Low light and BMPCC

I am currently doing some tests with my BMPCC for a short film I"m planning to shoot with it. And it is becoming clearly apparent that this camera's micro 4/3rds sensor isn't a huge fan of anything thats remotely underlit, and thats with a 1.8 lens too. I've conducted some low light external tests with it because a scene I'm shooting is set at night, and I tested various ISO's. 200, and 400 barely gave me a picture, and 800 and 1600 introduced a shedload of noise. So I am wondering, should I just OVER light my scenes, and take back the exposure a bit, either on the day or in post with Da Vinci Resolve using the Camera Raw function?

It's not over lighting. It's lighting. 800 is a pretty fast camera by any standard. For example, the X-Files, was for a time, shot on 800 speed Kodak film, which was the fastest motion picture film ever made.
But, just because your camera has a fast rating, doesn't mean you don't need lighting at all.
That said, in urban environments, my pocket camera can hold up fine with minimal augmentation of existing lighting. It's all about where you're shooting and how you're exposing. Yes, you will need to do a noise reduction pass later on, as the camera does none in and of itself, but this is a trivial thing to do in the color correction phase.
Hell, I once lit with just 2 coleman lanterns before on the pocket when production messed up and rented a 2000w genny as opposed to a 22000w.

DSLRs have utterly RUINED cinematography. For most of my generation, 100-125T and 100D were the torchbearers of film. 200-250D speed film became the norm, and 500 speed films (usually rated at 320-400) became the new indoor speeds, but were a little noisy.

One of the reason's most microbudget films look SO BAD is that they are not lit. I'm not saying you have to light to ISO 64 like people did back in the day. But EXPECT to light to ISO 320 at a minimum. Preferably ISO 200-250. It makes an AMAZING difference to the sensor when you can give it enough light to clip the sensor at ISO 200. You want to know why Hollywood movies look so great? It's not the camera. They show up with a tractor trailer full of lights!

Please look at this photo.

http://ichef.bbci.co.uk/bbcfilms/image/ ... tion_1.jpg

That is a BTS look at the filming of Revolutionary Road (DiCaprio/Winslet). Lit by Roger Deakins, one of most foremost DPs of our time. This is a soft daylight look in a kitchen. There's about 10kw of Mole Richardson lights on that scene. Plus the 20kw lights out on the lawn bouncing in off muslins.

PLEASE light your films. Save our craft.

I am currently doing some tests with my BMPCC for a short film I"m planning to shoot with it. And it is becoming clearly apparent that this camera's micro 4/3rds sensor isn't a huge fan of anything thats remotely underlit, and thats with a 1.8 lens too. I've conducted some low light external tests with it because a scene I'm shooting is set at night, and I tested various ISO's. 200, and 400 barely gave me a picture, and 800 and 1600 introduced a shedload of noise. So I am wondering, should I just OVER light my scenes, and take back the exposure a bit, either on the day or in post with Da Vinci Resolve using the Camera Raw function?

The Pocket camera does not use a m4/3 sensor, it has a smaller one than that. Also, the overall sensor size has no baring on its low light performance - that is dictated by many other factors and the only one pertaining to physical size is the size of the photosites - in this case they are actually quite large, larger than a 5D Mkii and Mkiii.

The Pocket camera uses a sensor from the same family as the BMCC, only that its resolution is lower and its size is equally scaled - it is as if the sensor was windowed to a 1920x1080 crop rather than 2400x1350 one.

On the BMCC I have managed to film with good results up to a rating of ISO 12,800 - which is pretty good and well outside of what I would consider to be adequate film lighting. The lower sensor resolution of the pocket camera will no doubt reduce the low light performance slightly - as a higher resolution does help to cope with noise - but not by a massive amount.

Example of a night time scene, it ONLY with street lighting - rated at ISO 12800

Password: Nolight

Some noise reduction has been applied in resolve - but as you can see the image still retains detail.


All this is by the by however - as lighting is the number 1 most important part of cinematography in my opinion - more important than good lenses and a good camera. Whilst cameras which are capable of shooting in low light do indeed open up extra possibilities and increased functionality, when one can light properly - one always should. Even scenes which are intended to look dark in the end need proper lighting, it is all about the lighting ratios and relative light levels, rather than the absolute values.

I am currently doing some tests with my BMPCC for a short film I"m planning to shoot with it. And it is becoming clearly apparent that this camera's micro 4/3rds sensor isn't a huge fan of anything thats remotely underlit, and thats with a 1.8 lens too. I've conducted some low light external tests with it because a scene I'm shooting is set at night, and I tested various ISO's. 200, and 400 barely gave me a picture, and 800 and 1600 introduced a shedload of noise. So I am wondering, should I just OVER light my scenes, and take back the exposure a bit, either on the day or in post with Da Vinci Resolve using the Camera Raw function?

It means you should properly expose the image, and in the world of digital cinematography slightly overexposing is usually a better option.

The Blackmagic cameras behave similar to film cameras in that they are designed for you to match the ISO (or ASA on the menu - even though this refers to Film sensitivity not Sensor sensitivity)with light rather than like on DSLRs where a lot of people like pushing the ISO as far as possible to retrieve an image (which in my mind is a bit lazy). The native ISO of this camera is 800 ISO which gives it the highest possibly dynamic range, this holds the opposite wisdom of the Canon DSLRs in that the native ISO is much lower as they were designed as stills cameras.

Unfortunately night exteriors (which from what you said is what you're having trouble with) even with extreme low-light cameras require a lot of light which is why they tend to be very difficult to pull off by low-budget filmmakers (streetlights or any available light helps greatly though).

The best advice I have is to treat it like a RED One - Expose a bit higher because its easier & safer to take more light away in post rather than add any more in. .

That being said, at 800 ISO I've managed to get decent results out of a few cheap 65W household bulbs w/peedboosted f1.4 lens, so I'd imagine that if you had a few hundred more watts in the mix you'll be Ok.

It all depends very heavily on what look you're going for. If I had more information as

I mainly have to film cocktails and events which are usually low lit and even putting a light on the camera is really annoying to the guests. I like the pocket because it is a lot more discrete than my old 5d set up. I am usually filming with Voigtländer lenses that open up to 0.95. And me and my clients are quite happy with the result... Wish I could properly light these events, but it would take the magic away from the event, so unfortunately I don't have a choice...


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