A 21-year-old man sentenced to 14 months' imprisonment for filming and uploading acts of animal cruelty to social media has been released into the community after serving less than three months behind bars.

Jet Jai Johnson successfully appealed his sentence in the Broken Hill District Court on Friday, with Judge Clive Jeffreys reducing the remainder of his sentence to nine months to be served in the community under an intensive correctional order.

The Broken Hill station hand was originally sentenced on July 30 after pleading guilty to five separate acts of animal cruelty with a non-parole period of six months.

Johnson filmed himself committing offences against native animals and livestock, including a kangaroo, a joey and three kid goats.

The videos were shared widely on social media, one of which showed him performing a run-up kick on a young kid.

Defence barrister Rebecca Mitchell described the original sentence as "stern" and presented a psychological report suggesting Johnson likely suffered from ADHD.

"Two-and-a-half months in custody has been a significant wake-up," Ms Mitchell told the court.

"He has very good prospects of rehabilitation and he is unlikely to reoffend, and he has expressed a lot of remorse."

The defence supplied character references from Johnson's employer at the time, who described his actions as out of character and stated that he loved animals.

The court heard a former employer had offered Johnson immediate employment in a position "away from animals".

In delivering his decision, Judge Jeffreys took into account several factors, including Johnson's age of 20 when he uploaded the videos, noting that males do not intellectually mature until their early 20s.

The judge also noted it was unclear when Johnson actually committed the offences.

"It's been a wake-up call. He had to celebrate his 21st birthday in custody," Judge Jeffreys said.

"As a result of these offences and the great deal of publicity, the appellant lost his employment and will not be able to return to that sort of work – animal husbandry."

The judge acknowledged that Johnson's previous work in animal husbandry, which included euthanasing animals, may have led to desensitisation.

"He became desensitised. That is not an excuse, but needs to be taken into account," Judge Jeffreys said.

Under the intensive correctional order, Johnson must not commit any offence and must continue seeing his psychologist.

Friends and family who attended the hearing embraced each other as news of his release was announced.