how to avoid waxy skin tones?

[Filmdude]

hi, new to fuji here with a brand new XT2. was reviewing the pics I took over the weekend on a 4K monitor and noticed the infamous waxy skin tones on high ISO portraits. noise reduction is set to zero, do I need to set it to -4 to fully bypass the wax effect? any other settings to mess around with? I don't mind noise/grain (actually find Fuji noise to have a filmic quality). also I'm not shooting RAW as the XT2 is purely for fun/travel/video and I'm all about the film simulations!

Edited December 12, 2016 by Filmdude

[kimcarsons]

Try NR-2 and Sharpness -2. Also consider shifting the white balance away from cyan a few points.

[Filmdude]

ok i might try that, may i ask why NR-2 and not -4? i'd like to cancel noise reduction as much as possible. not sure i want to mess with white balance though, auto-WB is the best i've ever experienced on any camera (beats my FF Canon/Nikon)

[kimcarsons]

ok i might try that, may i ask why NR-2 and not -4? i'd like to cancel noise reduction as much as possible. not sure i want to mess with white balance though, auto-WB is the best i've ever experienced on any camera (beats my FF Canon/Nikon)

 

You can do whatever you like man. I think NR - 4 looks a little too rough on color images. For black and white it's fine. But again, it's your photo. As for the white balance. It definitely leans to the cool side out of the box, which makes people look more corpse-like/waxy, which is something you indicated you wanted to avoid. Try warming it up a bit, you might be pleasantly surprised.

[Filmdude]

You can do whatever you like man. I think NR - 4 looks a little too rough on color images. For black and white it's fine. But again, it's your photo. As for the white balance. It definitely leans to the cool side out of the box, which makes people look more corpse-like/waxy, which is something you indicated you wanted to avoid. Try warming it up a bit, you might be pleasantly surprised.

 

 

Cool man, I get what you're saying. Indeed i think -4 looks nicer on B&W too. But I've got no issue with color although i also agree SOOC does run much cooler then let's say Canon standard. But you can always fix that in post. The waxy skin though is a different issue, where i believe Fuji applies intense smoothing above 6400 ISO. It makes the skin look kinda airbrushed, and that i'm afraid cannot be fixed later! Thanks for the feedback..

[kimcarsons]

Cool man, I get what you're saying. Indeed i think -4 looks nicer on B&W too. But I've got no issue with color although i also agree SOOC does run much cooler then let's say Canon standard. But you can always fix that in post. The waxy skin though is a different issue, where i believe Fuji applies intense smoothing above 6400 ISO. It makes the skin look kinda airbrushed, and that i'm afraid cannot be fixed later! Thanks for the feedback..

 

Well, anything can be fixed later if you shoot RAW. In my experience, the number of times I think to myself "Hey, I like the JPEG just as well as my RAW processing" drops off sharply above ISO 1600, and no amount of tweaking of camera JPEG settings changes that. I mean, in camera processing simply can't beat being able to selectively apply NR to shadow areas, avoid edges, adjust chrominance and luminance NR separately, etc. (in other words, tailor your processing to each image).

[Filmdude]

Well aware of raw & post benefits. I shoot professionally with a 5D3 raw only. Like I said though, the aim with the XT2 for me is to have minimal post work done. It's my walk around / travel cam. Plus I'm going for a kinda "film camera" mantra: what you shoot is what you get!

 

I hear you about keeping ISO low, I have to remind myself I'm not on a full frame. But again I was just trying to get rid of any in cam noise reduction polishing. I'd rather have noise/grain then waxy airbrushed image..

Edited December 13, 2016 by Filmdude

[Carlos Mendes]

You can do whatever you like man. I think NR - 4 looks a little too rough on color images. For black and white it's fine. But again, it's your photo. As for the white balance. It definitely leans to the cool side out of the box, which makes people look more corpse-like/waxy, which is something you indicated you wanted to avoid. Try warming it up a bit, you might be pleasantly surprised.

My impression is that it tends to create skin tones with blue overcasts. How did you set yours kimcarsons? Was it the same with X-T1? 

 

I've attached an example of what I'm getting on skin tones. 

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[kimcarsons]

My impression is that it tends to create skin tones with blue overcasts. How did you set yours kimcarsons? Was it the same with X-T1? 

 

I've attached an example of what I'm getting on skin tones. 

 

You can forget about correct skin tones over grass like that. It's like putting a big green reflector under someone's face.That's definitely a scenario where you're going to have to fix it in post (with local adjustments). (however, I will say that the more limited tonal range of the Classic Chrome simulation does a pretty good job of fixing the skin on shots with foliage involved---might not give you the look you want though).

 

I use B -2 R +2 on the X-Trans III cameras. I find that B -1 R +1 works best on the X-Trans II and I cameras. Auto white balance is never going to be 100% consistent, but that puts it in the ballpark for me.