What is the Best Aperture for Filmmaking?

what is the best aperture for video it's f 2.8 or t 2.8 if you're thinking t stops and before you ask t 2.8 is for the super 35 millimeter sensor that's close enough to aps-c too for full-frame 35 millimeter sensors this would be about a t4 you can stop now and watch another one of my amazing 10 second videos or you could stick around and i'll tell you why 2.8 is the best aperture are you democratic then you'll be easier to convince i've studied the work of hundreds of cinematographers and the t-stop they like to most of the time is t 2.8 this corresponds to about f 2.5 or thereabouts but you can assume it's f 2.8 for the sake of your sanity again this is for super 35 millimeter or thereabouts because that's what most films have been shot on because that's the format that approximates what most films have been shot on there are other formats but then the popular aperture number will change it changes if you're going to academy frame for example and it definitely changes with anamorphic so why do cinematographers pick t 2.8 for reasons the aperture number called f number decides how big the aperture opening is the higher the number the smaller the aperture and the lesser the light hitting the sensor cinematographers always had to fight the low sensitivities of film stock today most cinema cameras have a native iso of 800 and that's just for starters but a few decades ago they were working with an exposure index of 50 to 200 most times generally speaking there are exceptions but you had to give up image quality nowadays film stock has an exposure index of 250 500 which is about a thousand iso because the corresponding iso is about double the exposure index according to kodak in short they didn't have the low light abilities modern cameras have this meant they had to open up the aperture for good exposure or use too much light too much light would have cooked film sets and the actors well over illegal tanning limits they had to strike a good balance between practical lighting and what is tolerable t 2.8 was a good happy medium just short of war and this is just one reason the second is when you open up the aperture you get shallower depth of field if you stop down or close down the aperture you get deeper depth of field this is why movies like citizen kane had to use tons of light for their deep focused look if you want everything in the frame to be in focus you must stop down the aperture this cuts light by a tremendous amount every step in the aperture scale cuts one stop of light or double the light the other end of the spectrum is shallow depth of field where you have no clue where the actor is to get this effect you open up the aperture to its highest rating sometimes t2 or t 1.3 on traditional cinema glass if you had the option these lenses were available back in the day when cinematographers used t 2.8 the godfather was shot with boston long super ball towers that were t2.3 and the taxi driver was shot on zeiss super speeds that were t 1.4 some scenes in taxi driver were shot wide open especially the night shots but most of the film wasn't shot in t 1.4 so why didn't these cinematographers open the aperture all the way if they could have because there's no free lunch lenses in those days weren't as advanced as today so if you open the aperture all the way you had three major problems first you had too much flare flare is not just those cool streaks of light you see it's also a loss of contrast imagine going through all the trouble of learning about film stock and lighting only for something stupid like lens flare to ruin your shot through lack of contrast the second problem was also serious the lenses weren't that sharp wide open this is true of almost every lens on the planet with a few rare exceptions lenses are not the sharpest when wide open the general rule of thumb is lenses have to be stopped down by two stops for best sharpness for example if you have an f 1.4 lens you have to stop down to f 2.8 for best sharpness this also meant if you use different focal lengths the sharpness across the entire range matched this is the biggest problem with cheap lenses that open to f 1.4 or higher today they don't match across the entire set great cine lenses like the aerie master prime series open to t 1.3 across the entire range you'll never find an equivalent photo lens series that all open to a t 1.3 at any price the master primes are known to perform very well at t 1.3 they're sharp and cinematic but even these lenses are sharper stopped down to t 2.8 the last reason cinematographers stopped down was probably the most important one shallow depth of field also meant focus bowlers had a terrible time following actors remember they didn't have monitors in those days focus pullers had to use all their experience and concentration to keep the moving actor in focus today there are aids but unfortunately high resolution has balanced that out focus mistakes are way more obvious in 4k and unforgiving in 8k so whatever advantage monitors and electronic systems have introduced higher resolution has taken away it's still hard to focus moving subjects at t 1.4 in 8k force focus pullers to do that and there will be a contract out for your life t 2.8 provided cinematographers the best balance between shallow depth of field and deep focus even visually you could make out the background which was and continues to be important in film nobody wants a completely mushy background otherwise it will look like the shot in the studio the third reason to pick t 2.8 is very few people can afford deep focus when i shot man-made love i stopped down the air master anamorphix or t8 and compensated by raising my iso to 6400 which is the limit for the red monstro even then i felt i didn't have enough light there is another problem with stopping down the lens when you cross a certain threshold typically f11 for super 35 millimeter sensors you'll lose sharpness due to something called diffraction the explanation is quite technical but all you have to know is just because you can stop down to t22 doesn't mean you should you'll get softer images with full frame it's about a t8 just like with everything else in life a happy medium is the best for the aperture as well and it's not like cinematographers sat down and decided these things cerebrally they didn't even vote for it it came about organically through practical limitations of cinematography cameras lenses and lighting over many many decades of filmmaking for all these trade-offs they got a lot in return they got the ability to stay consistent with their lighting and exposure they could achieve the great images we love so much even in the high stakes high pressure environment of a hollywood film because they were able to keep many things constant this is why over about 100 years of cinema t 2.8 came to be the most preferred aperture for normally lit scenes for low-light night scenes cinematographers typically prefer t2 again all this is for the super 35 millimeter sensor or any format close to super 35 millimeters today due to the improvements in iso and sensitivity in digital cameras the photographers can use a wider aperture range here's something cool look at the classic popular zoom lenses for cinema they are close to t 2.8 t 2.95 or t3 even photography zoom lenses are consistent across all brands at f 2.8 look at b h even they let you find lenses with apertures above f 2.8 or higher because they know that's the popular threshold so t 2.8 or f 2.8 is the best aperture for filmmaking if you're feeling democratic you can open the aperture as wide as you want or you can stop down as much as you want not everybody sticks to t2.8 all the time there are always exceptions i hope you found this video useful i'll see in the next one bye now

Channel: wolfcrow

Views: 162,025

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Id: zCyXtC43U3k

Length: 8min 33sec (513 seconds)

Published: Mon Apr 11 2022