You're Using ISO Wrong When Shooting Video 

Just got an R6mkii and your videos have been amazing. Great content. Many blessings

"ISO" is gain. Its signal amplification. ISO/gain has nothing to do with "exposure". What are we "exposing" our sensor to?....light. The only thing that changes light is aperture and shutter time. "Exposure" is completely finished when the sensor dumps is voltage values to the A/D converters. At 100 ISO and 12,800 ISO....the sensor light exposure is 100% identicle. Even 1 trillion ISO does NOT change the light that the sensor gathered. People think that high ISO means more light.....it does not. It just means more gain or amplification on your image. ISO does NOT change the sensitivity of our sensor.

This is actually amazing. I got a Canon R8 and was trying to record at iso 100 and getting noise. I went to 400 and used lightning and aperture for exposure. It makes a huge difference in Clog3. Thanks so much.

As an amateur videographer, this tutorial just raised my production value, thanks Josh, and hell yeah I'm now a subscriber to your channel so keep sharing please, and thanks!

This is great. I was just talking about this with a friend over the weekend. Sent him the video because you did such a better job of explaining it than I did!

Excellent video, I have revisited this now since I’m looking diving into video more with my R7. Next on my list they Meike drop in adapter

such an underrated channel. keep going!!! amazing stuff.

Thanks for this amazing video.. I haven’t seen much detail about the base ISO for the profiles.. learned a lot!

So helpful - Thanks so much!

Josh love your channel - thoughtful and useful content, every time. Good news - I’m not using ISO wrong when shooting video LOL. I will, however, try out your technique of lowering the ISO and adjusting aperture by one stop in dark situations. It makes sense, after hearing you explain it. We shoot wildlife in habitat so controlling light is not an option (unless you count the “wait until sun passes behind clouds technique ha ha). ND is essential so we mostly use Canon cinema cams (C70, C300iii). Thanks for the explanation here.

So glad I found your channel a few weeks back when the R7 videos started coming online. Not so much related to the R7 but just video in general. Good technical info. I have the R6 and the A74. I was waiting for the R7 specs hoping for DCI but now I found out when shooting DCI resolution you are locked in at 24fps. Is that the case with the R5 ?? Great content.

Hi! In Sony cameras, native ISO is a meaning when picture profile clipping happens closest to the sensor clipping. If you lower your ISO below native, you basically clip the highlights lower than S Log or any picture profile you're shooting in. This is crucial if you record in body to lossy codec, because that means, you just lose some useful digital meanings of a signal. In that case you better should expose native ISO like you would expose lower ISO - essentially overexpose a little bit, then lower your exposition in post.

Thank you for the excellent video! How about when shooting in RAW? For example: 8K RAW on the Canon R5. My understanding is that you don't have to shoot in Log when in RAW because you can change it to Log in post processing. [Is that correct?] So is it good to shoot at ISO 100 (when there is plenty of light--i.e. outside in daylight), and then convert to C-Log 3 when processing? Will this give better, less noisy results than shooting at ISO 800 outside and using stronger ND filters?

Great stuff thanks!

Very valuable information, thanks. It is very clear to me now, light, aperture and ND. 👍🏻☕🌴🌋🌊🏝☀️📸

Great video. I want to shoot with ISO 800 and f1.8 which will be very blown out. Guess I have to use an ND which I hate doing indoors. Thanks!

Does all this hold true if you don't use CLOG3 and shoot in standard mode? Specifically calling out using ISO800 and working around that for exposure.

What about in a situation where you have low light but lots of highlights, can't change the lighting and are already wide open? E.g. concert photography. Is it better to raise the ISO significantly above base, drag the shutter past the 1/ twice the focal length rule, or shoot at base and correct underexposure in post?

Everything you are saying is true, but if shooting in log then it is more important to get exposure correct than stay at base. Yes you lose some Dynamic range, but unless you are in a very bright and shade situation it is not always that important. On the Canon cameras it shows you on the hystergram the loss of DR either on the top or bottom of the hystergram. I often use a set ND so i change my ISO off base and see very little difference in post. I have a R3 and R.

Shutter Angle works great. 180 base but I'll go to 172 or higher than 180 to either get just a little bit more or less.

Kinda late but a general question. I Have perfect lighting and ND. Should I record at 50/100 iso or set everything for 800 iso? Is the iso at 100 cleaner than 800 base iso would it be no different ( lets say im shooting some in clog3 and then some in a modified 10 bit profile for quick turn around things)

Yup. I was using it wrong. ;) thank you!!!! 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽

so this is just a suggestion, when you're using numbers in your dialogue, put them on the screen in a sensible way to reinforce them. If you can get the graphics to show what you're saying you just created a great video (because the oh golly rule is Show, don't tell). You can thank Joseph Campbell for that.

Really helpful. Any suggestions for a R5 LUT to use with an external monitor shooting in CLOG3?

Does the R6 have dual base iso in clog 3?

Found some gray bars left and right from the histogram on my R7 when shooting video and thought that this may be the limitation by different ISOs - thanks for clarification! Now I will shoot @800 except nothing else works and use my ND filters more extensively.

Honestly adding more light should really be apart of the solution here, lower ISO and more light. Depending on the situation most smart phones come with a light and you can turn that light on and back it up a bit to soften it and that might help in a very dark low light run-and-gun situation.

I work with the R5C and R3 for professional video. The R3 has terrible noise when shooting in log, you have to leave the R3 at 100 ISO for a clean image with LOG even at ISO 400 it's too noisy --looks like a 60D from 10 years ago!. However, when you shoot in HDR PQ on the R3 you get great noise performance up to about 3200 ISO. When shooting with the R5C I'm primary using the Wide DR profile which is the best codec/profile I have ever used. Great dynamic range and color out of camera that makes for an efficient post production. I have a few points. I would encourage you all to ask yourself do you really need to use log? yes, you have been taught to use log for dynamic range... (blah blah). I myself have shot log in the past and have stuck with the herd in this workflow. But times are changing.... all top camera's on the market have great dynamic range at this point and if you know how to expose you won't run into dynamic range trouble for 95% of your shots. If you own the R5, R7, R3 give HDR PQ a try its an incredible image with nice color and from my experience has been a joy to work with in post. (It's 10 bit as well) The more projects and business that comes in-- the more important speed and efficiency is. I'm pretty much done with shooting LOG at this point. For those that like the LOG workflow, all good, no worries to each their own. I personally though think it offers pointless hurdles and all the ISO technicalities is just an error waiting to happen-- and no effect in post takes longer to render than NOISE REDUCTION.. lol. Also, side bar. Even when shooting on the Mavic 3 I'm not using D-LOG anymore and just using the normal mode, D-LOG messes with the color and gives you noise issues and the new normal profile on the Mavic 3 has incredible dynamic range built in. I have been loving your channel Josh! Cheers for all the work you do :)

Thank you!!!

Thanks Josh

What if I am moving my camera in different directions, say darker to brighter while both the subject and the camera is moving? Is Auto ISO the answer to this question or should I choose shutter priority mode with base ISO?

Thanks!

Is "base iso" only a thing on cameras that have a log profile? For example, I shoot my videos on the Canon 70d--in this case 100 iso will be the best result, correct?

Good video and nice beach

Great video! Does anyone know what the base ISO is for the canon 80D? Is the base iso just when using log ?

So I lose detail when I lower my ISO? Even though we learned that “the lower, the less noise”

Dude, this is very good and helpful info! Now if you could just tell me how to grade video! :)

I have both the R5 and R7. Is it important to use the base ISO of 800 when CLOG is turned off? Or can the ISO be raised or lowered to provide another means of correcting for exposure. Thank you!

I shot well above the base ISO all the time with the R6. I shoot real estate, Im not lugging lights around and many times houses I shoot are dark. Good info, but there is A LOT of instances that this doesn't apply at all. Your disclaimer should have been this really only applies if you are capable of making the artificial light the way you want it.

What if you are not shooting in log? Should you still use the base ISO as much as possible

The aperture is important and should be the choice for shooting. Lenses are not working perfect if they are open and the Sharpness can loosing by little moments. Best way is You have enough light too shoot with a lower ISO and the best Quality Stop of Your lens.

I use a c100 mk2 at the moment but about to change too c70 I video a band every week in a dark pub I shoot at F4 1/50 and the iso to get a correct exposure I have to use 16000 to 20000

I have a question I hope someone can answer. I have been trying to shoot clog3 videos for wildlife and for sunrises and sunsets. The base iso of 800 seems to be too dark. Would it be recommended to just go up to iso 3200 in those situations. I’m not sure what to do

Here you suggest using ND filters instead of lowering ISO. But ND filters also introduce color issues and inconsistent color. I would be curious to see a test of video quality between the two. For instance, what is the video quality if we reduce by 2 stops, 3 stops, etc. between doing it by using ISO and doing it by using an ND filter. On the other end, in low light situations where you can't just increase lighting, is increasing ISO the same as just increasing brightness in post? Or exposure in post? Which would be better? I seem to recall situations where I could coax out details by increasing ISO that I couldn't get by doing things in post production, but maybe that's just my imagination or lack of expertise in post. I appreciate all your knowledge, my quest is the same as yours, shoot the highest quality video I can. Finding the best solutions in difficult environments is key, it's easy when the lighting is good.

You talk a lot about shooting in CLOG. But if I'm just shooting 4K in a standard profile on the R5 (no log footage), should I stay in native ISO 800? Do the rules stay the same in that situation as with CLOG? Does it hurt anything to drop the ISO down to 400, 200 or 100? I'm thinking the bright days when the ND isn't enough to get the shallow depth I want.

Sorry to chime in, but I'm not hearing what I'm looking for. Base ISO 400. Shutter at 1/50th, correct? The F has to be changed re: depth of field desired. But now, with the R6II, the ISO is 800. So, that's the Shutter? (It's because I'm shooting 24P Do I leave it where it is?). Can you please comment on this 1/5oth question? (I recognize that the frame rate doesn't exactly play into this conversation.) Now back to your video.

Yeah! But this only works if you have enough light in terms of max apeture of the lens and the light itself. Most of us Most often fighter with not enough light.

Thanks Josh. You always have a great content. By the way, did you ever sell your R5C?

What if we don't shoot in log?

Great video! Oddly enough, I often find myself in a situation where I need more light and just can't get it. I do a lot of run and gun stuff and sometimes I don't even know what's happening until it's happening. I try to carry enough lighting with me to cover situations, but often I don't even know where I'll be shooting until its happening and don't have a way to move the lighting around in a timely manner. I know, its completely ridiculous, but unfortunately its the world I live in. I do a lot of corporate work for a hospital, and they drag me around the building trying to grab shots of certain things. I always try to tell them I need more planning but it falls on deaf ears. Basically, what I'm trying to say is that I often don't feel like I have a choice but to crank ISO. I'd love to hear your thoughts on a scenario like this. Perhaps you can use it as a topic in tonight's stream? I haven't actually been able to participate in one yet, but I always listen back to the streams and love the show. Thanks Josh!

I'm not sure if iso works differently in video versus stills, or I'm misunderstanding something, or he's just leaving out the obvious? He seems to be saying that in low light try to use less ISO. Definitely if you can get more real light via shutter speed or aperture or lighting, then of course just take the real light. But if you can't get any more real light, like in a night time shot and your shutter speed is already slower than you want and the aperture is wide open, and now you have a choice between bumping ISO or brightening in post, ISO beats post every time. That's how it works with stills. On some cameras it's a minor Improvement and others it's major. But it's always better. Basically if you can't get real light, ISO is the next best thing. Deliberately shooting at low ISO when you have insufficient light, and trying to fix it later in Premiere or Resolve or whatever... you will get much worse noise than if you just accept that you need the ISO. Maybe his point is simply that you shouldn't raise ISO needlessly when you have real light available, which I thought was pretty much common knowledge.

Not shooting log means you CAN use iso to change the brightness and darkness. Log makes things so much more complicated for shooting and for turn around in post. Hardly worth using for the average corporate video shooter charging under $1000 /day.

Its just better to ETTR in your scene.. you dont really have to touch ISO.

what if you don't shoot in log?

You lost me at lowering the ISO to get more detail in the shadows... Did you mean the same detail, but with less noise in the dark areas?

I find these test difficult as YT removes noise.

Why do people most of the time recomend to over expose log (like Flog) by one stop ? Your video is very relevant as you show it but I why those people give those overexpositing recommandation?

youre not mandated to use 180 degree for shutter always. its only necessary when theres alot of motion in the scene, a fast moving scene. but for a slow quiet scene, like sitting down, you can use 1/4000 etc. so shutter speed is still relevant for exposure. same as iso, if its getting darker and you cant throw light into the scene as you wish, you have shutter, iso and aperture at your disposal. but you definetely want to be as low iso as possible.