Shooting in low light

[Greg Syverson]

How would you rate the abililty of Red to shoot in low light such as trynig to capture the auroras . Can the shutter be left open like a film camera?[

[Evin Grant]

You will have 360º shutter capability as well as a few Gain options which are not quite clear. However from the cameras on display in the booth I would say the sensitivity/dynamic range of the Red is perfectly suited for shooting in low light, especially fitted with a piece of fast glass like a Master Prime or a Nikon 58mm f1.2 NOCT.

[jbeale]

The published specs mention frame rates from 1 fps to 60 fps. For any longer exposure than that, surely a regular dSLR would be a better choice?

[Alexander Black]

Depends on the glass you have. If it's all PL and you don't have a a DSLR it's very nice to have an intervalometer (well, in software)

[David Mullen ASC]

Whenever I see Aurora Borealis footage in a nature doc, it looks like night vision-type photography because I often see the stars in the footage.

So I'm not sure even 1 fps with no shutter (so 1 second exposures per frame) would be fast enough, even if you boosted the image to an effective 1000 or 2000 ASA. You could easily take a still photo shot at this ASA / shutter speed combination and find out.

But then, I don't have any experience shooting those things. But the fact that the footage I've seen shows stars in the shot implies some sort of super low-light photographic process is employed.

[Tom Lowe]

I can confirm that there is no way a sensor like this can expose for stars at 1fps. Even with a full moon and ISO 800 my DLSR takes at least 30 seconds to expose for stars.

Here is a recent night shot I took. It was something like a one-minute exposure, f/5, at ISO 600, I believe.

http://farm1.static.flickr.com/187/431977009_22b34133b8.jpg

[Evin Grant]

I though the aurora was brighter than the stars. Don't listen to me though, the most north I've ever been is Seattle!

[Rick Darge]

Awesome picture Tom!

[jbeale]

You can get some brighter stars using a 1/4 sec exposure on a "prosumer" video camera. Here is an example I took with a Sony VX2000 some years ago:
http://www.bealecorner.com/vx2000/orion1.jpg
No additional equipment, image intensifiers, etc. were used. I am aware this is not professional quality.

[Greg Syverson]

I have shot the auroras for over 20 years now with 35mm slr. Now I have 4 winter season under my belt in video. I used the VX2100 and DSR500.

The VX2100 at 1/4 shutter did a good job. The DSR500 was able to capture at 1/60 but had so much noise it is unusable.

I missed sales on my aurora footage from the VX2100 because it was not HD. I did manage to sell a lot with the VX2100 dispite the noise and SD format.

The biggest problem I see is that when the auroras get real bright and move fast. You would miss all the action shooting a 4 to 10 second exposure. During a very weak slow arc, you could do a long exposure with a DSLR and place them into a video stream. This would be a clean nice shot. Not much movement and boring. I saw a DVD that some guys in Iceland put together of the Auroras. It is by far the best I have seen. It is called the ( Aurora Experience. I have a sample on my site. Look for the video clip called Alaska Up Close. It has a small piece of Aurora that I shot using a VX2100.

http://www.gregsyverson.com

I am eager some day to see how the Red camera will do. I think in the right conditions it will give very good results in the kind of work I do. Looking forward to the finnished product.

[Justin Kirchhoff]

I'm guessing the dynamic range will introduce a whole different level of possibilities for night shoots. I can see some cool time lapse footage coming in the near footage. Also, with the announcement of a new board in the camera, Jim states that the already high dynamic range will be increased even more.

Great news for all of us. This is just getting too exciting.