Holy WOW, This is WHY You Should Have a Variable ND Filter for VIDEO
Roughly four years ago I started to shoot video with my DSLR. I had zero background in the fundamentals of video and only knew how to get the proper exposure.
I have worked hard to learn as much as possible to make me an even more well rounded content creator.
Let me explain to you why you should have a variable ND Filter in your bag for video.
Taking the video as our example we start off with the settings of 100 ISO F22 1/50th of a second. In a future video I will explain the reason for shooting at 1/50th when your frame rate is at 24p.
Because it is so bright out we had to go to F22 and drop our ISO to get our 1/50th of a second exposure. If it were any brighter we would have to raise the shutter speed which would break some general rules. Remember rules are not always meant to be followed but we wanted to follow them for this situation.
Because we were shooting at F22 the background came in and was almost completely in focus. This was not the result we were looking for but what could we do to cut down on the amount of light we were letting in?
I recently purchased a variable neutral density filter. Photographers may have heard about people using them for shooting waterfalls and helping cut back on the amount of light entering the camera while maintaining a wide open aperture.
As you saw in the video by putting the filter on the camera and adjusting it, we were able to get our F stop down to F4 while keeping the same 100 ISO and 1/50th of a second. The one thing we did not account for was the white balance shifting which is something to be careful about in the future.
You can see such a huge difference from F22 to F4. I am popping off the background and no longer is it distracting. You can always play around with different amounts of out of focus area depending on what results you are looking for.
If you are starting to get into video and you find yourself outside shooting in bright daylight you may want to invest in a variable neutral density filter.
