Hi,
In the one above i was only about 18 inches away,used program mode and flash went off.
Its not quite as bad outside depending how bright it is, the first one in snow is reasonable, but second one taken today isn,t very good.(before he bit me)
It was taken again in program mode, iso set at 200 and flash used.
ps i know he,s not looking at camera but at the time thought it would be a good pic of him investigating the coconut feeder, maybe not lol.

You could go for installing better/more customisable firmware...

Apart from that, I'm a Fuji fan too. I've got a similar model to TomtheLurcher and it's great!