How to PROPERLY Expose in Low Light - Cinematography Breakdown
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 เม.ย. 2024
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In this video, we walk you through how we expose our videos in low light situations. This is how we approach it, and it's been successful in most instances! This Cinematography breakdown covers this video we recently shot for Lunar New Years as part of a 4 part series.
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love this! will you be having masterclass courses on these & business on commercial production in near future?
We actually have a masterclass that just went live for pre-sale! It’s 200 spots at the 50% off price. We have a cohort course coming out July first! Will keep you posted
@@TenfoldProduction is the masterclass 50% still available and when does it start,?
@@PNWVISUALFILMS it’s still available! It’s in the video description! Opens in 3 weeks, May 1st.
Why aren't you using exposure index to rate the camera at 2000 or 1600 (from 2500 base) and raising your lighting levels, then bringing it down in post? You'd get much more information in your shadows and a cleaner image. You should only shoot at a higher ISO and add ND in brighter settings, not dark. You've got it backwards. You need to shift your middle grey so that you're protecting your shadows/highlights. High ISO protects the highlights, low ISO protects the shadows.
Thanks for the feedback! There are lots of ways to light projects, as mentioned this was a fast run and gun project with many moving parts, this was the most efficient approach without having to relight the entire space, especially when we knew we were likely going to crush the spots in post as well. It’s all contextual. Appreciate it though!
thought the exact same!
Most in-depth explanation of “light for space then light for face” thank you very much.
appreciate you! Much more to come!
great idea
I really like your photography teaching, it’s great
Thanks Gary!
Yes! More on step printing! Thanks for the video💪🏾💪🏾
Appreciate the support! Coming soon
love the way you give real info without the fluff
Thanks Ed! Glad you found it helpful
that ISO & ND filter exposure framework provided so much context to how you get such cinematic looks!! GGs!
Glad you found it helpful! Just a simple way to do it when you’re looking to move fast.
This was great. Yes to the advanced exposuring tutorial and the editing for shutter drag shots!
Thanks Eric! We have tons more content coming soon so def stay connected. Appreciate the support.
Yes I would love to see those transition tutorial video...
Coming soon! Thanks for supporting
I’d really like to see a video on the coloring process for this. Great work as always!!
was waiting for this one! thanks for the breakdown!
Appreciate you! Might do a more dedicated video in the future to describe all the variations and methods we use!
@@TenfoldProduction especially white balancing practicals/key lights etc. would be super helpful - of course we can push this in post as we want but with 10bit clog3 I want to get it as close to the final look (that greenish teal & orange from joker for example) as possible ;)
Nice noted! Maybe this is our next challenge haha. Appreciate the insights!
Thank you for yet another great one! The technique is very cool definitely trying it!
Thanks for the support!
I’m glad this ISO discussions keep popping up. Great explanation as well as the final look! I’m going to test these low light scenarios on my Sigma FP and BMPCC 6k Pro.
Great job man.
Appreciate the support! Lots of ways to light and get proper exposure, this works for us and hopefully you found something helpful from it.
"In terms of anything like that" this is a great tutorial! Much appreciated! 😊
Thanks so much! Appreciate you watching
Thank you very much, and Yes I would really like video dedicated on this low shutter transitions.
Definitely coming soon! Thanks for the support
Well thought out! I really benefited from this. Lighting is one of those things where there is always more to learn.
Absolutely! Thanks for watching and the support Marana.
Cinematographers should be absolute masters of exposure. Same goes for anyone in any creative field really.
It's our most common form of [proposed] payment. ;)
Very well said! Exactly, it’s truly important to get a strong understanding of it all.
@@TenfoldProduction thanks, but it was actually just a silly joke/pun... on the fact that people want to pay us in "exposure" rather than cold hard cash ;)
A tutorial on slow shutter/step printing would be awesome!
Coming soon!
Definitely yeeesss
Can’t thank you enough for this. I have learned so much from your videos. Still struggling with noise all over the place on my fx3 when trying going for low key. Still way to go. Again.. thank you so much. Definitely taking your course when I have the money.
Thanks David! Appreciate you and your support. Let us know more details about things we can help you with now. Always looking to get more dialled into the content that we create.
Freaking fantastic breakdown!
Really appreciate you Joel!
Can you made a video about color editing and Step Printing Effect editing?
Congratulations on your work, I love it 😄
Coming soon! Stay tuned, thanks Elvio
please keep going! it would be awesome to see the follow-up videos!
Thanks Alejandro! We have a lot more coming out soon!
would love to see a video on the post production process for those low shutter speed shots you were talking about!
Great video!
Appreciate you!
I need that video of the Step Printing, I love the technique and use it but I want to learn how to use it like this because I like my results but I LOVE yours!
Appreciate you! We have a backlog of videos, but we’ll get it going soon!
Love this.. would love to see your on location false color / EL Zone scopes.. good stuff..
Damn, would love to watch the full commercial 😍 Beautiful work!
Hey Jonas! All of our work is in our TH-cam! Thanks for supporting
Full dedicated vid! I got a bunch of really cool step printing Fx3 footy I haven't had a chance to edit yet - footy from a few different music videos, some anamorphic etc.
Dope! We’ll definitely dive into this in the near future. Appreciate the feedback
Love this. Thank you for sharing this. Your productions and your breakdown videos are stellar. Absolutely love them.
Couple questions: Why shoot on the Venice for the wide? Also can you share your post process for your slowed shutter work?
By the way, "Step Printing" comes from shooting film at lower than 24fps, at 8fps or 12fps, combined with a slowed shutter, and then reprinting each frame twice or thrice based on the fps that it was shot at.
Thanks for watching. We shot the Venice on the wide because it was as static shot, and the fx3 was on a gimbal. Just time saving (also we own both, so it wasn't an additional cost or anything around that).
Appreciate the knowledge, we're aware of the process, but you can say this is the new age digital + post processing version of it. We'll release a video shortly.
@@TenfoldProduction Awesome. Looking forward to the video.
Great tips! Thanks for the video. I’d love to know what your doing in post to fix the jitters you spoke of when shooting at a slower shutter speed
Well definitely release a shutter speed specific video shortly! Appreciate you
Love this video, extremely helpful! When you say the second base iso on the FX3 is cleaner what do you mean? I haven't done any scientific testing but I've found in my own footage 12800 is significantly noisier than 800, it's still clean but I've been sticking to 800 where possible. Was just curious to know more about your thoughts on it?
Hey Matt! In most cases 800 is a cleaner iso when light is available. For extremely dark scenes like this, there are two routes. If we shot this space in 800 iso, it would require us to light the entire space to get a proper exposure, this is time consuming and expensive in certain cases. For this project where we had limited time and we were going for a dark space look where only our talent was exposed. In this case, if we just exposed for the talent at 800 iso without lighting the entire space properly, the shadows would have been crushed / gone with no data to pull from.
Option 2:
We use the iso to our advantage to move faster. Raising the iso to 12800, brings our entire exposure up, which actually brings our shadows and highlights a bit too high. We then ND down to get the shadows to a place that looks good with minimal noise. Then we adjust highlights accordingly to look properly exposed for skin tones/ the look. It’s all about using the tools we have to our advantage to our benefit to move faster. We know in post how much more flexibility we have, and the images still came out clean and usable for us.
If you’re interested in getting to know more about our system, we have a lighting masterclass that’s coming out next month that dives into our systems/ processes and how we approach different spaces.
Love This! BTW is there a link to those magnets that you often speak about?
They are super clutch amzn.to/3TUq9RE (affiliate)
@@TenfoldProduction 🥹 a life saver 🙏🏾
Amazing work and explanation. Question, would you recommend using the 2nd base iso with internal ND to pull off this low light look?? To your point we can all agree that the fx6 is pretty noisy at 12800.
Thanks
Appreciate it! We’ve used the fx6 at 12800 before, it’s not the best, but it’s workable, just with a bit more grain. Definitely test it out, the concept works the same. It’s possible to keep it clean, but there are a lot of factors that need to come into play ( sorry this was so vague haha)
Thank you great one! , i'd really like video dedicated on using false colors to expose the scene and skin tones.
Thanks for the suggestion! It’s one that we’ll tackle soon!
@@TenfoldProduction would also love to see that! :)
Great video! I do exactly the same process regards to iso and ND with fx3. Could I ask how did you get the correct exposer for the light side of the face, did you use zebras at 55+-? and background at max 94? I use these zebras in Day light which works great but I'm finding it difficult exposing in this manner with slog3 at low lit scenes like this. Would you have any recommendations, like the scene more, or just use my eyes and not over expose etc...?
7:11 would love to hear more of your thought process on this! Overexposing the log image as much as possible without clipping important highlights has been a go-to method for me with the fx3 (and bringing it down in post). I’m interested to hear your approach to this using false color! (You ever using EL Zone system by chance?)
You got it, typically we just get it properly exposed or slightly over (shooting in lot, monitoring with a lut). We use false colour as it’s easy to toggle and view contrast ratios and how the light is sitting on our talent. We don’t use EL zone system. We try to keep things fairly simple as our sets move pretty quick.
What does your waveform look like for these shots? How many stops over are you shooting? Do you use a compensation LUT to check the difference? You say you step into this room and set for the room tone, but is this room completely black, no lights, so you are just setting for complete darkness? Are you then getting level from that on the sensor, or is their some ambient light in the room to start with? Are you aiming to have any shadow detail register in a black out room? When I shoot like this I start with my key level and then adjust that and my exposure to give me the ratio, I find it's a tricky balance between the brightness of my key illuminating too much of the room, which is where I start dialling in ND.
What do you use to draw on footage ? And What is your work flow for these , do you screen record whilst recording your talking head ?
Yo, great video! I’d love some insight on what tour using to watch the video and draw on the screen! Looks like photoshop and I know some people use iPad but really curious how you’re doing it! Thanks!
Hey! Yeah just photoshop, and any tablet really. Appreciate the support
@@TenfoldProduction that totally makes sense! Man, when I have a sick lighting setup, I’m following in your footsteps brother! Keep up the good work!
Such a sick breakdown! Where could we pick up those Magnets with 1/4 20's?? They sound like such a time saver
Here's a link. They are super clutch amzn.to/3TUq9RE (affiliate)
@@TenfoldProduction Let's go! Thanks!
Hey thanks for the vid. I have a question about white balance. When you choose your white balance on the venice are you matching that to the fx3? Or are you re calculating it? I've noticed with using variable nd's I get a lot of color cast and then end up compensating with white balance/ tint adjustments. I drive myself crazy thinking about these little things, don't know if they're really worth much attention lol
We match white balance between all cameras. That’s going to be the easiest. I highly suggest trying to find an nd without a shift, will save you the headache in post. Single ND’s are nice but expensive.
@@TenfoldProduction What do you reccomend? Thanks for the response, I wasn't even finished watching the video!
@@yeah700 will check shortly and get back to you.
Take a note he's using Sony Venice. You need to take in the consideration that different base ISOs affect your dynamic range, so you need to check when your camera is giving you most informations in the shadow on different ISO
Yes this is important. We use the same concept with the fx3 as well, and it’s just knowing how far you can push images for post. Takes some testing and experience.
Hi, which ND do you used?
Yes please dedicate a video to the How To of your transitions.
Thanks for the feedback! That’s a great idea.
How you set the fx3 to the higher iso with a nd filter.. would that work with the fx30 as well?
Looks like it has a second base iso of 2500, but remember we just use it as a way to help lift the shadows quickly without relighting. The difference between 800 and 2500 iso isn’t that many stops of light, so you might not need, we just use the nd filter to dial in the exposure if needed.
Awesome men!! what lens do you use?
Nikon Ais vintage lenses
@@TenfoldProduction thanks:)
If I understand this correctly, I have to turn off my Rec.709 Lut in camera to see if skintones and highlights are right. Or do I just have to turn off the Lut to determine wheter my shadows and highlights aren't clipping and for skintones I have to turn it back on? I usually look at my camera's (FX3) zebras which are set around 55IRE to get the skintones right and I have the Rec. 709 Lut turned on, is this wrong? and would also love to learn more on step printing! -and thanks for that video, super helpful as always! :)
hey Gabriel, it's all about playing within the range. If your monitor has false colour, that's a great way to view if everything is balanced and exposed. We typically always have a lut on to monitor, as working off of slog will be extremely hard to view.
If you have your rec709 lut on, toggle between your false colour to see if you highlights or shadows clip. If they are in a solid range, you can go about adjusting the lighting on your talent. Hope this made sense.
@@TenfoldProduction Thanks for the detailed response, really appreciate this. Not a lot of TH-camrs do this, so thanks a lot! I think it makes sense. Just to confirm, the highlights shouldn't clip with the log image when looking at false color? (False color obviously changes when Lut is enabled) For viewing I should switch back to the Lut after I have checked the log image with false color, right?
With the FX3, if you're properly exposed, you should be fine. There's enough dynamic range on both ends that you shouldn't have any issues. If you're using the standard rec709, you should be able to do false colour off of that. Correct, the highest range you'll want to avoid clipping. It's also very dependant on what the situation is that you're shooting. If you're shooting in a dark environment like this, you have to decide what you're exposing for to save. We wanted to save the shadows and not have them overly crushed, so we focused on exposing for shadows first, then adjusting the highlight levels for skintone.
If we're in an outdoor situation, you should be exposing the sun / brightest parts first, then adjusting / cutting light for the skintones. Hope that makes sense, it's all a balance and understanding where you want to focus on first.
@@TenfoldProduction Thanks, man! Really appreciate the response! Also just bought your Luts to support you :)
@@gabrielaaronmoser-diary appreciate you! Means a lot!!
low shutter transition video tutorial plz
Coming soon!
Is it better to use the ND filter technique instead of cine el on the fx3 in low light? I’m assuming you would have had better dynamic range using cine el without an ND.
Cine Ei is for viewing, whereas the ND changes the exposure of the log image itself. We just exposed it to where it needed to be, and it didn’t give us any issues for post.
@@TenfoldProduction Ok I see. This looks dope. I most definitely have to test this out. Keep up the great man.🙏🏾💯💪🏽
@@braxtonwoullard1188 appreciate you! Def do some testing before you test on an important shoot!
@@TenfoldProduction Most definitely man!
@@TenfoldProduction Cine EI is not just for viewing; it can also be used strategically to shift your dynamic range to the left or right to provide maximum shadow or highlight information that can later be revealed through post-production techniques.
did you shoot this in RAW? and is it possible to achieve same look in SLOG3?
Shot slog3 on both cameras, makes it very easy to match.
@@TenfoldProduction awesome thanks. Do you find it difficult to see if scene is well lit using LOG? Because you can only see it in flat color?
@@Dksupa94 we film in log, but we monitor with a lut / rec709. That way we know exactly what we’re getting.
@@TenfoldProduction thanks, is it the monitor that you reference in the video description?
Hey! Can you please explain me the ISO 500 and 2500 + 0.6 ND Logic? I don´t get it. Why you didn´t use rather an ISO like 800/1250 or something that equals the 0.6 ND Filter. You would have less noise because lower ISO and the same exposure, or what am I missing?
Hey Maya, keep in mind this method is something we tactically use when we have a very dark space, and minimal time. Your method is correct too.
If we started at an 800 iso, the blacks would be completely crushed. We wanted to have the control in post to pull it back down if we wanted to.
We decided to move up to the second base iso of 2500, as that brought all of our shadows to a properly/higher exposed level without crushing our blacks completely. That raised the the rest of our lights levels, which is why we used nd to rebalance the rest. We were exposing for the shadows first here, and then readjusting our highlights as a secondary.
Luckily the Venice has a clean noise floor, but we often do this technique with our FX3 when we shoot on probe etc. It's still a clean profile, but again this is pretty situational to Sony's and how clean their noise floor is and how easily we can clean it up in post.
If we had time on our side, we could have done the first base and lit everything up to standard, but for a majority of our projects, this method works perfectly fine.
@@TenfoldProductionbut technically you lose dynamic range in the shadows with the higher iso., because the Sensor do not get more light then bevore. So wouldn’t it be smarter to lower the iso an blast some romtone in there.
The camera have "dual" base ISO.
@@TenfoldProductionyes except adding ND makes zero sense compared to pulling down the ISO to the equivalent exposure. I have a feeling you don’t know what you’re doing.
@@Sanatas66623yes except higher ISOs are still only for outdoor or high key environments to control highlights. I have a feeling many people don’t understand this still. It doesn’t matter if you’re shooting in raw or baked in. But with baked in, it’s even worse.
For your skin tones (slog), are they still at proper exposure? Or under?
Yeah we’re always exposed, we still check our false colours before we shoot to ensure that we’re properly exposed. Will go more in-depth in another video in the future!
what was your metering on Fx3?
Either exposed dead centre, or slightly to the right.
I wish you showed the raw footage. I try shooting in dark settings and even at high base iso some shadows are just black with no info. Are you also getting some small shadows that have no info and noisy?
Yeah, likely towards the edges, but if we know that’s going to be vignetted in post for the wide, it’s not too big of an issue for us.
@@TenfoldProduction any tips on reducing noise in shadows? other than base ISO, maybe a post edit?
@@micahsmithmedia haha truthfully the best best advice is to just add more light into the scene and bring it down in post. If you’ve already shot it, then a denoiser app like neat video, but that’s pricey and can chug down your flow. If you have DaVinci resolve, their denoiser is solid.
Link to the magnet mounts?
amzn.to/3TUq9RE
juste a question you shot in log or in normal mode ??
Shot in log! Just monitored with a rec709 lut
@@TenfoldProduction ahh right i will try your advise tonight in paris street and crank the iso and use the nd
What lenses did you use for this?
Vinage Nikon Ais Lenses
Why use ND instead of increasing aperture? Just for the depth of field or is there another reason.
Apeture is a creative choice for us. It was shot at t2 and didn't want to go lower or higher. Once it's set, we make other lighting choices to adjust exposure up.
@@TenfoldProduction Ok thank you. I am shooting a dark scene like just like this tomorrow. I don't have tubes, just two aputure 200x s and some panels though. I won't be able to place them on the ceilling. Any suggestions? Great video by the way.
Hello what's the objectif ?
Hello, like this content but to me you didnt really answered the question, like i really struggle to expose in low light and i was seeking for informations on for example waveforms, i assume on the fx3 you are shooting in s-log 3? so maybeb showing the actual slog footage raw to see how it looks, with false colors, waveform etc could be a good idea, bc a lot of us (me lol) are trying this look and get a lot of noise in the shadows.
w Channel still 😘
Hey! Thanks for the feedback, if you’re interested we are doing a cinematic lighting masterclass (in our description), where we cover how to get consistent lighting across all of our images. We’ll be covering a lot more in depth and our system that we use to do it.
What 12mm do you use?
Laowa!
@@TenfoldProductionthanks! It looks awesome. I love those wide establishing shots. Thanks for your channel! Inspiring.
there's something I don't understand... Why not just go on the lower iso of the dual iso so you'll have more information in the shadows, instead of being on the dual base iso and using nd ?
800 iso in a room this dark would have our shadows completely crushed. Due to our schedule, context of the shots, and what we could control with lights, we used the second base iso as a tool to properly expose the shadows, and we controled the highlights instead. It's an easier move. They did this a ton in The Creator to light large dark scenes while moving with a small crew and minimal lights.
very helpful channel but y your logo looks like the black sun 😳
Thanks! Not sure what that is haha. Its 10 T’s folding over haha
Interesting approach at 2500ei.
Another well produced video!
I usually shoot at base ISO (or just one notch lower (eg.640) to keep more detail in shadows.
Then use a 1 stop reduction LUT and a .3 ND
Then if client wants slightly more exposure. Instead of having to change all the lighting on set. I'd just remove the .3 ND to give that extra stop quick and easy.
Appreciate you! That definitely works too, same concept but both work. We find if we’re in dark spaces, it requires more lights to get the entire room exposed. Whereas when we change our base, we’re already exposed for the shadows and just have to control the highlights. Both work, depends on the speed and shooting window of the project.
Fair enough! Keep up the great content! One of the few cinematography channels that actually has people working on Jobs out in the field rather than just "TH-camrs"@@TenfoldProduction
Who cares about an internal ND, I don't, just crew it on.
Yes, any ND filter works!
Freudian slip. You def need a crew if you’re gonna be constantly switching ND
@@Cinnovationsyea i always need 3 guys to change my nd 😂
Why would you shoot at a high iso in low light? That seems counterintuitive. I’m always shooting an iso a stop below base to clean up the shadows, especially in low key,
Thanks for the feedback