FUJIFILM Fujikina NYC 2026 Recap – Real Images, Real Community, and No AI Talk

by Nino LeitnerToday

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I flew to New York for FUJIFILM’s Fujikina NYC 2026 with no shoot, no interviews and no schedule, just a camera and three days on the Lower East Side. What I found was a photography festival where nobody talked about AI, and where more than three quarters of the visitors were new to FUJIFILM, according to the company’s own numbers.

This was a strange trip for me. I travel a lot for CineD, to trade shows, press events and shoots, and that usually means a calendar packed from breakfast to midnight. This time, FUJIFILM invited us to Fujikina NYC 2026, a three-day community festival of photography from October 16 to 18, and my only job was to take it all in. If you read my preview of the program a few weeks ago, you know I went through every bookable session before the trip. On site, I mostly left the plan in my pocket.

A $10 ticket and nine venues

The format is simple. A $10 Experience Pass got you into most of the festival, and some of the workshops and photowalks cost a small extra fee. Everything happened in nine venues spread across a few blocks of the Lower East Side, with the FUJIFILM Brand House at the center.

On my first day, I was told that more than 6,500 people had signed up and that around 70% of them had never been in contact with FUJIFILM before. The final numbers that FUJIFILM sent me after the event are even higher: 7,564 tickets sold, and more than three quarters of the visitors were new to the company. For a brand that has been in the photography business for as long as FUJIFILM, that is remarkable, and in my opinion it is the most important number of the whole weekend.

The FUJIFILM Brand House was the center of Fujikina NYC. Image credit: Nino Leitner (CineD)

Jonas Rask and the photographers behind the program

FUJIFILM hosted dozens of talks, workshops and presentations, with a strong focus on street photography, and according to the company, almost every bookable session was fully booked.

The person who impressed me most was Jonas Rask. He is a Danish street photographer and, in his day job, a medical doctor. He also shoots FUJIFILM’s product images, and has done so since 2019. But what people really know him for is his street photography: double exposures, and a very precise eye for shape and form. Take a look at his portfolio and you will see what I mean. That he does all of this on the side, just for the fun of it, is amazing to me.

Jonas is only one example of the many talented photographers and filmmakers who presented their work and their methods at Fujikina.

Photowalks, and why I took photos again

What I liked most about the format is that the inspiration does not stay in the lecture room. The photowalks take you straight out into the city, often with the same photographer you just listened to. After the first day, I was one of those inspired visitors myself. For the first time in years, I walked the streets of a city with a camera and no plan, no shot list and no client. I simply had fun taking photos again.

Meeting so many people with the same interest in one place gets your creativity going like nothing else.

A street fair, and free camera loans

On Saturday, the festival closed an entire street, Ludlow Street, for a street fair. There were circus performers that you could photograph or film, and a number of tents from photography and filmmaking accessory manufacturers.

But this was not a trade show. Nobody really talked about gear. The conversations were about the photos, about the community, and about having something to say with your images.

Gear was still there, of course, for the people who wanted it. At the Brand House, visitors could borrow FUJIFILM cameras and lenses free of charge and use them during the festival. People loved that. (FUJIFILM, if you are reading this: next time, a corner with the GFX ETERNA 55 and the ETERNA ProRemote app for the video people would be very welcome.)

ICP, World Press Photo and the exhibitions

What makes the event more than pretty pictures and good vibes is the partners. The most important ones were the International Center of Photography (ICP), Magnum Photos, World Press Photo and FotoFest. ICP was itself one of the nine venues, which was very practical.

Some of the exhibitions celebrate FUJIFILM’s own history, such as 15 Years of X Series. Others deal with some of the most urgent social issues of our time, for example Laia Abril’s exhibition at ICP, On Rape and Institutional Failure, and the World Press Photo Exhibition 2026.

During the festival, World Press Photo also announced an extended strategic partnership with FUJIFILM. The point of it is to support photojournalism around the world, and to show reality as it is in an increasingly unstable world. I think that matters a lot right now.

Not a single word about AI

Here is the thing I keep thinking about since I came back. This was 100% an event about real connections and real images. In three days, I did not hear the word AI once. Nobody ignored the topic on purpose. People simply did not care, because nothing beats getting together like this, everyone with their own style and their own perspective on the world, and with a lot of respect for each other and for human creation in particular.

In my opinion, this is very much in line with FUJIFILM’s philosophy, and you could see it in everything they did there. The festival was not about the technology. It was about using that technology to make images that mean something, and about building connections between the people who make them. We recently wrote about how Canon, Nikon, Sony and FUJIFILM see the future of cameras and AI, and in New York I saw one possible answer in practice.

Yes, AI has a huge influence on our jobs, in photography and in filmmaking. I do not want to pretend otherwise. But my feeling is that even average viewers prefer real images, and a festival like this one shows that a lot of people want real images, real connections and real community. In a world that becomes more artificial every day, going back to the roots looks like the way forward to me, and FUJIFILM is celebrating exactly that.

What comes next

FUJIFILM sees the festival as a start. According to the company, it wants to keep building the photography community in New York with local partners such as ICP, and take the same approach to other US cities with Create With Us: On Tour, its regional event series. Photographers Reuben Wu, Casey Cavanaugh and Jonas Rask all told FUJIFILM that Fujikina NYC was the best photography festival ever held in the US. For my part, I came back home more inspired for my own creative work than I have been in a long time, and I can’t wait to get back out there and shoot more.

My advice to FUJIFILM, and honestly to the whole industry: do more events like this. Don’t focus on the tech. Focus on the community, on the connections, and on learning from each other. That has always worked, and it still works in 2026.

A big thank you also goes to my wife, Anita. When I travel like this, the real work waits at home with the kids, and she makes it possible for me to live my passion.

Have you been to a Fujikina event, in New York or in Europe, or would you go to one? Let me know what you think in the comments below!