Do you usually crank up the ISO?

[cpreston]

Neat Video is well worth the price as it can save your ass in bad shooting conditions. Most of the Canon APS-C cameras start to look bad over 800ISO. You will be tempted to underexpose in order to reduce noise the footage. Don't. Shoot at the required ISO to get proper exposure (or add light or increase the aperture), and then use a denoiser in post. Yes, you lose resolution, but it will always look better than underexposing.

 

[Bruce Watson]

I'm having a bit of a difficult time getting a proper exposure without cranking up the ISO.

1a) More light.
1b) Better quality light (that is, color temperature in the 5600K range, so you aren't starving your blue sensors, and therefore aren't creating blue sensor noise). Look at 5600K fluorescents and the Cool Light CDM fresnels at 5600K. I use the CDM fresnels and they work a treat.
1c) Faster lens(es). You'll likely want f/2 or faster.
4) Limit your ISO to your noise tolerance. You'll have to experiment and find out just how high you can go with acceptable results. Clearly, YMMV so you'll have to actually do the work and find out what works for you, personally.
5) As a last resort, Neat Video. This takes some effort to properly set up, and it drives my rendering time up by 3x, but sometimes you just gotta have it. But make no mistake, this is no substitute for a proper capture; it's a fix for a poor capture.

First three can be done in the order you feel works best for you -- they all do basically the same thing -- get more light to the sensor, or at least to part (blue) of the sensor.

Note that as you raise ISO, you are lowering dynamic range. It's not something for nothing, it has a real cost in terms of visual quality. Make a large effort to shoot at optimal ISO.

 

[Michael Carter]

Man, everyone always advises getting a 1/8 or 2.8 lens and shooting wide open.

What if you want the DOF of F4 or 5.6? I just rarely have a composition framed up that looks good at even 2.8, unless it's a telephoto-portrait thing. Really not into the "only one eye in focus" look. F4 or 5 with a 50mm on an APS-C is a nice look but not ridiculously DOF'd.

Fast primes & zooms are nice since they're often better lenses than the consumer stuff. But you may be better off getting some lights with that cash of a pricey lens.

And when the softbox is eating up all your lumens... maybe it's time to bounce.

 

[maarek]

Neat Video can bite you in the rear if you rely on it constantly. Plastic skin tones, posterization... and all that rendering.

Actually Neat Video gets rid of posterization pretty well. If you use it in 16-bit mode that is. It works wonders on banding too.