Waiting for a Friend – Camera Tests

I’m planning to shoot in S-Log2 on a Sony A7Rii. This is the first time I have used this camera so I had to do some research to ensure I got the best results. After reading up on this and consulting several different people, I learned that it is best to overexpose by 1 or 2 stops when shooting log, to avoid excessive colour noise in the shadows. To confirm this, I conducted some camera tests using different picture profiles and exposure settings.

I will use the results of these tests, combined with a histogram and light meter, to help me find the correct exposure when shooting and to help me determine the most suitable LUTs when colour grading.

Below are 3 of the graded images; the non-overexposed footage (+-0) had a substantial amount of colour noise in the shadows while the overexposed footage looked much cleaner when the exposure was brought back down in DaVinci Resolve.