and how I want to shoot it only to return with something completely different. This was the case last weekend when I went down to Newport Beach to make some long exposure photographs of the Balboa Pier. I arrived at the pier Saturday morning only to find the area already full of summer visitors. I took a detour down to the end of Balboa Peninsula and walked back along the beach towards the pier. While walking, I turned my attention to the ocean and started making images of the huge waves crashing along the beach. I have always been fascinated by the breaking of waves and I ended up spending the morning creating photographs that could convey the movement and power of the ocean. While the photographs turned out completely different than what I set out to make, they did give me an idea for a new project. Here are three of my favorites from this recent outing.

VSCO Film vs Fujifilm Digital

I've been using VSCO Film 02 for a week now and so far I like the results of the images I processed using the presets. Only time will tell whether or not I grow tired of the look the presets produce. The nice thing about the film pack and accompanying toolkits, however, is that they make it easy to dial back on "the look". The adjustments bundled into the film pack and two toolkits for Lightroom each have various versions which let me fine tune my edits quickly and easily. After a week, one of the biggest benefits I've noticed is that the presets speed up the editing process while allowing me to maintain a high level of consistency from image to image. True, I could have saved my money and created presets myself that gave me the look I was after. But sometimes, it's worth the investment to let someone else do part of the work for you, especially when they do it as well as VSCO has done here.

Here's a set of images I shot yesterday and edited using the Fuji Superia 100 preset. For comparison, I also included the JPEGs processed by the Fujifilm X-Pro1 using the built in Astia film simulation mode. (For each set of images, the RAW files edited using VSCO Film are on the right while the out of camera JPEGs are on the left.)