The World of FUJIFILM Film Simulation – Episode 2: CLASSIC CHROME

Classic Chrome. Fujifilm has published Episode 2 – “CLASSIC CHROME” in their series of “episodes” on their unique Film Simulation modes. This particular film simulation has apparently gained popularity among street and documentary photographers who often shoot in monochrome.

The basic idea behind “CLASSIC CHROME” is to provide a film simulation in color that can be used how monochrome is used. Tonality is key, with saturation minimized to the limit.

Unlike previous Film Simulation modes, Fujifilm’s CLASSIC CHROME was released in August 2014 apparently after frequent requests, particularly from photojournalists, for a mode with more muted tones. CLASSIC CHROME therefore does not reproduce an existing Fujifilm film but instead aims to reproduce the ambience found in documentary-style photographs and magazines. Follow the link to read more about the development of CLASSIC CHROME. CLASSIC CHROME was phased into models starting with the X30.

Here’s episode 2 (“CLASSIC CHROME”) of the “The World of Film Simulation”:

Photography is often called “Art of omission”.

CLASSIC CHROME omits the element of color in order to stand for the story you want to tell to stand out.

Velvia uses color as the main element, and CLASSIC CHROME is on the opposite end. The use of color is minimized and the tonality becomes the main element.

Take a look at the chart again. You can see that the tonality is a little above the center line and is the second hardest after Velvia.

CLASSIC CHROME’s tonality is hard, but it is not equally hard in all range from shadow to highlight. The shadow end is hard, but the tonality is soft on the highlight end.

To express the tight atmosphere in a picture, one may set the exposure under, but that would equally affect all range from highlight to shadow. The final image would be better if only shadow part is under exposed and the highlight part is kept as is. The subject would become more live and the texture remains present by doing so.

Monochrome is not present on the chart, but the tonality of Monochrome is designed exactly the same as PROVIA for FUJIFILM cameras. It means that the CLASSIC CHROME’s tonality is harder than Monochrome.

CLASSIC CHROME minimizes saturation as much as possible, but the element of color remains and therefore the subject of the picture still remains in color. So the feel of “Monochrome” would be more apparent if the tonality is a little bit on the harder end.

Minimized saturation and one of a kind tonality that make the subject stand out, this is all to tell the story as clear as possible. We would like the photographers that advocate for contents, to also use this film simulation.

In corporation with : R&D Div. Optical, Electronic Imaging Products Div. FUJIFILM

Here are all six of “The World of Film Simulation” episodes: