A7s Picture Profiles And What They Do

Erik Naso

Erik Naso

Veteran
Here is the Sony manuals description of the A7s Picture Profiles and what they actually do. I think this will help new users understand or at least try to understand what Sony says they do. I have this as a note on my iPhone just in case I want to play around in the field.

A7s Picture Profiles.

Gamma Profiles


  • Movie - Standard gamma curve for movies
  • ITU709 - Gamma curve that corresponds to ITU-709.
  • TU709(800%) – Gamma curve for confirming scenes on the assumption of shooting using [S-Log2].
  • Cine1 - Softens the contrast in dark parts and emphasizes gradation in bright parts to produce a relaxed color movie. (equivalent to HG4609G33)
  • Cine2 - Similar to [Cine1] but optimized for editing with up to 100% video signal. (equivalent to HG4600G30)
  • Cine3 - Intensifies the contrast in light and shade more than [Cine1] and[Cine2] and strengthens gradation in black.
  • Cine4 - Strengthens the contrast in dark parts more than [Cine3]. The contrast in dark parts is lower and the contrast in bright parts is higher than for
Movie - Suitable colors when [Gamma] is set to " type="application/x-shockwave-flash" pluginspage="http://www.adobe.com/go/getflashplayer" width="576" height="324" allowFullscreen="true">
 
It's good info.....I just don't know what to make of it, though! lol

I can see that shooting cine 2 is what you want for 16-235, so I think working off of that would be nice for a good SOTC profile that for certain jobs. Pro, cinema....just too many variables that I'll never have the time to fully explore. The stock profiles grade pretty close to each other outside of PP7 anyway. A little DR tossed here and there but the overall difference is pretty subtle.
 
Ha! It's very "Sony" as for what the values mean but at least it will give us some sort of understanding. I think.....

This ones my favorite. Scratches head????....

  • TU709(800%) – Gamma curve for confirming scenes on the assumption of shooting using [S-Log2].
 
709 800% is for monitoring slog2, but it doesn't make sense they even included it since you cant output slog2 to an external recorder, but monitor on the camera using 709 800%.

Maybe a future firmware upgrade ?
 
If one wanted to shoot with maximum dynamic range but without needing any grading after the fact (so no slog2), would the cine gammas offer more dr compared to the movie/709 ones, or do the cine gammas offer about the same dr but just distributed differently? I'm thinking in terms of someone that has never graded slog2 before and doesn't want to jump into that yet, but on the other hand wants to still get the most dr that they can from this camera. I was contemplating buying an A7s for video use but peoples comments on it seems to imply that the only way to get more dr compared to typical video cameras in it's price range is to record with slog2, it wasn't clear to me if the cine gammas offer any advantage there aside from just offering the same dr but customized for specific lighting situations.
 
Hey, Whenever recording externally to a monitor, what FPS can you get up to with 4k footage? Is it just 30p? or can you go up to 120? Thanks!
 
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