DLog, HLG & Night mode

[Ralph thompson]

Yesterday I posted on the benefits of HLG over DLog. I added a comparison for night mode with, for me the conclusion that in future, I'll stick with HLG rather than going with night mode (see attached side by side comparison of metadata). Night mode has 3 additional stops of ISO but a photographers rule of thumb is keep ISO as low as you possibly can to minimize noise. The M3 camera has a pretty fast lens, aperture 2.8 and you can reduce shutter speed below the 180 rule. The 180 or twice FPS is just a rule of thumb, a slower shutter speed just produces a more dreamy like image. Even on super low noise DSLR's, I am reluctant to go much above ISO 3200, at a push ISO 4000. The night mode reduces the file size from 5K max to UHD max and drops the bit depth on capture down to 8bit with Rec 709 output. I appreciate this is theoretical and I have got good twilight/nighttime capture using Night mode. But in my opinion, HLG will give the more possibilities in post.

 

[JoelP]

If I read your table correctly the HLG has the larger color gamut of REC 2020 rather than 709 and the extra stops of night mode aren’t worth the enormous file size.

 

[Ralph thompson]

That would be my interpretation Joel except night mode will give smaller files. I believe DJI/Hassalblad use dual native ISO, a technique used by high end camera manufacturers like Blackmagic, to reduce noise at higher ISO’s but in my experience with the BMPCC4K, this has limited benefit & I‘d prioritize 10 bit, rec2020 over the iso benefits. But I appreciate others may see benefits in higher ISO & faster shutter speeds for live streaming & not concerned with or experienced in post production.

 

[Ralph thompson]

I was testing out my theories above in practice last night and its very clear that with a little work in post (I use Davinci Resolve, you do need the Studio version for noise reduction) HLG is the winner. It even has an edge over ProRes as demonstrated in the video link below, good news for those who waited for the M3Classic.

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[GadgetGuy]

I was testing out my theories above in practice last night and its very clear that with a little work in post (I use Davinci Resolve, you do need the Studio version for noise reduction) HLG is the winner. It even has an edge over ProRes as demonstrated in the video link below, good news for those who waited for the M3Classic.

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Mavic 3 can do everything the Classic can, and has a free 7x telephoto camera, if you buy a DJI Refurb from DJI for $1569 on eBay.