by Rico Pfirstinger

Hello and Happy New Year!

While the topic of Friday’s column appears to be set in stone by now (I have already uploaded several samples on “extended ISO settings” to my Flickr Photostream), I’d like to know about your interest in a different subject matter: EXR sensors. Plenty of Fujifilm cameras are using them, including three X-series models: X10, X-S1 and XF1.

To be clear: This is not about “EXR Auto” mode, which is basically kind of a “dummy mode” where the camera automatically decides which scene program to choose and what settings to establish, so the only thing the user has to do is press the shutter button. Nope, it’s about EXR DR and EXR SN: how it works, what it means (practically!), how to use it, when to use it, and when not to use it. Plus, how does your EXR camera actually use EXR? Do you really know? Do you even care to know?

Having spent several years with at least five different EXR camera models, I may have gathered some knowledge and experience that could be instrumental in answering some of these questions. I had to do it all by means of “reverse engineering”, as Fujifilm doesn’t disclose any kind of useful technical information about the inner workings of the EXR camera logic. So the question is: Do you want to know (more) about EXR?

Kindly answer the poll below:

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Rico Pfirstinger studied communications and has been working as journalist, publicist, and photographer since the mid-80s. He has written a number of books on topics as diverse as Adobe PageMaker and sled dogs, and produced a beautiful book of photographs titled Huskies in Action (german version). He has spent time working as the head of a department with the German Burda-Publishing Company and served as chief editor for a winter sports website. After eight years as a freelance film critic and entertainment writer in Los Angeles, Rico now lives in Germany and devotes his time to digital photography and compact camera systems. His book “Mastering the FUJIFILM X-Pro1” is available on Amazon.