FX1 Exposure setup?
 

Hello everyone.
How do you guys get around the problem of certain areas of your image being over-exposed while others are under-exposed?

I was shooting some test video of my daughter yesterday and tried to manually adjust the iris & shutter to get her properly exposed- problem was, the background was overexposed as the sun was shining on a school building behind her. How would you guys tackle uneven exposures in a shoot?

~ I tried the various built-in ND filters and got her underexposed and the buildings right, but can't achieve the perfect setup!

Any advice in calming down overexposed areas?

Thanks

Steve,

I am usually in a controlled enviroment or have the nescesary tools to light the under exposed areas of a shot. But I know that we all don't have those tools available to us all of the time.

Without lights, I suggest that you investigate the use of Grad's. ND Grad's have one side the filter that is dark and one side that is clear with a smooth transition between them. By adjusting where this filter is placed, you can darken only certain portions of the shot. By manipulating your frame so that your highlights and shadows fall within the two different portions of the frame, you can properly expose a shot with extremely different levels of light.

ND Grad's should not effect color, only exposure. However, for effect you can also experiment with Color Grad's. For example, a Blue Grad will allow you to not only darken the sky for proper exposure, but also give the sky that extra blue pop, even if it's a grey and overcast day! Not that you would need that though. Isn't the sun always shining in the Bronx?!

Jon, thanks.........just read your review of the FX1- I enjoyed the article. I look forward to using this camera and learning the art of video!

Steve,

You're welcome. Glad you enjoyed the article. There are more to come, so stay tuned HDVi for the latest.

Though it's not set in stone yet, I am likely going to be serving as a panelist on High Definition at the upcoming NY stop on HDFEST tour. As well as giving a presentation on HDV from a cinematographers point of view comparing HDV footage with HDCAM and DVCPROHD footage from the F900 and 27F. Once everything is official, I will post the information here to let everyone know.

I know it's hard to leave the Bronx, but surely you can make it to Mid Town for a few hours! :)

Where do I sign up?

Like I said, it's not offical yet, but you can go to http://hdfest.com for more information. I'll post the official notice here once everything is in place.

Heath McKnight is already confirmed for the South Florida stop of the tour. For those of you in Florida, make sure you check out his presentation.

Here you go:

www.dvinfo.net/conf/showthread.php?t=51018

If you are talking about an outdoor scene where the BG is blown out, I built a rig that lets me put a fine netting behind my subject and diffuses the BG for me to balance the scene. Obviously not all scenes lend themselves to this type of solution but many do.

I built a frame out of PVC pipe that allows me to easily break down for transport and I used a dark mosquito net that has elastic across the corners to hook onto the PVC frame. I generally have someone holding the frame so that it does not get knocked over in the wind. If it's too windy, you cannot use this.