Cine1, 2, 3, 4...What's The Difference?!

Have you ever wondered what the difference is between the four cine profiles available in the Sony Alpha cameras? I think most Alpha camera users are familiar with the pretty obvious differences between SLOG2 and 3 profiles compared with all the others, but at first glance the cine profiles may all seem quite similar. So I thought it was high time I...and in turn you guys, learn about these four profiles.

I wanted to find out which has the most dynamic range, which is the most contrasty and in what situation you would use one profile over the others...enjoy and I hope you find it helpful

Please leave your thoughts in the comments below, let's help each other out and shoot better video together

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⬇️ GEAR I USE TO MAKE THESE VIDEOS ⬇️

[HarvVideoAudioStuff]

I hope you guys find this helpful, PP settings were set to 0 for everything and I used the Cinema colour space...enjoy :)

[above-us-only-sky]

I never NEVER comment on vids like these. But I genuinely feel like you actually give a shit. Being a cinematographer I know how long and borish these vids are to make. But I really appreciated your input. This is valuable info for those of us who have recently made the switch to Sony mirrorless. There's next to no info from Sony about this stuff. Anyway. Thanks for doing what you do.

[ARickyRodriguez]

I agree, I have a Sony FS 700R and when shooting mostly outdoor shoot I use this following profile setting in Outdoors / high contrast situations and to control the shadow details : Gamma: Cine 4, Black Level: +4, Black Gamma: Middle, +4, Knee: 90, Slope: +2, Color Mode: Pro, Level 8, Color Level:-2, Detail: -4, and The rest is default.

For lowlight situations believe it or not, I turn to Cine1 at a setting of Gamma: Cine1, Black level: 0, Black Gamma: Middle, 0, Knee: 90, Slope: +2, Color Mode: Pro, Level: 8, Color Level: 0, Detail: -4, and the rest is as is. I used the cinegama1 for lowlight not cine2 because I love how it looks into the shadows.

Anyways awesome test video. Thank you for posting, keep them coming it motivates millians.

[andrewtaylor]

Cine2 is the same curve as Cine1 but it's compressed to fit into the 0-100 range. If you shoot Cine1 and bring down the whites it'll recover some of the blown highlights and look the same as Cine2.

[_rhapsodist]

I use cine 4 for daytime and cine 2 for night time as a general rule, it seems to work well

[davidmultimedia]

YES! Finally someone confirming what I believe (Cine 2 has more DR than Cine 4).
Everybody says that Cine 4 has more dynamic range, but I found that it doesn't hold as much information in the highlights and it makes skintones look unnatural with yellow spots...
Cine 2 makes the smoothest skintones, and is the closest Sony profile to EOSHD Pro Colors (based on my experience).
Also, the lowest ISO setting with Cine 2 is 100, while Cine 4 is 200.

I just made a fishing trip movie using my modified version of EOSHD Pro Colors (with SLOG2) and my Genustech Eclipse variable ND filter to control the depth of field... and it looks AMAZING!
Once color graded, and with the addition of film grain... it seriously looks like a real film camera (I could almost insert a new scene in JAWS lol).
The EOSHD Pro Colors makes the skintones looks way better and smoother (less sharp details like a real film camera) and the SLOG2 profile give me a lot of flexibility (HDR).
I wonder what the results would have been if I was using EOSHD Pro Colors (with Cine 2) ... Of course, the image would be a little cleaner with ISO100, but I not sure if I would miss the extra DR that SLOG2 gives me.

Anyways... as always, great video Harv and thanks for sharing those tests! :)

[davidlekes]

Cine 2 vs. Slog 2. That will be really cool.

[FunWithTheBugs]

Very helpful videos. Recently picked up a Sony a6300 and your channel has some great info. Subbed you yesterday but just wanted to say thanks.

[johnmullins]

What a great demonstration of the different Sony cine profiles. I really like the way you put things together, thanks!

[lukewoodwardfilmslwfilms]

Another great video Harv, I love how you tend to answer questions that people naturally have about these cameras. I would love for you to do another similar video in the context of low light comparisons and how they each handle noise at a "realistic" high ISO, not 250, 000 but maybe between 20k-50k. Thanks for all the great content!

[benjaminfargen]

Rocking good!!!...thanks for making the time to do these...some of the best and most useful vids on Sony PP!!!

[EddyReckless]

I did the same test and cine 4 even at higher base iso (200) keeps highlights better than cine2 (iso100) with the same exposure. The higher max level on cine 4 (109) allows me to recover even more higlights in post, meanwhile cine 2 has a hard cut on the whites (better for night scene I guess or if you dont want to edit a lot). Finally, if you mod black level on cine 4 you can achieve something really similar to slog2. I have my video test on youtube but only in spanish. I really love to see neardy tests so keep doing your stuff 🎉

[Yoyoman]

I think your audio is better than any other filmmaking channel's. #RealTalk

[justingooch]

Harv, thank you for this, really clear insight and good tests. Best wishes to you

[byProvings]

I’ve done similar tests and also found Cine 2 to work best. I use it any time I don’t have an ND filter handy for Slog-2 and also for lower light situations.

[leomartin]

Brilliant and always new things learned! Appreciate it Harv!

[fotosvond_]

This is really interesting. Using Cine profiles is somewhere in the middle between setting creative mode Std to contrast -3 (which still retains a lot of contrast) and using Slog2 for maximum "flat" look (which is obviously the absolute best in terms of DR, but takes more time).
What bothers me, however, is the way you have to work with these Cine gammas. I prefer shadow handling on Cine 1 and 2, but they always tend to look greyish and greyish-flat on the whole image. Can't really describe it properly. Cine 4 on the other hand is a lot easier to work with. What I did is I set black level to +10 on Cine4 and expose for the highlights with slight tweaks to exposure/shadows/colour saturation in post. That works quite well. I got to this when I was watching videos of people trying to fake S-Cinetone on A7 3rd generation bodies which involved Cine4, but somehow these guys even dialed black level down to -10 which for my feeling is really crazy because Cine4 already offers plenty of contrast.

[hackit]

OMG Thanks for doing this. I've been shooting Cine4 with good results, but it's taken a lot of time just testing the various color spaces in Cine4 alone to get my 'look' right. Big time saver, Harv!

[CarFinanceSimplified]

Great vid as always - will get testing Cine2 on my A7S.

[SonicParkour]

You're the best! Thanks so much man, we all really really appreciate it.