Low Light Shooting Tips on an iPhone or Smartphone

Low Light Shooting Tips on an iPhone or Smartphone

Shooting film or video in low light conditions is always a challenge. With smartphones the challenge is even higher.

In recent years, DSLRs and mirrorless cameras have been getting better and better at performing in low light conditions. This is down to improving technology and increasing sensor sizes. In addition, these cameras generally allow you to shoot with a wide aperture.

But smartphones have very small sensors and apertures, so they are particularly bad in low light conditions. Having said that, there are certain steps you can take to get the best out of your tiny device.

1. Use manual controls

If you don’t use manual controls on your camera, then your iPhone will do what it does – which is to compensate for the lack of light by boosting the ISO. Boosting ISO is what increases the noise in the image. Therefore, being able to control the ISO setting is the most important step you need to take to get the best looking footage.

Some phones come with good or great inbuilt camera apps. However, some phones have no manual control for video at all. For example, in a recent system update Samsung took away all manual control for video in their smartphone camera app.

To the rescue are third party apps such as FiLMiC Pro. With FiLMiC Pro you have almost total control over your smartphone’s camera, being able to set and lock focus, white balance, ISO, frame rate and shutter speed.

2. Use the widest aperture

Some smartphones now have 2 or more aperture options. For example, my Samsung S9 has apertures of F1.5 (widest) or F2.4, which I can set using the FiLMiC Pro app.

If your smartphone has the option to change aperture, then use the widest available. When the aperture is wider, more light is allowed through the lens onto the sensor. You should also get a slightly shallower depth of field, which is why I always try to shoot with the wider aperture anyway.

3. Keep ISO low

When we are shooting video we are always balancing between desired shutter speed, frames per second, aperture and ISO. To mimic the look of traditional film cameras, we might want to set our frame rate at 25 fps and our shutter speed at 1/50th. This means we now only have ISO to play with.

Now you have control over your camera settings, you can fix your ISO at a low setting. All phones are different, but using my Samsung I have shot at ISOs of 200-300 without too much noise appearing. I recommend trying out your smartphone camera at different settings to see how much you can raise ISO before noise starts to be a problem.

4. Lower the shutter speed

If you are at your ISO limit, you can always drop the shutter speed to 1/25th (if you are shooting at 25 fps). This basically means your shutter is permanently open. There will be more motion blur, but it might be worth it for the extra light.

5. Watch out for light flicker

Electric lights flicker at a certain speed. If your camera frame rate is at a non-synced speed, those electric lights will start to oscillate. When you watch the video back, the lights will flicker in a way we don’t see when using our eyes. The simple trick is to sync your frame rate to the lights.

So, in Europe lights flicker at 50hz. Therefore we need to set our frame rate to 25fps. In the USA, lights flicker at 60hz, so setting your frame rate to 30fps will put your camera in sync. Unfortunately, this means you can’t shoot at that desired-for-the-filmic-look 24fps.

6. Add more light

Depending on what you are trying to achieve, one obvious way to counter low light problems is to add more light. Either bring a portable light with you or move to where these is more available light.

For example, maybe you are shooting an actor but their face is in shadow. A small light can help you out, if you use it carefully. Otherwise, think about moving closer to shop windows with lights, or under street lamps.

7. Fix the noise later

If you have no choice but to add some noise to your video because there’s simply not enough light available, you can always “fix it in post” (those dreaded words).

I would advise being careful about this. If your video is imply filled with noise, trying to remove it can turn your video into a weird plastic-looking thing. Basically, some noise can be removed with various software. So all is not lost if your video contains a little noise.

8. Noise can be ok

Film actually produces noise in low light too, for similar reasons. This can be desired for artistic reasons, by some filmmakers. That’s why there’s now simple ways to add film grain in the colour grading process.

Film grain is so desired by some filmmakers, people will even sell you film grain to add to your video. So what’s the difference?

• The size of the grains in film varies depending on the film’s sensitivity. The more sensitive the film, the larger the grains. But with digital noise, the “grain” is always the size of a pixel, regardless of the ISO setting.
• Film grain is color neutral, as it consist mostly of luminance differences. Digital noise consists of both luminance and color differences, and is most visible in the blue color channel.
• Film grain doesn’t have any banding or patterns, so it’s even across the image. It’s more of a texture and so less noticeable as something “ugly”.

But still – adding a little film grain might just hide some minor noise issues?

Read more: How to Fix Noise (grain).

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