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By Benjamin Hilton · Posted
Are you talking about real doc work? Or narrative stuff. Because in my experience in the doc world, lighting has to be very selective. Of course I'm lighting interviews, and anything I can. But in the world of fast moving subjects and spur of the moment things happening, it is so incredibly handy to have a camera I can crank up the ISO and get a decent image when the character is only lit by the light on the stove, or the dash lights in their car, or the stars in the desert. I totally get it that knowing how to light is much more important than having high ISO, but that doesn't negate how important it can be for doc work. I guess this all totally depends on the use case though. -
By herein2020 · Posted
I agree 100% with @bjohn your first question should be how much are you willing to learn about lighting, your second should be how much ambient light is typically available to you, and your last should be how much lighting are you able/willing to bring with you. Once you have truly learned how to maximize both available/ambient lighting as well as how to optimize your supplemental lighting then figure out what camera meets your workflow needs while delivering the image quality you are looking for. You need amazingly little supplemental lighting with modern cameras at ISO 3200 - ISO 4000 when filming only a few individuals which is where many current dual native ISO cameras tend to set their second native ISO. I have managed to adequately fill light up to 5 people at night with nothing more than optimizing my ambient light and two Falcon F7 panel lights. One thing I keep alluding to here is ambient light. Yes even at night there can be plenty of ambient light if you know how to use it. A streetlight, window sign, digital billboard, lit candles, even oncoming car headlights can all be used to help light your scene at night. I like to use ambient light for back or side lighting whenever possible then a small panel light for front fill and as a key light for good white balance/skin tones at night. At the end of the day all cameras need light, cranking the ISO as high as it will go trying to turn night into day is a newbie approach which just reduces contrast, washes out colors, and can make any camera you buy look worse than cell phone footage no matter how clean YouTubers will tell you a camera is at high ISO. When you have mastered or at least optimized your supplemental/ambient lighting approach then and only then would I start looking at the camera side. A few generic non vendor specific features that I would look for is: What glass options are available for that ecosystem when it comes to fast lenses? How much do lenses in the F1.4-F2.8 range cost for that ecosystem and do they offer IS if you shoot mainly handheld like I do. Do camera bodies in that ecosystem offer dual native ISO and if so what are they set at? I have found ISO 3200-4000 to be a very useful second native ISO option for low light. I keep mentioning ecosystem here, as I have said many times before, the actual camera body is probably the least important part of the equation, since any modern camera body will produce excellent image quality under the right circumstances. The camera's ecosystem (accessories, ergonomics, lens selections, cage selections, etc.) are what will ultimately determine if it complements your creativity or infringes on it. -
By Benjamin Hilton · Posted
This is true to a certain extent, but in doc work low light ability still can be very important. I've had to shoot a lot of stuff that happened so fast or spontaneously, or was outright just too dangerous to be lit. The nice part about having a camera that can do low light is it enables you to work with your setups quicker. -
This, plus: Plus: Or my pick which would be a used Lumix S5ii for approx $€£ 1500 There’s a range of quality f1.8 primes and some very tasty but slightly pricey zooms. Or there are some excellent f2 primes from Sigma and some equally as excellent, but cheaper zooms. I’d probably consider the latest 28-45mm f1.8 as a 3x prime zoom set up in a single unit, ie, 28, 35 and ‘nearly 50’. That would set you back another 1.5k and it’s so new, no used options yet. Total running budget, 3k so as long as that focal length is both wide and long enough, add in some of todays cheap but excellent lighting and you are good to go. Some audio also obviously, but all in without going crazy, 3.5-4k max?
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