(upbeat music) - If you've been searching for a black-and-white film
simulation recipe for your Ricoh, look no further than
Reggie's Monotone Standard. (upbeat music) This film simulation recipe started out as an attempt for me to recreate the look of my
popular Fujifilm recipe, Reggie's HP5, but for the Ricoh GR III and and GR IIIx. And while it doesn't match Fuji's Acro simulation exactly, it's a great alternative
that especially works for high-contrast scenes
that make the Ricoh shine. Before I walk you through all the settings for Reggie's Monotone Standard, I wanted to take a moment to thank today's video
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for sponsoring this video. (chill jazzy music) I'm going to walk you through the settings of Reggie's Monotone Standard using the Ricoh GR III as an example, but it's exactly the same
on the Ricoh GR IIIx. We're gonna open up the menu, and we're gonna go over down
to the fifth page right here. So first off is the file format. For the file format, I shoot everything in RAW+JPEG. I mainly only use the JPEGs for editing and posting anywhere, but because this is a
black-and-white film simulation, it's always good to have
the RAW as an archive. Just in case down the road you want to change the photo to color or to edit it differently. it's good to have the RAWs. As for the aspect ratio, I set this to 3:2. If you want to shoot
it in 1:1 for Instagram or to challenge your
compositional skills, you can. And if you have the RAW, you'll be able to go back to
the original aspect ratio. For the JPEG recorded pixels, I set it to the largest at 6,000 x 4,000 so that we get all the information and the full resolution. And for color space, I set this to SRGB. The main reason for this is so that I can have full compatibility across different devices. If I want to transfer it to my phone or import it to my computer, it's gonna work across all devices. Next, we get into the
image control settings, and this is where we actually bake in the film simulation recipe. So as you can see, I'm actually down at
the bottom at Custom 2. And the reason for this is because the film simulation recipe is this monotone one, but I have it down here so that I can set my Custom 1 to my color film simulation recipe, and then I can go down really quickly to my black-and-white
film simulation recipe. Because if that was the case, I would have to go from negative film and then go up all the way here. And it's just too awkward
for me to change very quickly as opposed to just being
here two different settings. So once we go in here, we're gonna press Function to get into the gear part
and change the settings. This film simulation
recipe is on monotone, which is the standard black and white for the Ricoh GR III and the GR IIIx. And this is really a good platform for the type of contrast
levels and tonality that I want to match somewhat
close to Fujifilm Acros. One of my favorite things about shooting with mirrorless
cameras like the Ricoh GR III is that you have the ability
to observe in real life everything in black and white. This allows you to see the light and
the shadow more clearly. You can also notice all the shapes and lines in your surroundings, and you can really focus on
emotions and interactions without having the distraction of color. So even if you are a RAW shooter, baking in a monochrome recipe can really help you to
hone in and see light. So it's almost like a
photographer's supervision. Moving on, we have the high
key and the low key adjustment, and I actually have this to -1, which darkens it just a little bit based off the standard look. If you want to make the look a little bit brighter by standard, you can raise it up here or you can also make it darker. This is kind of like, in my opinion, a baked-in exposure compensation. For contrast, I have this set
a little bit higher at +2. And if you wanna reduce the contrast, you can always go down. But I have this at +2 because I like to shoot
this film simulation recipe for high-contrast scenes. For highlight contrast, I have this at the -4. This is really to try to
tame the bright highlights in the photos. If you find the image a little too flat, you can always raise this up here to get a little bit brighter highlights. And the shadow contrast is at -4 in order to keep the
shadows nice and dark. If you feel like you wanna increase the shadows a little bit, you can always brighten
them up by going to +4. As far as sharpness goes, I have this at +1. I like to bake in a little bit
of sharpness into the image because I'm shooting
in JPEG instead of RAW. As far as toning goes, I keep this on off, but if you like to give
a little bit of toning, maybe sepia toning or blue
cool toning to your photo, this is where you can add that. And for the filter effect, I have this at 3, which is the red filter. I'm not sure what the 1,
2, and 4 is off of memory. It's gonna be probably a green-blue filter and something else. But I use three because
that is the red filter, and the red filter is what I use in Reggie's HP5 on Fujifilm. And I feel like this gives a little bit
of a bump to contrast. It also makes the skies
a little bit darker. As far as the shading goes, I keep this at 0, and for clarity, I also keep this at 0. When I do want a softening or
halation effect to my images, I use a NiSi adapter to add a CineBloom filter to my camera. So usually using the 10% most of the time. On occasion, I've used the 20% to see how dreamy it can make it look. It's a quick way to add
that softness to your images and kind of get back that film look because the Ricoh is very,
very contrasty in camera. For the grain effect, I set this to 1. Just a little bit of grain, not too much, but if you want to increase that look and exaggerate that look, you can always go to 3. And to finish inputting
this film simulation recipe, we do have to go out of this menu and go into the dynamic range correction. I set this to auto for the highlights, and I set shadow correction to medium. And I feel like this is
the best middle ground in order to have a high-contrasty look, but still retain some shadow detail for the type of images
that I like to shoot. If you notice, all these images that I've been showing are slightly underexposed in terms of having it be very contrasty and having the highlights kind of dictate the overall
exposure of the image. But I also am shooting a lot of like directly harsh-lit scenes, so you can always change this
based on your shooting style. If you want more shadow detail, then I would set it to high. As far as noise reduction goes, I turn off all noise
reduction on my cameras when I'm shooting in JPEG. So here I have the slow shutter speed
noise reduction to off, and I also have the high-ISO
noise reduction set to off, and all these custom options as well for the different ISOs also set to off. If you feel like you don't like
the noise of a specific ISO, you can always turn this up a little bit, but I am here just to
embrace all the grain. So when I'm shooting with the
Ricoh GR III or the GR IIIx, I have them both set up the same, where the rear command
dial has a quick menu to go straight to the
image control settings. And I put it right in the middle. So basically I hit the rear command dial, and then I can go up to go to my color film simulation recipe and go down in order to get
Reggie's Monotone Standard. It's very simple. You can also set these to the actual U1, U2, U3 user settings. But for me, I like to set it right here so it's not going to
interrupt me to spin the dial. Instead, I just hit the rear command dial. And with that, my name
is Reggie Ballesteros. If you liked this video,
give it a thumbs up, and if you loved it, subscribe for more. And if you're still on the search for a color film simulation recipe that you can use for everyday
situations for your Ricoh, check out Reggie's Color Negative in this video right here. (chill jazzy music)
