Features

The Best Fujifilm Cameras for Portrait Photography

Chris Gampat
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04/23/2023
4 Mins read
Created with RNI Films app. Preset 'Agfa RSX II'

Every single time that we’ve done Fujifilm camera reviews, we have to do portraits. I mean, come on! How do you hate on film simulations? Well, this time around we went into our reviews index to find the greatest. And in this roundup, we’re curating the best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography. Plus, there are sample galleries in this post. You’re going to love it!

The Phoblographer’s various product round-up features are done in-house. Our philosophy is simple: you wouldn’t get a Wagyu beef steak review from a lifelong vegetarian. And you wouldn’t get photography advice from someone who doesn’t touch the product. We only recommend gear we’ve fully reviewed in these roundups. If you’re wondering why your favorite product didn’t make the cut, there’s a chance it’s on another list. If we haven’t reviewed it, we won’t recommend it. This method keeps our lists packed with industry-leading knowledge. Some of our stories include affiliate links. If you buy something through one of these links, we may earn an affiliate commission.

How We Chose the Best Fujifilm Cameras for Portrait Photography

Here’s some insight into how and why we chose these as the best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography.

  • Our roundups only prominently feature products that we’ve done full reviews of. With that said, within each section of this roundup, you’ll find links back to our full reviews of the products. So you can know that we really believe that these are the best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography because we’ve tested them.
  • All the product images and sample photos were shot by our staff.
  • The best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography all put film simulations at the forefront. Our staff likes Classic Chrome, Classic Negative, Pro Negative HC, and Astia the most.
  • Classic Chrome was originally designed to mimic the look of photos that you’d see in National Geographic. And therefore, it kind of looks like Kodachrome.
  • Classic Negative is designed to look more like Superia. I recommend overexposing it to get that more pastel look that photographers love.
  • Pro Negative HC is designed to mimic the look of their old Pro Negative 160 ISO film. It’s great for studio work.
  • Astia balances a vivid look with slightly softer colors. We really think that it’s fantastic.
  • With the best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography, use face and eye detection.

Fujifilm XH2

Here are the pros and cons from our full review:

PROS

  • Very quiet
  • Fantastic image quality
  • High ISO images are fairly clean, or you can embrace the noise.
  • The best color from an APSC sensor in a while
  • Subject detection is great in sufficient lighting.
  • Weather resistant
  • Good for street photography
  • Alright battery life
  • Still works well with older lenses
  • Cropped shooting mode in continuous drive mode is brilliant. (Let me get it right in camera and frame it perfectly there rather than fixing it later.)
  • Continuous AF is great in good lighting.
  • Very good at 10pm for tracking birds

CONS

  • I miss the ISO dial so much.
  • Desperately needs to find a way to make switching between subjects faster
  • Rolling shutter in pre-shot ES
  • I wish it had more customizable buttons.
  • Fuji needs to update how their focusing modes work.
  • Star ratings don’t transfer over to Capture one or Lightroom.
  • Continuous AF isn’t so great in low lighting.
  • Fuji needs to update their AF-C customization modes.
  • Autofocus performance deteriorates with exposure preview on and lots of underexposure.
  • High ISO editing versatility isn’t all that great, but for wildlife it really needs to be.
  • Fuji currently lacks a major selection of fast telephoto lenses, and they really need them.

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Fujifilm GFX 50s II

Here are the pros and cons from our full review:

PROS

  • Beautiful image quality
  • Colors and film simulations
  • In-camera skin smoothing transfers to raw file
  • It cuts down on editing time
  • Dynamic Range
  • Addition of IBIS
  • Small camera body for medium format

CONS

  • Autofocus can be sluggish
  • Although it’s improved, face detection can still be improved upon
  • Quick AF mode quickly drains the battery
  • Not a lot of fast lens options in the current lens lineup

Buy now

Fujifilm GFX 100s

Here are the pros and cons from our full review:

PROS

  • The build quality is much better than the GFX100
  • Weather sealing
  • The new IBIS system is excellent
  • Good autofocus in good light
  • More detail in images than anyone could ever want
  • Great performance up to ISO 6400
  • The film sims are great as always. Nostalgic Neg is a nice inclusion
  • Nice grip and a well-placed thumb rest round out great ergonomics
  • Excellent price point for a ‘more than Full-frame’ camera (it’s $5,999)

CONS

  • Still no touchscreen menu system
  • Mediocre battery life
  • 400MP Hi-Res image mode is meh
  • While the EVF is nice, it’s a step back from the GFX100

Buy now

astia best Fujifilm cameras for portrait photography classic chrome classic negative fujifilm Fujifilm Cameras Fujifilm gfx 100s Fujifilm GFX 50S II fujifilm xh2 portrait photography pro negative
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Chris Gampat is the Editor in Chief, Founder, and Publisher of the Phoblographer. He provides oversight to all of the daily tasks, including editorial, administrative, and advertising work. Chris's editorial work includes not only editing and scheduling articles but also writing them himself. He's the author of various product guides, educational pieces, product reviews, and interviews with photographers. He's fascinated by how photographers create, considering the fact that he's legally blind./ HIGHLIGHTS: Chris used to work in Men's lifestyle and tech. He's a veteran technology writer, editor, and reviewer with more than 15 years experience. He's also a Photographer that has had his share of bylines and viral projects like "Secret Order of the Slice." PAST BYLINES: Gear Patrol, PC Mag, Geek.com, Digital Photo Pro, Resource Magazine, Yahoo! News, Yahoo! Finance, IGN, PDN, and others. EXPERIENCE: Chris Gampat began working in tech and art journalism both in 2008. He started at PCMag, Magnum Photos, and Geek.com. He founded the Phoblographer in 2009 after working at places like PDN and Photography Bay. He left his day job as the Social Media Content Developer at B&H Photo in the early 2010s. Since then, he's evolved as a publisher using AI ethically, coming up with ethical ways to bring in affiliate income, and preaching the word of diversity in the photo industry. His background and work has spread to non-profits like American Photographic Arts where he's done work to get photographers various benefits. His skills are in SEO, app development, content planning, ethics management, photography, Wordpress, and other things. EDUCATION: Chris graduated Magna Cum Laude from Adelphi University with a degree in Communications in Journalism in 2009. Since then, he's learned and adapted to various things in the fields of social media, SEO, app development, e-commerce development, HTML, etc. FAVORITE SUBJECT TO PHOTOGRAPH: Chris enjoys creating conceptual work that makes people stare at his photos. But he doesn't get to do much of this because of the high demand of photography content. / BEST PHOTOGRAPHY TIP: Don't do it in post-production when you can do it in-camera.