In a previous post, I rushed out with the Fuji Finepix 6500fd and was impressed by the camera’s ability to hold onto detail. Fast-forward to a cloudy Sunday and a last-minute invitation from family friends, and once more, the Finepix 6500fd is in my hands. It has the feel of a mini-DSLR and the manual zoom, unlike most other Finepix cameras from the 2000s era, really adds to this feeling.

At this point, I’m trusting the Automatic White Balance of the 6500 because it does an admirable job, even on a really cloudy day. At some point, there’ll be some sun, I hope! As you can see in the above image, out of cameras JPGs are nice and colourful. Of course, I have it set to JPG Fine, ISO 100, and the Fujichrome picture setting so that there’s more saturation of certain colours and extra contrast. I’ve yet to use the F-Standard setting.

Like most older digital cameras, it’s not great when it comes to preserving strong light and shadow areas. There’s a bit of a focus on preserving highlight and shadow detail in modern photos, but it really depends on the subject and the type of photo it is. Is there anything you really want to preserve in the highlights/shadows? Do strong highlight and shadow areas add punch and drama to your photo? These are really the questions that should be asked, and not just an assumption that these areas need detail all the time. In many cases, clipped highlights and blocked out shadows don’t matter and add visual interest.

I did also take out my Nikon D40 but I ended up bagging it because it seemed to be overexposing. As it happens, I think it was my error entirely. I’ll take it out again and check to see if it’s a mechanical issue with the shutter speeds or just me being completely stupid.

Because I set the Finepix to Soft sharpening levels, all of the JPGs benefit from some light extra sharpening in Lightroom. Using both Texture and Clarity in small amounts also brings the best out of this camera. I’d go so far as to say that the lens on the Finepix 6500fd is superb for the time, and it wrings the most out of the sensor to the point that a higher resolution sensor would likely be a better fit for the lens.