I think...

[BMFM FILMS]

That's the exposure compensation, there's been lots of discussion about it. The other way is holding the play button and the up arrow to make it brighter. But thats about it.

 

[hepabst]

Here is a short clip of my first time in low light, well first any time. I tricked the camera exposure with a light. Lens Nikon 50mm f1.4.

http://www.pabstfilms.com/clips/d90lowlighttest24p.mov

 

[Park Edwards]

you show how you "trick" it with a light?

and need to see a higher rez version to get a better idea.

to all those who are questioning how i setup my camera...what you see on #15 is exactly what i do, whether or not it has any affect, who knows...but once I did all that, I had little to no noise in my shots.

 

[hepabst]

Here are the untouched .avi files from the camera that made up the above clip.

http://www.pabstfilms.com/clips/d90lowlighttest-1.avi
http://www.pabstfilms.com/clips/d90lowlighttest-2.avi
http://www.pabstfilms.com/clips/d90lowlighttest-3.avi
http://www.pabstfilms.com/clips/d90lowlighttest-4.avi

I use a small battery powered closet light that I got from ACE hardware. (pic attached)

This is my process. This requires a manual lens. I used a Nikon 50mm f1.4. I set the f-stop at f8 then put camera in LV mode. Turn light on and I put it about 10 inches from lens. You will see the camera adjust down then I lock exposure. I opened up the f-stop and started shooting. That's it.

 

[Park Edwards]

i wonder if there is a way to dim that light

 

[Park Edwards]

just checked that out. that's good man...pretty sharp too. i have one i'm gonna try out. see what i can get

 

[Park Edwards]

just tried it out...very easy, very easy to keep constant exposure...you my friend deserve an award. it takes out having to find an evenly list surface to lock down exposure. f8 is too much, pumps the gain too high, i put it at f4 and it's fantastic. i'm gonna check to see if i can put a higher watt bulb in it and play with the +/- values and maybe we can finally get accurate shutter speeds and achieve low light.

 

[hepabst]

i wonder if there is a way to dim that light

I just move the light further away from the lens to dim, closer to brighten. I like using the light because it's the same amount of light every time. It makes it easy to recreate what I did.

 

[hepabst]

It's not my idea. I learned how to do that with my Canon HV20 over at the HV20 forum. They should get the award.

I used f8 because my light is pretty bright. It just depends on how much light is getting into the camera as to what f-stop you start out with. It will take a bit of experimentation.

 

[Park Edwards]

you deserve it for bringing it to these boards. i suppose it's going to depend on a lot of different variables....

lens, amount of light entering and what not. i'm going to keep it in the same spot and just stop down and use the +/- button to change shutter and iso.

i'd move it in closer or further if the lens didn't have the ability to stop down, and since it does, i'm just going to put it at the end of the matte box and take it from there.

thanks for showing this. i'm excited to use it now.

 

[Park Edwards]

I like using the light because it's the same amount of light every time. It makes it easy to recreate what I did.

exactly!

 

[Park Edwards]

you remember what picture preset was?

vivid/neutral/standard and if you adjusted the +/- any?

 

[hepabst]

Standard preset, no adjustments to +/-

 

[alexandroff]

this is great. its a lytecap for the d90 that never saw the light of day...
there must be some kind of simple dimmer for these lights.
once its found and connected, we can then mark certain light levels linked to f-stops and observed d90 iso/shutter

 

[alexandroff]

what if we were to just use the white cap surface of that ACEHardware light stuck to the mattebox front

lit by dimmable:

http://cgi.ebay.com/Coast-V-Luxeon-...ht-LL7798_W0QQitemZ330149324162QQcmdZViewItem

or

http://flashlightnews.net/forum/index.php?topic=777.0;all

 

[alexandroff]

I set the f-stop at f8 then put camera in LV mode. Turn light on and I put it about 10 inches from lens. You will see the camera adjust down then I lock exposure. I opened up the f-stop and started shooting. That's it.

f8 is too much, pumps the gain too high, i put it at f4 and it's fantastic. i'm gonna check to see if i can put a higher watt bulb in it and play with the +/- values and maybe we can finally get accurate shutter speeds and achieve low light.

if that f# where Exposure was locked ends up being too high and going down to the smallest # makes it way too overexposed, apart from like Car3o said - "doing AE-L at lower f#", I came across this which could be of use:

http://www.singh-ray.com/varind.html

(2-8 stops)

 

[Park Edwards]

if i had money....$340 is out of my budget.

so far playing around with this light is producing some really great results.
there is a led light at wal-mart for 7bux that you can dim 3 ways.

i'm gonna check into that tomorrow...

 

[alexandroff]

there is a led light at wal-mart for 7bux that you can dim 3 ways.
i'm gonna check into that tomorrow...

awesome... lets create some kind of cheatsheet with these 3-dim-stops relative to d90 iso/shutter, with AE-L at noted F-stops...

 

[alexandroff]

there is a led light at wal-mart for 7bux that you can dim 3 ways.

wouldnt happen to have a link to that light online?

 

[mattsand]

i want one that flickers at 50 hz so that i can remove the lines with it too. problem is all battery powered fluorescents use high frequency ballasts. i guess i have to build my own. maybe a led and a 555 would do the trick, dimming could be done through pwm. i'll let you know.

/matt