Natural Light, It Burns

In My Opinion...

• Personally, natural lighting seems like more of a hassle than what it's worth, but I suppose that if the ambiance calls for the more naturalistic look, then the use of natural light would be the best idea.
• I thought it was very kind to add suggestions for more cost effective budgets (like the Rokinon Cine lenses). I don't think that is included in enough advise articles.

Cool Story Bro

• First off, I didn't even know that natural lighting was an option. I always believed that to have a good movie you had to have it as bright as possible without ruining the shot. When in reality, the exact opposite is true. Sometimes it is better to have less light. Magic Hour (hour just before sunset and after sunrise) and Blue Hour (hour just after sunset and before sunrise) would have the least amount of light with the most amount of brightness/darkness (depending on the time of day the shot is supposed to take place at). So it's like Charmin Ultra: Less is More
• Cameras can be very sensitive to lighting and apparently there are different cameras for different types of light. Ugh, it's all just so complicated. And not only that, there are different lenses to put on the different cameras! So there is a practically endless combination of cameras and lenses for every single possible scenario! Ugh, no thanks. I'll stick to animating.
• There is much more work involved with natural lighting. Natural lighting, to me, feels like a house of cards. One false move and the rest will come tumbling to the ground. And it seems like anything that can go wrong probably will (nobody's perfect). There is the problems with the actors forgetting their lines and not having the right equipment for the shot and the sun being in the actor's eyes and all that jazz. Hell, there are even tighter time constraints. If you can only shoot for about two or three hours a day, doesn't that rack up a lot slower than shooting for like eight hours (probably an outrageous assumption haha)?

 All in all, if you don't have to use natural light, you probably shouldn't (unless you're feeling ambitious, which is understandable. Risks may yield high success. I'm not much of a film-maker myself, so maybe I just don't understand yet).

I would like to know

• How many movies have tried this technique and made a successful production? How about how many have tried and failed? Other than a more natural feel, what else can natural lighting give to a film? Also, is it worth it in the long run?