Filming in Low Light 💡

Filming at night 🌚

Filming at night or in dark locations can mean that your resulting footage comes out grainy or indiscernible.

Here are ways to get the best footage you can in low light situations.

1. Add light 🔦

First, add light if you can. If you’re inside in a dark room, for example, try to add a lamp or bounce light into the room from another source.

2. Move things around 🚶‍♂️

Don’t be afraid to move your subjects around until the light works in your favor.

3. Move your subject closer to light 🌜

If you’re outside, move your subject closer to available sources of light like street lamps or moonlight.

4. Think about light accessories 📲

If you are going to do a lot of filming in low light, you might want to invest in an attachment light for your phone.

5. Be aware of your exposure 📸

A camera’s exposure determines how light or dark the resulting image is going to be.

For some phones, you can test the exposure by tapping the darkest spot on the screen. This will tell your phone’s lens to focus on that area and adjust the rest of the image accordingly. Tapping the lightest spot will do the reverse. Depending on the effect you want, pick whether you want to focus on the dark or light part of your image.

6. Finally, be aware of backlighting 🕯

If need your subject clear and visible, make sure bright lights are not behind them as it creates a silhouette effect.

Of course, if you want to achieve that kind of dramatic lighting, experiment and figure out what looks best for your film!

Filming in bad weather 🥶

Snow 🌨

Set the camera’s white balance using a sheet of white paper before you start shooting. If you aren’t enthusiastic about carrying paper around to set the color balance in the snow, you can try setting the white balance to its tungsten setting instead. Remember to keep yourself warm! Wear fingerless gloves!

Wind 💨

Cover your mic with a wind-muff of some kind. Any type of breeze is going to sound like the jets of an airplane taking off if the mic is unprotected. You can easily cover the on-camera mic with a little bandage gauze, if you don’t have a wind-muff handy.

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