ISO VS Gain

[Chris Harding]

Hi Serggio

Different profiles have different ISO's ...It's actually less confusing to switch to gain rather than ISO that way regardless of the base ISO the camera will keep adding gain in 3db increments ...that will give you an idea of what iris to use and reduce shutter when using a manual lens and when it hits 21db (or 24 db if you are brave and don't mind a few noise speckles) you know it's time to either add a bit of light or use a faster lens.

Chris

[Aaron Jones Sr.]

This is an awesome thread to read through... I didn't know the difference between Gain and ISO. Now I have a little bit better understanding than I once did. Also knowing that different PP's have different range of ISO is key.

[Francisco Estrada]

21d is my limit (you hardly see any noise) but lately this hasn't been enough even with my sigma 1.8.... plus people turn away when I shine my 150LED light on them (even though its set at a low level)... : / This is not to say that the nexea50 has crappy low light performance when you compare it to other cameras.

I am probably just going to start using around 24d to 27d from now on as my limit.

The next think I need to find out is which video settings is more acceptable/least bad.

Video shot at 21d but brightness increased in post

or

Video shot at 24-27d

[Chris Harding]

Unless you are shooting a black cat at midnight F1.8 should give you an acceptable image at 21db even without any lighting. I very seldom use lights at wedding receptions! Maybe just for the first dance otherwise ambient is more than enough.

Are you sure that you are not trying to turn night into day and spoiling the ambience?? I use all my manual lenses with the camera in auto so the cam does my exposure for me. Now based on that the camera "sees" a lot of darkness so it tends to push the gain up to try and expose correctly and normally what happens is faces are overexposed! You want the peoples faces nicely exposed so I never go higher than 21db so the background retains the overall ambience and people are not blown out. You really shouldn't need a 150LED light to blind them with ...I use a 6 PowerLED light only when I have to and more often than not it's turned right down to minimum.

24db is already a tad noisy but anything past that I wouldn't say is acceptable for professional video at all! so I have never gone to 27 or 30db!!

The secret with low light footage is to have your subject nice and close and well lit and let the background go dark as it should be ....If you have gain limited to 21db and zebras at 90% and have to use light then make sure that people's faces have no zebras on them at all.

Are you using PP3 profile BTW?? That gives you an automatic gain increase of 4.5db without any noise.

Chris

[Noa Put]

I use whatever gain (or in my case iso) it takes to get the shot, I shoot a lot at 3200 iso at very dark receptions and when needed I shoot at the max iso, 6400 iso on my gh3/gh4, on my rx10 I even use 8000 iso when needed (which is about the same in performance as 6400 on my panny's.

Eventhough the camera's are noisy at those iso levels, they still look a lot cleaner then 3200 iso on the canon 550d I started shooting with, that one you couldn't use past 1600 iso. For weddings I don't have any issue shooting at those iso levels, if needed I use neatvideo. Normally the only time I sometimes need to resort to these max iso's is during the first dance, a touch of neatvideo and lifting the image further in post can do wonders.

Candle light dinners have not been a problem for me, even not with my nex-ea50 and a fast f1.4 lens, the lights from the candle are enough to light the faces of the people that are sitting close and I use a preset that is quite flat so shadows are not that crushed, makes a big difference when shooting very lowlight scenes.

The only problems is when they kill the light almost completely during a first dance.

For next year I"m going to get a light stand that can go 3 metres high and put a strong video light on it and place on the side of the dancefloor just before the first dance starts, only if the kill all the light I will light my torch and bounce the light from the ceiling or point it downwards so it doesn't blind that much. Not going to spend 3K plus for a sony a7s and lens just for those 3 minutes during a entire wedding day :)

[Chris Harding]

My feelings exactly Noa

I cannot see any justification for a Sony A7S at all as the only time I need to have a video light is when the idiots turn all the lights off ... the guests cannot see a thing so the bride has to accept that. My wedding at the end of last month caught be out though!! I was doing the first dance with the lights slightly dimmed and had decent exposure but half way through some idiot decided they should dance in the total dark ..that's what happened so that's what the bride will get.

Seriously I have never had a reception issue since I had the Sigma 18-35 F1.8 apart from the first dance where they over-dim the lights!

Chris

[Peter Rush]

Must be the UK that has a penchant for 'mood' lighting then as I find most evening receptions push my EA50 up to 24db gain (that's where I limit it) and that's with my Tamron 24-70mm f2.8 (which goes down to f2.0 with the speedbooster) the A7s has been a godsend for me. The first dance however, like you guys, seems to nowadays take place in pretty much pitch black!

[Noa Put]

There would be many situations during a first dance where even a a7s wouldn't cope in my case, sometimes they kill all the light leaving only candlelight on the tables but there is always some lights coming from the DJ's side, sometimes strong light, sometimes just a weak fill light to create some mood.

I use the steadicam to very slowly circle the couple and do the first dance in one continuous shot..When I face the dj I have his lights pointing towards me with no light coming from my back so the couple would only appear as a silhouette against those lights with no detail in them. If I would have a camera like the a7s and expose so I can see the couple the lights from the dj would overexpose, not much of an issue but will become one once I circle further until I have the lights of the dj in my back and facing the couple , they will become totally overexposed with no way to correct on a steadicam without noticing.

So in my situation a a7s would be useless as well and adding my own lights on the dark side would be a better solution as I would create a more balanced lightsource which would allow no exposure changes.

[Peter Rush]

Hi Noa - I've only tried that type of shot once and after 30 seconds or so the DJ got the rest of the wedding party to join them and I was pushed pretty much out the way - I had to dump the Merlin pronto and film the rest as I normally would - more and more I'm lucky to get a minute at best before everyone else joins in. I also have issues with the couple 'dancing' right on the edge of the dancefloor so a roundy shot with the Merlin would be impossible anyway - I just play it safe these days - sorry that was a little off topic :/

[Noa Put]

I think the topic starter question has been answered and we are still talking about gain or iso :)

Another example when they take in the cake, then also kill all light but I never can go higher then 1600iso as the sparkles on the cake would overexpose the faces of the couple when they cut the cake.

Otoh, I'd love to have a a7s with a fast prime just for my creative shots :)

[Roger Gunkel]

Once we get into the 'dark' part of the reception, I keep a 132 led dimmable light handy on my double tripod mount, so that if someone decides to lower the lights I can always resort to my own light as a fill, rather than trying to increase the gain too much.

Roger

[Chris Harding]

The wedding we shot yesterday was a budget affair in a sports hall and one could either have all the lights on or none on! Luckily for me they decided to have them all on!

I not only left my speeches lighting kit in the car but also my on camera light. Ok, it doesn't create an event mood but shucks, shooting was a breeze!!

I still zap my on camera light on the B-Cam for the first dance in case I need it as some event co-ordinators don't know the difference between "dimmed" and "dark"

Then again the wedding I'm doing on the 8th of next month has fancy light controllers and a professional theatre spot focussed on the speeches lectern. Easy peasy for that venue!! I could of course still have to use the on=cam light for the first dance!

Chris