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RED ONE outdoor night filming

J

Jonathan Goggin

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Hi I am a newbee to this, I have owned my RED ONE since july and have been learning a lot. QUESTION: I have been shooting night shoots with a generator and three 110-130v 500w lights, its all I have. I have noticed I have to turn the ISO setting super high in the thousands, and the white balance way up there to, just to see anything . Using my 10-100mm zoom wide-angle I opened the shutter all the way, but the shot still needs more, really dull and kinda orange looking. Is there anything I can do to improve what I am already doing??? Besides bye more lights. I use a Sony 700v also in these spots a night and the camera on auto white balance lets in plenty of light and shot looks great . PLEASE HELP ME

Rookie Red:
JGoggin
 
I recommend using faster primes, something around T1.4
And with your lighting, get it as close to the subject as you can, light drops off quickly the further away you have it..
Also try not have the iso too high as the image becomes noisy. 1600iso is usually the max i'd go.
 
I recommend using faster primes to.
I use Samyang lens for my night shooting.
You can also use black shading calibration :
http://www.red.com/learn/red-101/black-shading-calibration
This thread can interest you :
http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?108220-Scarlet-amp-Samyang-Low-Light-test



P.S : last year, I have do a outdoor night short movie with just a nex-VG20 (nominal iso is 200 and format is AVCHD), one littre chinese light panel and a fast lens, and the picture is not so horrible.
https://vimeo.com/61750720
With red one with sensor at 800 ISO, RAW, real lighitng, fast lens and real post production, you should have good result in outdoor night :-)

P.P.S :
This two thread can help you :
http://reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?102212-Cooke-Panchros-and-the-MX-on-a-Night-Shoot
http://www.reduser.net/forum/showthread.php?36441-Exposing-Night-Interiors-Exteriors
 
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If you happen to have a shot that doesn't have much movement in it (i.e. night street or landscape with no traffic; talent sitting still etc) you can also "cheat" by varispeeding to a lower frame rate, possibly coupled with a wider shutter angle. Shooting at 6 fps with a 360 degree shutter will give you a whopping three stops more light from the norm. If the conditions are exactly right you can get some amazing images that way. But obviously this only works in some very specific circumstances... and handheld is not an option. :smile5:
 
Thank you for all the help, I have a PL mount set up on my RED ONE so does Samyung have that option ?? I am filming snowboarding in the street so lots of fast motion action. So low frame rate will not work for me on this project, I agree iso should be low because there is a lot of noise above that. My best bet would be to have lights on features I am filming and also have a light near me in field to let more light into the camera, or get real close with like a fish eye lens so i get the light from the feature lights set up, as my main focus is getting the rider on feature with best light possible. Am I correct in this assumption ?? Thank you all for your help, as I am a beginner having fun learning. Anything else you all can think of let me know asap. Thanks again.
JGoggin
 
Yep, probably not much to add to Russell and Guillaume's advice above - more light on the subject and faster lenses, no magic bullet beyond that... If you're on PL you could look into renting some fast primes for your shoots. Getting to around T1.4 will definitely make a big difference.

For great bang on a limited buck, I could suggest 1000W theatrical PAR64 cans - these are dirt cheap, lightweight and available with swappable lamps for different beam widths. 500W lamps are also available for them. You can do a lot with a few of these and some reflectors.

For example, here is a teaser for a piece I have in post at the moment which I think came out quite nicely on a very lightweight lighting package. The interior shots are lit with 2 or 3 PAR cans and nothing else except for some daylight leaking in at the far end of the hall. The snow shots are lit with a single 1000W open-face worklight (and 40 flame pots, granted). The brief clip in the rain towards the end is just two cars with headlights on high beam. ;)


http://vimeo.com/61634112

Good luck!
 
Hi Jonathan,

You're getting exactly the right advice by the members in here. Use a fast prime for low light shooting. Also, unless you have a really great zoom lens, I'd generally be careful about shooting wide at maximum aperture. The lens may not offer optimal optical performance at maximum aperture.

Cheers,
Christian (producer, corporate films in Denmark)
 
Sweet thank you to all that have helped, I am saving up for the 300mm prime lens, I agree my zoom at high aperture is ok but not great. So I have decided to just get bigger light set ups, I have just ordered 3 200w LED portable lights natural white light with bridgelux chips, what do you all think about this?? What would be my best setting for LED night shooting??
 
Lots of advice about faster lenses. This can be deceptive. Yes, a faster lens will give you more light and what you need is more light. From a lens, no. From the camera sensor at the same T stop, yes.

T1.4 is going to give you shallower depth of field. Think of aperture as your depth of field. The lower the number, the shallower the depth of field. I made the same mistake.

Here's an example why "using a faster lens" as the answer to your lowlight problems can be deceiving.
Yes, you'll get more light than T2.8 appeture. Two extra stops of light, which doubles with each stop. T2.0 is double the light of T2.8. T1.3 is double the light of T2.0.

Shooting your lens at 50mm...

Your shooting a moving target, at what, ten feet away? On a T2.8 lens, which is probably the lowest range on your lens, you have 20" of critical focus. That's the spot where you subject is totally in focus, the image is sharp.

The same scene, given the same lighting, shot at T1.3 at ten feet away gives you a critical focus window of 9." That's a hard target to pull focus on. This principal is only compounded when you use a longer focal length.

At 9 feet, on an 18mm (T1.3) you can have 52.5" DOF window.
At 9 feet with an 85mm (T1.3) your window is only 2.17."

Back to T2.8

At 9 feet, on the 18mm you have a 126" DOF window.
At 85mm, on the 85mm you have a 4.37" DOF window.

More than doubling your critical focus window using a slow aperture. Do you want the whole shot in focus or do you like the blurred out background for this shot? Why not get a couple different shots and piece them together, there's your art.

Here's a DoF calculator for you to figure it out yourself.
http://www.red.com/tools/depth-of-field

Jonathan, what you need is more light my friend. SIMPLE. The R1 is NOT a great lowlight camera. It loves light and you'll find noise in the shadows if you underexpose, and it's easy to do.

Take the tools you got and used them to your advantage. Know your limitation of light and use it for you. Light silhouettes. You don't need to "see" everything. Let the darkness be darkness. Try to get in closer, use the lights you have to fill more area. Use your lights artistically. What's your scene? This is a snowoboarind film? Would seeing the lights in the frame be a major problem? Is the scene about the lighting or the riders skill?


Russell Morris said:
I recommend using faster primes, something around T1.4
And with your lighting, get it as close to the subject as you can, light drops off quickly the further away you have it..
Also try not have the iso too high as the image becomes noisy. 1600iso is usually the max i'd go.
Click to expand...

What Russell says. I'd shoot that sensor at 320-500. Do a test, see where you "acceptable" level of noise is.

Russell Morris said:
get it as close to the subject as you can, light drops off quickly the further away you have it..
Also try not have the iso too high as the image becomes noisy. 1600iso is usually the max i'd go.
Click to expand...

Guillaume. Is that video filmed with a scarlet?

Guillaume Tisserant said:


P.S : last year, I have do a outdoor night short movie with just a nex-VG20 (nominal iso is 200 and format is AVCHD), one littre chinese light panel and a fast lens, and the picture is not so horrible.
https://vimeo.com/61750720
Click to expand...

Okay, so it's clear. None of our advise is any good. Can you light some fires in the area? Car lights off the snow might add some fill, can you put a white sheet or tarp hanging above the rider, then bounce some light off them? Frame your area, then add a bunch of white sheets from the hotel, blankets, tarps, anything to watch the light and bounce it back to your action. Can you add fog, or car exhause? The extra particles in the air will help to pickup more light and also add a fool feel to your scene... The truth is... you are pushing the R1 past it's limit in this situation if you bring it above 800 ISO or underexpose.

Are you doing a rail slide off stairs? If you are ready for a challenge, here is an idea. Shoot between 80-110mm and capture the scene frame by frame. If your ambitious, you can try to track the snowboarder through out it's movement. This will be a challenge to keep focus but practice, it's possible.

Jonathan Goggin said:
I am filming snowboarding in the street so lots of fast motion action.
Click to expand...
 
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The depth of field issue that Mr. Keir notes can be crucial. In some of our shooting, we have one side of an actor's face in focus, and the other side of his face out of focus. That's what f1.4 buys you.

Good luck.

Stephen
 
That is indeed a very good point about the reduced depth of field. Of course you can also try to arrange the shot so that the action moves perpendicular to the camera, i.e. stays at the same distance where you've pre-focused...

Will Keir said:
Jonathan, what you need is more light my friend. SIMPLE. The R1 is NOT a great lowlight camera. It loves light and you'll find noise in the shadows if you underexpose, and it's easy to do.

Take the tools you got and used them to your advantage. Know your limitation of light and use it for you. Light silhouettes. You don't need to "see" everything. Let the darkness be darkness. Try to get in closer, use the lights you have to fill more area. Use your lights artistically. What's your scene? This is a snowoboarind film? Would seeing the lights in the frame be a major problem? Is the scene about the lighting or the riders skill?
Click to expand...

Would second this 100 %. One way or the other, you need photons on those photosites, no way around it... But you can also turn minimalism to your benefit. Constraints drive creativity. :smile:

Good luck!
 
Wow thanks for all this info. I cannot afford a faster lens at this time but I am saving. I agree with being closer it totally helps. But what I have done is bye 3 200W LED lights which should light up our night shoots a lot and work great on the R1. I am primarily shooting rails with stairs at night, I would use reflectors but we are trying to limit the amount or none natural stuff in the shots, the lights are already in the shot and that is all I really want with riders. Do you think 3 200w LED's will be good enough? Let me know and thank you for all your help RED world!!! PS if anyone has a used 300mm RED Lense or the 85MM let me know as that is what I am looking for but can't really afford it yet??
 
you need more light...

go to the hardware store and get some work lights (with porcelain/ceramic sockets, NOT plastic) on the cheap and grab the biggest, brightest compact fluorescents you can find (i'd get daylight balanced, 5-6k). these run cool enough to gafftape a piece of paper/cloth to the metal to soften the light (leave a gap so any heat can vent easily and keep an eye on them, of course). you can run these off a $25-50 inverter on your idling car battery (and in that case use your headlights as well, or you can hook up directly to a deep-cycle marine/rv battery without your car). other than that you just need a few extension cords. led's are good as well, but you really need more light - no reason that the source needs to be in frame. a ladder is a good thing to have...
 
3 200w LED lights should do the trick, right?? I use a Honda Generator for the power source as most of time the car is not near the shoots, if so I do use the car lights to help out. Work lights are what I was using 3 500w Halogen if I add more lights to generator more than three it seams to dim the lights down equaling the three only. I am waiting for my LED's and I will do from there. Thank all of you for the advise and knowledge it is awesome.

JGoggin
 
Your RED is not as good at night as your FS700 - the Sony has a newer sensor, and is much better in lowlight. The tradeoff is your RED is RAW and 4k, while the Sony is 8bit compressed.

You will need to shoot on faster primes, yes. A 1.4 would be good. If you are shooting masters with deep focus, not sure if shallowness will be an issue. But unless you are shooting on Master Primes, most 1.4 lenses are a bit soft.

Also - what 10-100 zoom are you on? The Zeiss Vario-Sonnar? That's a 16mm zoom. So are you shooting cropped at 2K? Just beware that you are using only a PORTION of the sensor if you do that (2k vs 4K), and will most likely being seeing much more noise, especially at night.

Good luck.
 
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