Rich textures and organic images
With an improved dynamic range, shooting with a DGO sensor carries further flexibility through to post production, particularly when grading footage of darker scenes.
"When you bring footage shot on the EOS C300 Mark III to grading, as soon as it sits on the screen, it just stands out against everything else that I've shot," says Ben, who will often have shot in Canon Log 3 and then graded for Rec. 709 deliverables.
"It's a joy to work with in post production. I've pushed the images really far. We've been shooting in some very dark conditions, filming with fire, so you're dealing with very high-contrast images, because you want to have someone's face correctly exposed but then you also want to have that fire well exposed.
"In post production, we've been pushing the cutters massively and really trying to pull up the shadows and really trying to bring down the highlights. It seems like no matter how far we push it, it doesn't snap. It just retains all that lush information – which is witchcraft, if you ask me!"
Unlike with alternative methods such as Dual ISO, the benefits of DGO apply to a range of ISO levels, maximising image quality regardless of the shooting environment. Canon says users can concentrate on shooting in a natural state without the hassle of switching the base ISO according to the brightness of the shooting scene.
"I shoot with a variety of different cameras," Ben says, "and that's a problem now because now I've got this EOS C300 Mark III footage which just jumps out at you. There's something so rich about the textures that are in there, the colours, the detail – but no noise. It's just the most organic feeling image that I think I've seen."
Modern movie-making and high-end episodic television productions are now seeing even greater demand for HDR content and particularly the ability to shoot in low-light scenes. Canon's breakthrough Dual Gain Output technology supports such a look without compromising the reproduction of highlight details.