Thanks for the help Shane! Sounds like maybe my footage really is darker than I think because my viewfinder was lying.
That all makes sense, but if thats the case why do stills in Photoshop from the same shoot look better than my video footage? Here’s a comparison with photoshop on the left:
Ahhh it seems like I should have messed with the different channels in multi pass rendering. “Material Transparency” seems to give me what I need. Thanks anyway : )