VSCO vs Legendary Presets: Lightroom Film Comparison

If you’ve been searching for the best film presets for Lightroom, two names keep coming up: VSCO and Legendary Presets. They both cover Kodak, Fuji, and Agfa film stocks. They both work in Lightroom. But they’re built on different philosophies, sold differently, and they suit different types of photographers.

This comparison covers what each actually delivers – film stock range, colour accuracy, how they’re sold, and where each one falls short. No vague claims. Just the differences that matter when you’re choosing how to edit your work.

Key Takeaways

• VSCO Film 02 for Lightroom relaunched in February 2026 and closed again on March 31, 2026 – it’s currently unavailable for download
• VSCO’s Lightroom presets have been discontinued twice and are tied to an ongoing subscription you don’t own
• Legendary Presets covers 30+ film stocks across Agfa, Fuji, and Kodak – you buy once and own permanently
• VSCO covers a narrower range (primarily Portra and Superia variants, plus Ilford Delta 3200) in its Lightroom offering
• Both products work on RAW and JPEG in Lightroom Classic and Mobile
• The right choice depends on whether you want an ecosystem or a focused film library

 Background 

What VSCO Actually Is in 2026

Most photographers think of VSCO as a mobile editing app. That’s accurate, but it’s only part of the picture. VSCO is a platform – a subscription-based creative community that includes a photo editing app, video tools, a website builder, client galleries, and more. VSCO Pro starts at $19.99 per year and includes 50+ film preset packs, AI background removal, HSL editing, and ad-free use across devices.

The confusion about VSCO’s Lightroom presets is understandable because their availability has been inconsistent. VSCO discontinued its classic Lightroom presets back in March 2019, frustrating many photographers who had paid up to $119 for the packs. Then, in February 2026, VSCO launched Film 02 – one of its most beloved preset packs – back into Lightroom as a limited release for Pro subscribers. That release closed on March 31, 2026, and VSCO’s Lightroom preset page now states the presets are no longer available for download.

That history matters. It means if you built a Lightroom workflow around VSCO presets before 2019, they stopped being supported. If you downloaded Film 02 in early 2026, you have them – but updates, new camera profiles, and continued access aren’t guaranteed. VSCO’s support documentation explicitly states that compatibility of their presets with newer operating systems, Adobe software, or newly released cameras is not guaranteed.

For the mobile app, the situation is different and more stable. VSCO offers over 40 film presets in its app designed to emulate film stocks like Kodachrome, Kodak Portra, and Fuji Velvia, along with dozens of modern filters. If you edit primarily on your phone, VSCO is a serious tool with a long track record.

 Background 

What Legendary Presets Is

Legendary Presets is a dedicated film preset library for Adobe Lightroom, built specifically around the colour science of real film stocks. We’ve been building presets since 2021, working from scanned film reference images rather than approximating from memory. The library covers 30+ film stocks across three brands – Agfa, Fuji, and Kodak – plus a dedicated black and white range.

Every pack ships as permanent .xmp files for Lightroom Classic and DNG files for Lightroom Mobile. You buy them once. There’s no subscription, no platform, no community features. Just presets for Lightroom, built to behave like the films they’re named after.

 Comparsion 

Film Stock Coverage: What Each One Has

This is where the practical differences start.

The VSCO Lightroom preset library – when available – focuses tightly on Portra variants and a handful of Fuji Superia and Ilford stocks. That’s a strong lineup for portrait and wedding photographers, but it leaves out most of the Kodak colour range, the entire Agfa catalogue, Fuji’s slide films, and the professional Fuji portrait range.

The VSCO mobile app has broader film coverage, but mobile app filters and Lightroom presets are different workflows. If you shoot RAW and edit in Lightroom Classic, the app filters don’t directly translate.

 Colors 

The Color Accuracy Question

This is where opinions genuinely differ, and it’s worth being direct about what each approach does.

VSCO’s film presets have always been described as “inspired by” rather than precise emulations. VSCO’s own photography evangelist, Zach Hodges, described Film 02 as having “a variety of really nice looks, from clean and pretty to grainy and faded” – emphasising character and inaccuracies as features rather than claiming scientific accuracy. That’s an honest characterisation. VSCO presets – particularly the iconic A4 and A6 – became the signature “Instagram film look” of the 2010s precisely because they had a recognisable aesthetic, not because they were faithful reproductions of specific film stocks.

The lifted blacks, faded shadows, and cross-processed color shifts in VSCO’s aesthetic presets are deliberate stylistic choices. They look great on social media and have defined a generation of photography editing. But if you put a VSCO Portra 400 preset next to a scanned Portra 400 negative and compare them directly, the color science – the shadow tone, the highlight rendering, the HSL response per channel – doesn’t closely match the film.

At Legendary Presets, we built our presets differently. Every film stock was matched against scanned reference images – actual negatives and slides developed and scanned, then used as reference targets. We measured the per-channel tone curves, the HSL response at different exposure levels, and the grain structure at native ISO. Then we built Lightroom settings to match those measurements as closely as the develop module allows.

The result is a preset that behaves more like the film when you adjust it. When you pull down the shadows on a Legendary Kodak Portra 400 preset, you get the warm brown-green shadow tone that Portra produces – not a generic darkening. When you push the exposure, the highlights roll off the way Portra’s T-grain emulsion rolls off. That behaviour is the difference between a stylistic interpretation and a film emulation.

Neither approach is wrong. They’re solving different problems. VSCO at its best creates a consistent, beautiful aesthetic. Legendary Presets at its best creates a starting point that behaves like the film it’s named after.

 Fundamentals 

Pricing and Ownership: The Fundamental Difference

This is the comparison that matters most for working photographers making a long-term decision.

The ownership question is the clearest distinguishing factor. When you buy a Legendary Presets pack, the .xmp files are yours. They sit in your Lightroom preset library and work regardless of whether our website is still running in five years, whether you have an internet connection, or whether any subscription is current. VSCO’s own documentation states that previous purchasers of VSCO Film presets before 2019 lost access when those packs were discontinued – refunds and exchanges were not available.

That happened once. There’s no reason to assume it won’t happen again – VSCO has already discontinued their Lightroom presets twice.

For a working photographer who builds a client-facing workflow around specific presets, the ownership question isn’t abstract. If a wedding photographer’s signature look comes from a specific preset, the idea of that preset becoming unavailable mid-season is a real business risk.

 VSCO 

Where VSCO has an Advantage

This is a comparison article, which means being honest about where VSCO wins.

Camera-specific profiles. VSCO Film 02 includes camera-specific profiles for popular models from Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fujifilm, Ricoh, and Leica. These profiles calibrate the preset’s color response to the specific sensor in your camera, which means a Sony A7R V and a Canon R5 will produce more consistent results from the same preset. Legendary Presets uses standard profiles that work well across cameras but don’t have this level of per-sensor calibration.

The mobile app ecosystem. If you edit primarily on your phone, VSCO’s app is genuinely excellent – a well-designed editing environment with a large filter library, HSL tools, and a creative community. Legendary Presets is a Lightroom product. If you don’t use Lightroom, VSCO is the right choice.

The aesthetic presets. VSCO’s non-film presets – A4, A6, C1, G3, and the rest – are polished, distinctive, and genuinely useful for social media editing. Legendary Presets doesn’t have an equivalent range of general-purpose aesthetic presets. We focus entirely on film stock emulation.

Ilford coverage. VSCO Film 02 includes Ilford Delta 3200, which Legendary Presets doesn’t currently cover. For black and white photographers who specifically want the Delta 3200 look, that’s a meaningful gap.

 Final Question 

Who Should Use Which

Choose Legendary Presets if: You shoot RAW and edit in Lightroom Classic or Mobile. You want film stock accuracy rather than a generalised film aesthetic. You shoot portrait, wedding, travel, or documentary work where specific color science matters. You want to own your presets permanently without subscription exposure. You work with Agfa stocks, Kodak’s full color range, or the Fuji professional portrait series – none of which are available in VSCO’s current Lightroom offering.

Choose VSCO if: You edit primarily on mobile and want a full-featured app with a large preset library. You want camera-specific color calibration for your sensor. You want the classic VSCO aesthetic presets (A-series, C-series, G-series) alongside the film stocks. You want Ilford Delta 3200 specifically. You’re comfortable with a subscription model and the uncertainty that comes with VSCO’s track record of discontinuing Lightroom products.

Consider both if: You use Lightroom for serious client work and VSCO for quick mobile edits. The two products don’t overlap much in practice – VSCO mobile for social media and fast turnaround, Legendary Presets in Lightroom for RAW editing and client deliverables.

 Summary 

The Bottom Line

VSCO built its reputation on making film photography accessible to mobile photographers, and it did that job well. The A-series presets shaped how an entire generation edits photos. But VSCO’s Lightroom preset offering has been unreliable – discontinued in 2019, relaunched in February 2026, closed again by March 31, 2026. As of April 2026, you cannot download VSCO Film presets for Lightroom.

Legendary Presets is narrower in scope – it’s a Lightroom film emulation library, not a platform – but that focus is the point. Thirty film stocks, built from reference scans, sold as files you own. The Kodak Portra Collection, the Fujifilm Pro Bundle, the Agfa Bundle – each one is a specific answer to a specific color science question, not a subscription you pay for indefinitely.

If the film stock your work depends on isn’t in VSCO’s currently-available Lightroom library – and right now there is no currently-available VSCO Lightroom library – the choice makes itself.