I’ve been shooting a lot with my new Sony A7S II over the past few weeks and recently developed a LUT that I’ve been using on all my SLog 3 footage. While I really like the A7S II, my biggest issue with it so far is the same issue I have with all of Sony’s other cameras – color science.
Sony is currently leading the way in mirrorless innovation and I have huge respect for their tremendous efforts. But while they are leading the way in many respects, their color science is still far behind the likes of Blackmagic Design or Canon.
That’s not to say you can’t get nice color results with Sony cameras, but it means you’ll have to work a little harder to achieve it. For example, on my Blackmagic URSA, if I expose the shot correctly, I can put it on a LUT in Resolve or FCP X and the image will instantly look great. On the other hand, with the A7S II, I’ve never gotten perfect results using the Sony SLog 3 LUT on any clip I’ve shot to date.
As time went on it was inevitable that I would be shooting more and more with the A7S II, so I decided to create a new LUT to replace Sony’s standard SLog 3 LUT. Of course the goal is to save ourselves a ton of time in the editing room/palette and make each shot instantly closer to the final look.
The new LUT I created is based on a hybrid of a Sony SLog 3 LUT and an Arri Alexa LUT, the former works surprisingly well with the SLog 3 material. From there, I lowered the mids a bit, made slight contrast adjustments, and warmed up the midtones a bit. I tend to find Sony’s medium/skin tones look cool, sometimes even purple, so one of my main goals with this LUT was to eliminate that problem.
The following three screenshots show the different appearances of SLog 3:
Ungraded SLog 3 footage
Sony SLog 3 LUT
Norm Kroll SLog 3 LUT
The difference between my LUT and Sony’s LUT isn’t huge, but the change is big enough to save at least a step or two in the color process when locking down the beginner level.
As is the case with any LUT, you’ll still need to fine-tune your levels to make them look perfect, but so far I’ve found that my new LUT helps me get to the finish line faster.
Download the Slog3 LUT here via my CINECOLOR platform.
And don’t forget to check out the rest of my color grading LUTs, film grain, and post-production tools!
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