Fuji X-E5 Video Settings

When I got into videography two years ago, I had to absorb a lot of technical information in relatively short order. At the same time, there were various other topics which I knew I should know about, but which I put off to a later date because they seemed less interesting, or in some cases, mind-numbingly boring.

One such topic was the question of video settings – the choice of resolution, frame rate, codec, bitrate and so forth. For a while, I got by using my camera's default settings with some tweaks, but this week I finally decided to take matters into my own hands and did a deep-dive.

My goal was to figure out the best video settings for my own needs (emphasis on my own), set up my camera (Fuji X-E5) accordingly, and hopefully leave them largely untouched for the next few years. Set and forget, as they say.

That said, I don't want to completely forget this hard-earned knowledge, so I thought I'd set down what I learned in a blogpost. The topic is frankly rather dry, but as with my mechanical keyboard posts, this post is mainly for my own future reference. If it helps anyone, that's a bonus.

The video settings that I was looking into are resolution, frame rate, codec, chroma subsampling, bit depth, format and bitrate.

The way I went about this was to (a) do a bunch of internet research (the best sources I found are Video Bitrates and Export Myths by Jarle Leirpoll, Pal2Tech's guide to shooting video on the Fuji X-T5, and Understanding Video Formats and Settings by Canon), (b) shoot a series of 6-second test clips of my cat at various settings, and (c) analyse and compare. You can see two of the test clips on my YouTube: Full HD and 4K. And here are thumbnails of all seven clips:

Some caveats: These are short clips, with soft, consistent lighting and relatively little movement. The camera was on a tripod, and the microphone was muted. Results can and do vary when clips are longer and have more going on. Also, my comparison is based on my own camera, display environment, hardware resources and subjective preferences. Your mileage may vary.

As an aside, did you know that you can right-click on a YouTube video and bring up "Stats for nerds"?

Going forward, the settings that I plan to use on my Fuji X-E5 are:

Resolution: 1080p Full HD at 16:9 aspect ratio

Playing back the straight-out-of-camera video files on my monitor (Dell E198WFPf 19-inch 1440×900px widescreen LCD), I actually can't see a difference between FHD and 4K. When uploaded to YouTube, I can see a slight difference – see the clips linked above – but not enough to make me want to shoot 4K for personal projects (as opposed to paid work).

Shooting and editing 4K requires significantly more storage and processing power. For example, my 6-second-long 4K file is 139 MB, whereas my FHD file (other settings being identical) is only 51 MB. 4K also requires faster memory cards, drains the camera battery and increases the risk of overheating. So FHD it is.

As for aspect ratio, the only two choices are 16:9 and 17:9. The former is more common, and anyway if I want a wider ratio, I can always crop.

Frame rate: 24fps

Online video content on platforms like YouTube and TikTok is often shot at 30 or even 60 frames per second. Some people feel that faster frame rates look smoother or cleaner. Higher fps video is also more forgiving of camera-shake. But I prefer 24fps for its more cinematic look and smaller file sizes.

One downside is that my phone (Google Pixel 6a) shoots video at 30fps by default, and doesn't offer 24fps. So if I use both phone and camera footage in the same video, I might need to slow down the 30fps phone clips to 80% speed, or risk dropped frames. But such is life.

Codec: H.265 Long GOP

When it comes to codecs (video compression formats), my camera offers a choice between H.264 and the newer H.265 aka HEVC. H.264 is more common and widely supported, while H.265 compresses more efficiently, resulting in smaller file sizes with the same quality. H.265 does require more processing power for playback and editing, but so far, my computer seems to be up to the task. If I subsequently run into problems, e.g. with longer videos or more intensive editing, I might switch back to H.264.

My Fuji X-E5 only offers Long GOP, while some other Fuji models also offer All-Intra. That's okay, because Long GOP would be my choice either way. There's one situation, though, when All-Intra would be nice to have: when I want to shoot at a shutter speed slower than 1/24 sec for a step-printing effect. This can be done with All-Intra, but not Long GOP.

Chroma subsampling: 420

The choices here are 422 and 420 (often written as 4:2:2 and 4:2:0). With 4:2:2, you get slightly better quality – a negligible or perhaps indiscernible improvement for my purposes – at the cost of slightly bigger file sizes. More importantly, the free version of Da Vinci Resolve, which I use for video editing, only supports 4:2:0, so that seals the deal.

Bit depth: 10-bit

H.264 is 8-bit while H.265 (my choice, see above) is 10-bit. Higher bit depth (not to be confused with bitrate, see below) means more tonal detail can be recorded, allowing for smoother gradients and more flexibility in editing. I suspect the difference is negligible for my purposes, but my H.265 file, as I mentioned, turns out to be slightly smaller, so there's no reason not to go with 10-bit.

Format: MOV

The only other option is MP4, which is also fine. But on my camera, H.265 encoding only delivers MOV (H.264 offers both MOV and MP4). For what it's worth, Pal2Tech also favours MOV because it includes slightly better quality audio (LPCM as opposed to AAC), but I'm not sure how much I care about that.

Bitrate: 50 MBPS

With the aforementioned settings, my camera offers bitrates from 8 MBPS to 200 MBPS. Online recommendations vary: Pal2Tech recommends using the highest bitrate available, but many others seem to think that 50 MBPS is plenty for FHD.

My file sizes for 6-second-long clips shot at 8, 50 and 200 MBPS (other settings being kept constant) are 12, 40 and 51 MB respectively. Much to my surprise, I can't actually see a noticeable difference on my monitor between even the highest and lowest bitrates. So I was tempted to just roll with 8 MBPS to save on file size, but it's possible, even likely, that higher bitrates will prove their worth in other shooting environments (e.g. more movement or challenging lighting conditions) and when colour grading. As such, 50 MBPS seems like a safe bet.

It makes sense to have good quality footage to begin with; later I can choose to export the edited video at lower bitrates if I want to save space, and if I can do so without noticeable degradation. On that note, I like this comment from u/CNCcamon1: "Your goal should be for the YouTube encoding to be the bottleneck for visual quality." Jarle Leirpoll says something similar, under Myth #4 about YouTube uploads.

To sum up, the video settings I plan to use in most situations are – say it after me – 1080p Full HD at 16:9 aspect ratio and 24fps, with H.265 Long GOP 10-bit 4:2:0 at 50 MBPS.

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Blog note: A blog like mine should ideally display differently on desktop and mobile (responsive design). I didn't like Blogger's default options for "mobile view", so I left it in "desktop view" for mobile browsers too. But that makes the text-size very small on phone screens. In my mind, this was an interim solution – I thought that someday I would code and set up the mobile view myself. But realistically, I don't know when, if ever, I will do that, so tonight I picked one of Blogger's default mobile themes (Dynamic view). I still think the desktop theme, which I extensively customised, is far better. But if you're reading on your phone, as I often do myself, the blog should now be more readable than before.

Shunbun no Hi: Bird Feeder

My spring equinox post is a bit late this year.

A couple of years ago my friend Abbi installed a bird-feeder in her yard which has a solar-powered video camera. It streams the footage, so I (or anyone with login permission) can view the live feed, wherever in the world we might be. When the camera detects movement, it also uploads a video clip to the cloud, so we can view it after the event.

The photos below are stills from such clips. I enjoy seeing the yard at different times of the year, a bit like my Seasons posts of yore. Sometimes the camera gets activated by squirrels, chipmunks – and children, like at bottom right.

And one time, in the dead of night, it got activated by deer, resulting in some eerily magical footage.

My Favourite Dishes in Singapore

When I lived in London, I used to look forward to TimeOut magazine's annual 100 best dishes list. It made me realise that I prefer Best Dishes lists over the more common Best Restaurants lists. The latter often include criteria like ambience, service and so on, which are generally less important to me. I also like going to a place with a specific dish in mind that I want to try. Some restaurants have one or two standout dishes, but the rest of the menu may not rise to the same level. For example, I go to Dishoom mainly for their famous black dal, slow-cooked over 24 hours. Their other dishes are okay, but with the possible exception of their brunch menu, they wouldn't keep me coming back.

In that vein, and before I forget, I thought I'd list my favourite dishes in Singapore. It's a relatively low-effort list – no reviews; just the basic info, and in some cases, photos. But a post like this is anyway more for my records. If it benefits anyone else, that's a bonus.

Many of the dishes on my list are under SGD 10, and the most expensive (tenchirashi soba) is around SGD 20. I've eaten at fancier places too, but I'm partial to hawker-centre and food-court recommendations. So in no particular order:

1. Xiao long bao at Zhong Guo La Mian, Chinatown Complex

2. Char siew bao at Tanjong Rhu Pau, Balestier (they also have other outlets, which I haven't tried)

3. Barbecue stingray at Rong Guang BBQ Seafood, Makansutra Gluttons Bay (permanently closed). I liked this place, although Newton Food Centre is more famous for BBQ stingray and seafood in general.

4. Chicken satay at Satay, Sembawang Hills Food Centre

5. Garlic prawn at A Kitchen, Novena (they also have other outlets, which I haven't tried). This dish doesn't actually appear on the menu. But they have garlic crawfish, and we ask them to make the same dish but with prawn (imo tastier, and significantly cheaper).

6. Whampoa Food Centre has good food, such as black carrot cake at Tanglin Halt A1 Carrot Cake, and beancurd with enoki mushroom at Xiong Sheng Kitchen. The Thai stall next to Xiong Sheng does a solid Thai basil pork with rice.

7. Classic Yangnyeom burger at Phat Fingers. This was a chain, but a lot of their outlets have closed down. From a quick look, it seems the Changi outlet might be the last one standing.

8. Spicy chicken mentai don at Mentai-Ya, Toa Payoh (permanently closed). I would sometimes eat here on my way back from Toa Payoh Public Library.

9. Beef pepper rice at Pepper Kitchen (various locations, usually in mall food courts, e.g. 313 Somerset). I would eat here after visiting the late lamented Orchard Library.

10. Salted egg chicken rice, at Yuan Wei Xiao Pin Mini Wok, Funan mall

11. Teriyaki chicken rice hot plate, at Sun You Japanese & Korean Food, Eunos Crescent Food Centre. Similar dishes are available at many hawker centres and kopitiams, but the Eunos one is better and cheaper than others that I've tried.

12. There are three nasi lemak places that I'm a fan of.
Husk, Bugis Cube for their sous vide beef rendang set
Yoshi's Kitchen, Toa Payoh for orange chicken karaage (first image below)
Madness Nasi Lemak, Fortune Centre (second image) for the ayam berempah set

13. Oyako donburi at Kemuri BBQ, Balestier Plaza

14. DBJ chicken at Liu Lang Mian Noodle Bar, Alexandra

15. Tenchirashi soba at Shimbashi Soba, Paragon

16. Green chilli ramen at Liu Kou Shui, Bukit Canberra Hawker Centre. They have another outlet in Woodleigh, which I haven't tried.

17. Pandan cheese minirolls by Dorisgoz, a home baker who offers free pickup at Redhill, as well as islandwide delivery for a fee

2025 New Things List

Last year I wrote a post about a few first-time experiences and new things that I tried in 2024. This year I thought I'll do the same, but whether this will become an annual tradition remains to be seen. Some of the categories are repeats from last year (food, sports, videography) while others are new.

Black chicken

I had seen black chicken on sale in wet markets, but I hadn't tried it until my friend made this stew for me. Silkie chickens, as they are called, have white feathers, but their flesh and even their bones are black. They taste like regular chicken, just a bit gamier because they are usually free-range.

60 kg (132 lbs)

One time at a house party, my friend, who was a few drinks down, was describing the ideal body type that she aspires to. Legs like X, boobs like Y, and so forth (all celebrities, though I don't remember their names). After running through the list, she paused and added one more: "And Sroyon's metabolism."

All my life, I've been lucky enough to be able eat whatever I wanted and still be a healthy weight. I was underweight in college, but for the last ten years, I've been in the 57–59 kg range. But I always told myself that if I ever hit 60 kg, I'll do something about it.

In the last two months of 2025, I was socialising and therefore eating out a lot, and not playing sports as regularly as I did before. And sure enough, in December, I clocked in at 60.4 kg.

It's not concerning by any means – I did a body composition analysis recently, which said my recommended weight is around 63 kg – but if I do gain weight, it should ideally be muscle and not fat. So now I stopped taking sugar with coffee, eating fruit for breakfast, and exercising more. Nothing drastic, but this is the first time in my life that I am actively trying to lose weight. My metabolism is still fast, but alas, not what it used to be.

Badminton coaching

As kids, many of us went to classes for music, painting, etc., but it's less common for adults – at least the adults I grew up around. But the cool thing about being a grown-up, if you are fortunate enough to have some disposable income, is that if you want to learn a skill, you can just pay someone to teach you.

I generally like to learn stuff on my own – I'm doggedly sticking to self-study for Spanish, though I know I'd make faster progress if I had a teacher – but with badminton, which I play recreationally, I realised last year that I had hit a plateau.

My friend recommended a badminton coach, and after a few sessions with Anthony, my game has improved a lot. I have more to say about it, but maybe that's a topic for another day, and a standalone post.

I like the different flavours of shuttlecock motion-blur that you can see in the sequence below: an instant of stillness at the apex, slightly blurry as it drops, and a streak as it leaves my racquet.

MRT station video advert

I've had photos displayed in public spaces, but not video. Until last year, when my friend Emiri spotted – and reacted quickly enough to record – this advert at an MRT (subway) station. It features a clip from a video which I made for Sigma Contemporary Dance. Blink and you'll miss it!

Malaysia

I went to Malaysia for the first time last year, to play pickleball in the border town of Johor Bahru. In the older parts of town I saw some interesting signage and typography. Maybe I'll compile them in another post, but meanwhile I wanted to share this one which I particularly liked – a random metal plaque outside a Commissioner for Oaths office. The Chinese text, apparently, says the same thing.

A Random List of Things I Replaced in 2025

My old phone was a Google Pixel 2 which I bought in 2020, secondhand but in excellent condition. Five years is a decent lifespan for any phone, let alone a secondhand one, but last year a purple patch appeared in a corner of the LED and slowly started bleeding across the whole screen (similar to the issue described here). Apparently a screen replacement is the only solution, so in the summer of 2025, I opted to get a whole new phone.

The latest model at the time was the Google Pixel 9, and the Pixel 10 would launch a couple of months later. My phone needs are modest, so I'm happy buying models which are a few generations older. I found a great deal on a Pixel 6a – a demo unit which had never been opened. I didn't really need a faster processor or more RAM, but I like my new phone's 0.6x wide-angle camera (example photo here), which my old phone didn't have.

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This next one is not a wholesale replacement but a partial one. The ear-pads on my Anker headphones were in a raggedy state (see below right) but I was pleased to find that you can just buy the pads separately. Unfortunately the headband padding is not replaceable, but c'est la vie. (Edit: Tomoe informs me that the headband padding is also available.)

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My first ebook reader was a Kindle 4 (2011). It's really basic – no touchscreen, backlight or wireless connectivity – but I like it, and I used it a lot. Unfortunately, ebooks from National Library Singapore are currently not Kindle-compatible, so I got a Kobo Clara BW instead.

The Kobo is also pretty basic by 2025 standards (e.g. black-and-white screen), but it has some nifty features. You can drag a finger down the left of the screen to adjust the backlight brightness, and pinch to adjust the font size. I also like that it allows for a degree of customisation, like selecting fonts, adjusting the backlight colour temperature, and choosing what certain gestures do.

The Kindle still works though! So I gave it to a friend, and I hope she gets a few more years out of it.

And that concludes this short and rather random list. I wish you, a bit belatedly, a very happy new year. Did you replace anything in 2025?

Nirvana

This viral tweet – "Saw a girl in a Franz Ferdinand t-shirt. She couldn't even name 3 other main causes of the outbreak of World War I" – reminded me of the time my Chinese friend Wu Chi (previously mentioned in this post) was wearing a Nirvana t-shirt:

I asked if she has any favourite songs, and she said "Huh? I thought it's Nirvana as in enlightenment..."

Long Take

Last year I watched Victoria (2015), a German crime thriller film which was shot in a single continuous take.

Cinephiles love to nerd out over long takes. There's a famous one at the start of Orson Welles' Touch of Evil (1958). We see someone set a time-bomb to just over three minutes and place it in a car. The camera then loosely tracks the car in real time until, just over three minutes later, the bomb goes off. The scene was referenced in another long take shot from In Bruges (2008).

Two of my favourite long takes:

1. At the start of the short film, Les Bicyclette de Belsize (1968) – also because I love bicycles, and the film makes me feel nostalgic about London.

2. At 25:40 of The Cranes Are Flying, a 1957 Soviet war drama. I'm not even sure if it counts as a long take, because it's not that long (less than a minute) and I've seen some comments saying there's an invisible cut at 26:00 as Veronika is running through the crowd, when the camera is presumably transferred to a crane. But I love the camerawork and choreography of the scene.

While we are on the subject of single-take, I have to mention One Cut of the Dead, a hilarious and heartwarming Japanese indie film from 2017 (Wikipedia; Film Crit Hulk review: both have spoilers). I believe it's on Shudder, and depending where you live, you may be able to watch it with a free 7-day trial. Highly recommended!

The Lambs Multiply on Balestier

Grassy patch in front of a restaurant in my neighbourhood (Chuan Yang Ji, specialising in lamb).

It appears that the lambs, previously featured on Dangerous Sheep and The Lamb Lies Down on Balestier, have multiplied. Three sheep and three lambs, where previously there were two and one respectively.