Fujifilm Simulations for Sony Cameras with Creative Looks
- Veres Deni Alex
- Mar 26, 2025
- 5 min read
Updated: 2 days ago
I’ve crafted a recipe for each Sony creative look to bring them closer to Fuji's base film simulations. This allows for a more familiar feel while still embracing Sony's unique color science. While these are more convenient and are great for beginners, you will get closer to Fuji's colors by using Sony's Picture Profile menu.
👉Check JPEGs of all 74 custom Picture Profile recipes!
Sony’s In-Camera Tools - What You Need to Know
Sony cameras give you two main ways to tweak your images right in-camera:
Creative Looks – These are built-in styles that adjust things like contrast, saturation, and sharpness. Quick and easy if you want to change the overall feel of your shot.
Picture Profiles – Originally made for video, but great for photos too. They let you go deeper, adjusting gamma curves, black levels, and color response. More control, more customization.
👉 Deep-dive - Sony Creative look vs Picture Profile for film recipes
Why Use In-Camera Film Recipes?
There’s a reason so many photographers love dialing in their look before they even press the shutter:
Instant Feedback – See your final look right away and tweak on the spot.
Faster Workflow – Spend less time editing, more time creating.
Consistent Results – Keep your colors and tones uniform across a whole shoot.
The Trick to Crafting Sony Film Emulation Recipes
No matter how advanced digital photography gets, it will never fully replicate the organic nature of film. Post-processing can get us close, but not perfect, so nailing a true film look in-camera is much harder due to limited customization options.
Even Fuji cameras—famous for their film simulations—are missing key tools like HSL adjustments, which would be a game-changer. Sony, on the other hand, has a slight edge with its Picture Profile menu, offering more control over color. But even with these extra settings, in-camera tools are still restrictive. These limitations make accurate film emulation more difficult, not easier—at least if the goal is true fidelity to a specific film stock. If you're just after a general film-like vibe, precision might not matter as much.
Creating recipes that actually resemble film takes a deep understanding of color science and camera settings. Given the limits of in-camera adjustments, I’ve found one powerful technique to manipulate color: combining Kelvin white balance with the Color Filter. This gives far more precise control than Auto White Balance (AWB) with a Color Filter alone. By using this method, we can push in-camera film simulations further than most people think—getting much closer to the timeless look of classic film stocks. However, for the sake of convenience, I designed the following recipes using AWB.
Exposure disclaimer
Sony is usually much brighter than Fuji, even on APS-C sized sensors. So remember to underexpose Sony by 0.3-0.7 stops to get the same kind of image as Fuji (at least on newer cameras). That's all you need to know as a starter. Now let's check the Creative look JPG recipes!
8 Free Sony Creative Look JPEG Recipes That Replicate Fuji's Base Simulations
If you like the recipes, share them with your friends!
Provia film simulation for Sony - Standard Creative Look Recipe
Contrast 0
Highlights 0
Shadows -6
Fade 0
Saturation 0
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter B0.5-M1
DROÂ Auto
Velvia film simulation for Sony - Vivid Creative Look Recipe
Contrast +3
Highlights +2
Shadows -8
Fade 0
Saturation +3
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter A1
DROÂ Auto
Astia film simulation for Sony - Portrait Creative Look Recipe
Contrast +2
Highlights 0
Shadows -9
Fade 0
Saturation 0
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter B0.5-M0.5
DROÂ Auto
Classic Chrome film simulation for Sony - Neutral Creative Look Recipe
Contrast +2
Highlights -2
Shadows -9
Fade 0
Saturation -1
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter B0.5-M1
DROÂ Auto
Pro Neg Std. Â film simulation for Sony - Portrait Creative Look Recipe
Contrast +1
Highlights 0
Shadows -4
Fade +1
Saturation -4
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter B1-M2
DROÂ Auto
Classic Negative film simulation for Sony - FL Creative Look Recipe
Contrast -1
Highlights -2
Shadows -9
Fade +1
Saturation -2
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature 8400K
Color Filter B7 M1.75
DROÂ +2
Nostalgic Neg film simulation for Sony - SH Creative Look Recipe
Contrast +5
Highlights +2
Shadows -7
Fade +1
Saturation 0
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter A1-M1
DROÂ Auto
Eterna film simulation for Sony - IN Creative Look Recipe
Contrast -7
Highlights 0
Shadows -9
Fade 0
Saturation -1
Sharpness 0
Sharpness range 1
Clarity 0
Temperature AWB: White Priority
Color Filter B0.5-M1
DRO Auto
The Drawbacks of Sony Creative Looks
A major issue with both Sony and Fujifilm cameras is that the image displayed on the rear LCD screen doesn't accurately reflect the actual JPEG file. With Sony’s Creative Looks, this mismatch is especially glaring between what you see live in the viewfinder or on the monitor and what gets recorded to the card.
Before you press the shutter, slightly overexposed skin tones look smooth, clean, and nicely pinkish in the preview. However, the moment you review the captured photo on that exact same screen, you are greeted by aggressive and unappealing color clipping. While minor color shifts can happen in the standard Picture Profile menu—such as saturated reds drifting toward yellow when sensor input hits its peak—those shifts are subtle. The clipping caused by Creative Looks is far more extreme. For anyone hoping Sony had finally solved its color processing and highlight roll-off issues with Creative Looks, the real-world results are a huge disappointment.
Creative Looks vs. Picture Profiles: Which is Better?
While Creative Looks are intuitive and pack some great built-in color profiles you can’t easily replicate in Picture Profiles—like the FL, IN, and SH modes—those perks come at a steep cost. When designing custom looks within the Creative Looks menu, I found it frustratingly limited. Because you are mostly constrained to basic color filter adjustments, you simply can't push and pull color in-camera the way you might want to.
By contrast, Sony’s Picture Profile menu offers significantly deeper control over color and tone—even surpassing Fujifilm in certain technical aspects. That doesn't make Sony superior to Fuji across the board, but when it comes to fine-tuning, Picture Profiles give you massive flexibility.
While Creative Looks are a solid, convenient tool for straight-out-of-camera (SOOC) shooting, I wouldn't be able to recreate my extensive 80+ simulation pack using them. Ultimately, you're trading convenience for refinement.
I have over 80 custom Picture Profiles that simply cannot be replicated inside Creative Looks. More importantly, Picture Profiles don't suffer from the nasty highlight roll-off, shadow banding, or harsh skin-tone color separation that plagues Creative Looks.
Want Even More Control?
If you want to take your color grading further, check out my Full Film Pack. It expands on these settings with over 80 Picture Profile recipes inspired by iconic film stocks like 1950s Kodachrome, Kodak Gold, Fujifilm Fortia 50, Kodak Vision 200T, Phoenix Harman, Kodak Portra 400, Cinestill 800, and more.
You can download the free settings below, or support the project by grabbing the full pack in the store.
Let me know what you think in the comments, thank you for reading, and see you next time!
I am trying use these creative looks on my a7cR. Where do I find Temp/ColorFilter/DRO options for each of the creative look? I dont have them in my a7cR. Greatly appreciate your help.
That's an interesting way to improve the Creative looks and leave them like that in case you need them. In a way you can have your favorite Picture profiles recipes on Memory 1,2 and 3 plus additional recipes on your Creative looks.