Sony has mapped out its VENICE 2 Firmware roadmap up until Version 6.0 in 2027, but one of the most intriguing aspects of the newly launched Version 4.0 is the introduction of the EL Zone exposure system.
Sony is currently right on track with its VENICE 2 upgrade roadmap. It said that Version 4 would drop in August 2025, and it actually cranked it out a couple of days early on July 30.
The new software adds support for CBK-3621XS Camera Extension System, otherwise known as the VENICE Extension System Mini, and the ability to display frame lines in different colors, simplifying the ability to shoot images for multiple delivery formats. There are also advances in the usual catch all categories of ‘improved usability and operability’ and ‘other improved functions’, but it is the promised introduction of the EL Zone System that really catches the eye.
The EL Zone System was developed by cinematographer Ed Lachman, ASC, and is very much standing on the shoulders of giants in that it is an evolution of the Ansel Adams Zone System developed by landscape photography giant Adams and Fred Archer in the 1940s. This, as you probably know, divides an image into tonal zones, where Zone 0 is pure black with no detail and Zone X is pure white with no detail. Lachman’s system in turn takes 18% grey as its starting point and then uses a colour-coded overlay to display exposure in stop values relative to this.
Here it is being demonstrated by Lachman on the Inner Circle Podcast a couple of years ago.
Tl;dr? It’s similar to false color, but it’s more exact and allows for greater consistency. Lachman says it “corrects what's needed to be fixed in False Color and IRE, Waveform Monitors' limited ability in mapping the exposure in details of the images,” and lists three advantages of the system when used in cameras.
1. Using the original raw sensor data, you get the best representation of how the camera reacts to individual stops. Especially with the extremes there is the advantage in accuracy, compared to monitoring signals.
2. There’s less room for user error for set-up
3. Exposure latitude is tailored to an individual camera's sensor
So, why isn’t it used everywhere?
“I came up with this idea with what I understood exposure to be based on over 50 years ago when I was a student in film school to control my negative and look,” he writes. “What I learned in the analog world, I have presented to digital camera manufacturers. Over a number of years they've given me tacit acknowledgement but it's been an uphill climb because they didn't want to change from their IRE and False Color (in which there is no consistency or standard) though they recognized the problems that I set forth. One camera manufacturer even said to me that the EL Zone won't sell any more cameras for them. Their system was fine. My answer would be false color equals "false exposure”…"
Despite this pushback, the EL Zone System is slowly gaining traction. SmallHD introduced it into its monitor range with the PageOS 5 firmware update, all Atomos Ninja monitor-recorders support it, and in terms of cameras it’s been available on Panasonic VariCam LT and 35 since a 2021 firmware update, the SIGMA fp L and fp became the first mirrorless cameras to incorporate EL Zone in 2023, and now you can use it on the VENICE 2.
There’s more to come as well. A proprietary EL Zone System app is forthcoming in 2025 and Lachman states that “discussions are ongoing with ARRI, RED, Blackmagic, Fuji and Canon.” Watch this space.