Question About Lighting A Fake Darkroom (Red Lighting)

[Ben Barnett]

I'm a student. In a few weeks, I am going to be directing my first (ish) short film! The script calls for a darkroom set, as in a photography development room, so it will need to have red lighting. I'm constructing the set rather than using a real location (none nearby sadly!) so I'm doing my own lighting. However the camera I am using (Canon C200) is not great for picking up red light and I know if I try to shoot in such a dark space with only red light the image will come out very grainy (have tested this, it is also very hard to expose properly). To my understanding this is because instead of using the full RGB colour spectrum I am only using R, which lets a lot less light in.

I am basically wondering what the best solution for this would be. I think it's possible to shoot in white light and then grade it later (any tips on this or how hard it would be would be appreciated, I am going to be editing in Premier Pro and have not graded before) but I don't want the image to necessarily be all red, as I think a little depth of colour, some hints of yellowy-green and orange, could make the image look better even if it is unrealistic (to be fair, the setting is more a purgatory than a real darkroom, so I am okay with bending the rules if it helps the image). Is it possible to get that level of colour depth via grading, or is it better to shoot with my intended colours? If I should shoot in white light, should I keep it as pure white as possible or would adding colour be fine/better?

Clearly, I don't know much about what I'm doing. Lighting isn't my strong suit and I'm worried about ruining my film with bad, one-note colour... help!