Canon 5D Mark 2 Tips and general lighting tricks

[Hiren Kachchhy]

Hey guys!

 

So I'm going to be shooting a short film next week with a low budget (surprise surprise) and we are shooting of the 5D Mark II.

There are day interiors as well as exteriors and also night interiors and exteriors. I'm not going to have access to lights for the exterior shots (which sucks).

Now my questions are:

 

1. How high can I go on the 5D in terms of ISO while keeping grains as low as possible?

 

2. If I do encounter grains and have no choice but to shoot, are there any tips for post work to help reduce the grains without loosing on details much? (I know there will be some loss but that's ok)

 

3. For the night exteriors, I don't have wide shots but what I am worried about lighting the MS, MCUs and CU shots. There are street lamps overhead from where the character is going to sit but there's no power supply around as far as I know (will confirm) But as a back up, are there any tricks to add some illumination on the character's face? (I'm thinking a bounce board to get some fill coming from the streetlamp and if possible/needed I'll use my motorcycle's headlight from a distance, bounced) and one of these can be gelled.

 

Im going to be shooting with the Optimum PP Setting - Sharpness - 0 Contrast - 0 Saturation - 2 points down.

 

Any tips or tricks for post, while shooting or otherwise would help!

 

Thanks and Cheers!

[Matthew Clements]

Hey guys!

 

So I'm going to be shooting a short film next week with a low budget (surprise surprise) and we are shooting of the 5D Mark II.

There are day interiors as well as exteriors and also night interiors and exteriors. I'm not going to have access to lights for the exterior shots (which sucks).

Now my questions are:

 

1. How high can I go on the 5D in terms of ISO while keeping grains as low as possible?

 

2. If I do encounter grains and have no choice but to shoot, are there any tips for post work to help reduce the grains without loosing on details much? (I know there will be some loss but that's ok)

 

3. For the night exteriors, I don't have wide shots but what I am worried about lighting the MS, MCUs and CU shots. There are street lamps overhead from where the character is going to sit but there's no power supply around as far as I know (will confirm) But as a back up, are there any tricks to add some illumination on the character's face? (I'm thinking a bounce board to get some fill coming from the streetlamp and if possible/needed I'll use my motorcycle's headlight from a distance, bounced) and one of these can be gelled.

 

Im going to be shooting with the Optimum PP Setting - Sharpness - 0 Contrast - 0 Saturation - 2 points down.

 

Any tips or tricks for post, while shooting or otherwise would help!

 

Thanks and Cheers!

 

Answering briefly; in experience with the 5D I've only ever used either ISO160/320/640, anything higher than 640 and the noise I've found is hard-ish to get rid of! A tiny bit of noise can crop up in 640, but in post you can generally lose the noise by crushing the contrast a tiny bit.

 

As for the filling in, I heartily recommend If you can get ahold of one, a white polyester board for bouncing as much light as you can from either your motorcycle light or street light.

 

Hope this helps.

[Ram Shani]

use this tehnicolor cinestyle http://www.technicolor.com/en/hi/theatrical/visual-post-production/digital-printer-lights/cinestyle

 

and this filter for great anti aliasing and moire http://www.mosaicengineering.com/products/vaf/5d2.html

 

and use 160 320 640 asa!!!

 

good luck:)

[Phil Rhodes]

I'm very cautious about the low-contrast picture styles. They can cause a pretty significant in noise once you've graded back to a viewable image. It's talked about extensively here. Technicolor created it for a specific technical reason, not because it's just "good" in some unqualified way.

 

Be very cautious about moire - shoot tests of costume and locations at various distances and angles, and view them on a full-resolution display. I'm currently in the middle of an edit made absolutely miserable by this problem.

 

P

[Freya Black]

Be very cautious about moire - shoot tests of costume and locations at various distances and angles, and view them on a full-resolution display. I'm currently in the middle of an edit made absolutely miserable by this problem.

 

P

 

Phil, I've heard theres a piece of software that can fix this.

Yes I realise that sounds like magic but I've come across other software that genuinely was extremely magic.

 

Can't remember the name tho, will see if I can find out for you.

 

...ACK! No it is an optical filter, not a software filter. :(

 

 

love

 

Freya

Edited June 12, 2012 by Freya Black

[Freya Black]

 

3. For the night exteriors, I don't have wide shots but what I am worried about lighting the MS, MCUs and CU shots. There are street lamps overhead from where the character is going to sit but there's no power supply around as far as I know (will confirm) But as a back up, are there any tricks to add some illumination on the character's face? (I'm thinking a bounce board to get some fill coming from the streetlamp and if possible/needed I'll use my motorcycle's headlight from a distance, bounced) and one of these can be gelled.

 

 

 

Motorcycle headlight sounds useful especially if you can make it seem motivated, maybe like fake it as car headlights going past. Might be hard tho.

 

Also you could look into finding some cheap LED lights, but if they are under the street light maybe that will be enough?

 

love

 

Freya