Canon Picture Styles and Film Simulations
Over the last few months, I’ve spent a lot of time testing Picture Styles – Canon’s version of Fujifilm’s in-camera film emulations.
I’m not typically a JPEG shooter. I prefer to grab my RAW files and edit them in Lightroom, but in a few cases, using film-like simulations was very efficient and convenient.
In this video, I show the results of those tests and try to explain the benefits of shooting with Picture Styles. It’s also a nice option for those Fuji users if they ever have to pick up a Canon camera and shoot film-like emulations, like their beloved Classic Chrome. Picture Styles don’t have the legacy of Fuji making its own film, but they get you pretty close.
There are two groups of Picture Styles I tested:
- Thomas Fransson’s Kodak and Fuji simulations
- Vision Wrangler’s collection of 158 Picture Styles (sadly, only available on the Cinescopophilia archive page)
Plus a Canassic (Classic) Chrome preset that’s been abandoned.
You can read my individual reviews of these picture styles:
- Classic Chrome (a Fuji classic brought to Canon)
- Kodachrome (my favorite – from the VW collection)
- T-Max black and white (from the VW collection)
- Crowdak (from Thomas Fransson)
- Pro Neigh High (from Thomas Fransson)
Canon also lets you build your own Picture Styles using the Picture Style Editor software.
Which ones have you tried? Any of them work for your style? Let me know in the comments.
May 18, 2025 @ 4:37 am
Hi Dave,
This is a great overview of picture profiles for Canon cameras! I think that more people should know about them – for one, those who’d rather pay twice or three times the amount of money for a Fujifilm camera to achieve pretty much the same effect.
Thomas Fransson’s work has been instrumental for me, and led me to the creation of my own, Fuji-inspired picture profile for Canon camers, called Cinematic Color Negative. I would love you to give it a try, and perhaps, share a few words with your audience.
https://p5v.gumroad.com/l/canon-cinematic-color-negative
The profile is completely free of charge, and while I’d be happy to get a few bucks for it down the line, for now, I’m gathering as much feedback as I can from all sorts of Canon photographers. Your will be invaluable.
Let me know what you think.
Cheers,
Preslav
May 18, 2025 @ 6:12 pm
Thanks Preslav – very generous of you, and I’d be happy to try it out!
May 21, 2025 @ 3:55 am
Many thanks, Dave! You and your audience are more than welcome. If you happen to take it out for a spin and post your results, let me know. I would love to see what you made out of it.