I Used James Popsys’ Fujifilm Recipe

Photography has always been built around influence. Painters copied painters. Filmmakers study other filmmakers. Musicians borrow ideas from artists they admire. Photography is no different, especially now where YouTube, Instagram and blogs constantly expose us to other people’s work every single day.

I’ve always liked James Popsys’ photography style. I like the softer contrast, the more natural colours, the slightly moodier feel without everything looking over-edited. So when he shared the Fujifilm recipe he’d been using recently, I thought I’d give it a try for myself.

The recipe itself is actually very simple:

Film Simulation: Astia/Soft
Grain Effect: Weak / Large
Color Chrome Effect: Weak
Color Chrome FX Blue: Weak
White Balance: Auto Ambience Priority (R: +2 B: +2)
Dynamic Range: DR100
Tone Curve: Highlight +1 Shadow -2
Color: +2
Sharpness: 0

What I liked straight away was that it didn’t feel overly stylised. Some Fujifilm recipes can feel quite extreme, where every image starts looking identical regardless of the lighting or subject. This one still leaves room for the environment and conditions to shape the final image.

It also made me realise something else.

Using someone else’s recipe doesn’t suddenly make you become that photographer.

I can use the same settings James uses, but I still live in Lincolnshire. I still photograph the things I naturally gravitate towards. I still frame images in my own way. I still walk different paths, shoot in different weather, and react to scenes differently.

The recipe becomes part of the process, not the entire identity.

And honestly, I think newer photographers worry about this far too much. There’s this pressure online to be completely original all the time, but most photographers develop their style through influence first. You try things. You imitate photographers you admire. You experiment. Eventually bits of inspiration from different people slowly start becoming your own thing.

That’s normal.

I also think Fujifilm recipes help remove some of the pressure around editing, especially for beginners. When I first started photography I spent more time fighting Lightroom than actually improving my photography. My editing style changed constantly because I didn’t really know what I liked yet.

JPEG recipes changed that for me.

They helped me focus more on composition, light, framing and storytelling instead of endlessly tweaking sliders. Even now I still mainly shoot JPEG + RAW, but realistically I almost always use the JPEGs.

That doesn’t mean editing is bad. Editing absolutely has its place, especially professionally. But I do think photography style is much bigger than editing alone.

Your environment shapes your style. Your focal length preferences shape your style. The subjects you photograph shape your style. Even your personality shapes your style.

The recipe is only one small part of that bigger picture.

So no, using James Popsys’ Fujifilm recipe hasn’t turned me into James Popsys. But it has influenced me a little, and honestly I think that’s completely fine.

That’s probably how most photographers grow in the first place.