A1 Low Light is Fine

[Nick Weeks]

Originally Posted by Tom Roper

Of course, the odds of someone still caring to watch a wedding video are a lot less since only about 1 in 3 couples make it without hating each other...lol.

so true. so true... I've actually had one couple I did a wedding video for last year get a divorce. That was actually my first wedding. I wish I had a clip of the video available, I'd post it because it was done with a 1ccd camera in very low light. Grainy video, very dark, but it still made a nice video overall, despite it being almost too dark to make out anything.

From Henry's clips on the A1, this is a great camera. Those clips look amazing... and the 12db gain looks much cleaner than I was expecting. ...and I agree with Tony because on my VX2100 I never went past 12db in the worst case scenario.

[Steve Nunez]

Setup: Camera XH A1, 0db Gain, 30F mode, 1/60 shutter, aperture 2-3 stops from full open, 1st few seconds normal lens, close up~ 4X 72mm Tiffen CU filter, lighting: 75 watt incandescent bulb about 1 foot above tank enclosure- about 2 feet from video location.

This setup leaves me even more options for lower light shooting as I could have dropped the shutter speed to 1/30th and opened the F stop 2 more stops- the 72mm filters also rob a small amount of light....

...video is about 1/4 resolution of full size and compressed to 65% of full quality in H.264 codec at half frame rate of 15 fps!
All captured with Firestore FS-4HD as I don't use tapes.

....here goes nothing special but here's what you'd see at above settings:
http://stevenunez.com/videos/mouse2.mov
(give it a sec to load- it's under 6mb)

[Steven Glicker]

Steve that was fun. Can't wait to get mine.

On challenging lighting scenarios... I've shot a number of live, local theatrical pieces which virtually all have low-light scenes, as well as unpredictable lighting changes (from my perspective). Generally speaking, in these situations where the footage is for the director or choreographer, seeing and hearing the performers takes precedence over image noise.

[Daniel Boswell]

Originally Posted by Doug Bennett

Daniel - cameras should produce marginal images at maximum gain. If not the manufacturers should just include higher gain settings. To say the canon falls apart above 12db but at 12 db it is already brighter than the sony at maximum gain is a criticism of sony not canon

Doug, I have both cameras and have done now extensive testing in the last 3 days.

We can around and around about numbers and the how each company handles gain settings differently, but the bottomline is, the Sony looks better to me in lowlight at all of the relevant settings that I will be using in the field.

That's what matters to me.

[Daniel Boswell]

Originally Posted by Larry Huntington

Still photographers use flashes, videographers use lights. 18db would be silly to use for a paid gig.

I have used my FX's at 18db at wedding receptions when needed for the past year and it looks fine with a little Color Correction.

[Daniel Boswell]

Originally Posted by Steve Nunez

Setup: Camera XH A1, 0db Gain, 30F mode, 1/60 shutter, aperture 2-3 stops from full open, 1st few seconds normal lens, close up~ 4X 72mm Tiffen CU filter, lighting: 75 watt incandescent bulb about 1 foot above tank enclosure- about 2 feet from video location.

This setup leaves me even more options for lower light shooting as I could have dropped the shutter speed to 1/30th and opened the F stop 2 more stops- the 72mm filters also rob a small amount of light....

...video is about 1/4 resolution of full size and compressed to 65% of full quality in H.264 codec at half frame rate of 15 fps!
All captured with Firestore FS-4HD as I don't use tapes.

....here goes nothing special but here's what you'd see at above settings:
http://stevenunez.com/videos/mouse2.mov
(give it a sec to load- it's under 6mb)

Looks great Steve.

No probs importing 30f footage?

[Bill Pryor]

Very cool. Looks like a nice opening for a horror movie.

[Bill Ritter]

I don't have clips and this is not very scientific, but I shot with XL-1s and XH A1 into kitchen (at night) lit with only some under counter lights. The XL-1s and A1 appeared to have same low light capability. My GL-2 is not as capable for low light, so I am happy that this will be suitable for receptions.

Enjoy,

Bill