Shooting a boat scene in a black box studio - concerns with making it look real

[Joshua Echevarria]

Hey all

 

I have a unique problem to solve for an upcoming shoot.  I figured the Visual Effects forum would be the best place for this question.

So we are shooting a boat  17’ long  x 5’ wide and about 1 ‘ off the ground in a black box studio.  I came onto the project after another DP had to step out and this decision had already been made.   Production had explored some Volume options and I explored more and its just not within the budget.  

The scene is at night and the plan is to haze it and add low lying fog to sell the gag but a concern I have is that it would be impossible to avoid seeing even bits of water at one point or another.  We discussed making moveable 4x8 water pools but that seems like a huge pain logistically and considering the FOV, they would likely need to be much larger.  I thought maybe doing rear projection could be an option but I’m not totally sure and was planning to test this weekend at my studio.  I know its an odd situation but I was hoping to bounce ideas off fellow DPs to try and come up with a budget friendly solution that also looks good.   

Below are some references for the look that the director is hoping to achieve but you can see how even in these references, water is visible even if it fades into the fog. 

[Joerg Polzfusz]

When there’s fog, then the water is usually relatively calm. (Fog = no wind = nearly no waves) So there’s no need to permanently shake the boat. A few gentle moves during the scene and some sound effects should do.

When not filming in front of a green screen or blue screen, it will be very difficult to replace the black areas with horizon, sea and fog in post as in your lower photo. And I doubt that you want to fill the whole stage with artificial smoke.

At least when having fog, then the light should not be too harsh = no great contrast between shadows and lit objects/actors. So even the shadows on the boat shouldn’t be completely black because of the diffuse light. Hence it might be possible to alter the background in post. (That’s unless the actors are wearing black clothes and unless the boat is painted black.)

 

Not sure whether front or rear projection would work here as you would have to synchronize the boat’s movements to the projected images and as the screen might cause reflections and maybe even a „glowing sea“ that would ruin the scene. I would rather fill the area around the boat and the „horizon“ with green blankets (if you want to stay on the extremely cheap side).

 

I hope that someone else can add some more helpful hints.

Good luck!

Edited April 9 by Joerg Polzfusz

[Aapo Lettinen]

I wonder if it would be possible to make a "pool" using huge black tarp and only tiny layer of water, like one inch or so. Just enough to show ripples and reflection but not enough to cause the deeper pool issues. If the whole studio is filled with fog, then could be possible to cover almost the whole floor with the one huge black tarp, roll it up to the walls on the sides, then fill a thin layer of water and pray it won't leak😅

even half an inch might work if the shooting angle is right

[Joerg Polzfusz]

You could use „pool liner“ for this. 

[Joerg Polzfusz]

A typical no budget amateur idea:

You might also use bed linen as water… yes, might be too static unless it’s out of focus and unless it’s covered by moving fog…

https://www.joom.com/en/products/68a41c7bd0f7a201e7299a4f?currency=EUR&utm_productid=68a41c7bd0f7a201e7299a4f&utm_feed=web&utm_hash=b2d8c608308e55d70fc2c9af4ef20a78&variant_id=68a41c7bd0f7a2aae7299b12&gsAttrs=eyJyZWdpb24iOiJERSIsICJzcGVjaWFsUHJpY2VVc2VkIjpmYWxzZX0g&exp_price=MzEuMCAg&country=DE&utm_audienceid=advertising_web_bing_2d&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=569984108&utm_term=cid-569984108%2Cagi-1174280318810338%2Cadi-%2Ctid-pla-2325192215914939%2Cdev-m%2Creg-129791%2Cmd-68a41c7bd0f7a2aae7299b12&kb=ga_pm_569984108_1174280318810338&msclkid=a59b9ced153f1905018bf53502850219

[Joshua Echevarria]

16 hours ago, Aapo Lettinen said:

I wonder if it would be possible to make a "pool" using huge black tarp and only tiny layer of water, like one inch or so. Just enough to show ripples and reflection but not enough to cause the deeper pool issues. If the whole studio is filled with fog, then could be possible to cover almost the whole floor with the one huge black tarp, roll it up to the walls on the sides, then fill a thin layer of water and pray it won't leak😅

even half an inch might work if the shooting angle is right

 

15 hours ago, Joerg Polzfusz said:

You could use „pool liner“ for this. 

We had a plan to create two 4x8 “pools” with pool liners and that would only be a few inches deep. The concern is that the studio wouldn’t allow it and that it actually wouldn’t be big enough to fill the frame.  We’re still entertaining this idea but we wanted to explore other options.

[Joshua Echevarria]

17 hours ago, Joerg Polzfusz said:

When there’s fog, then the water is usually relatively calm. (Fog = no wind = nearly no waves) So there’s no need to permanently shake the boat. A few gentle moves during the scene and some sound effects should do.

When not filming in front of a green screen or blue screen, it will be very difficult to replace the black areas with horizon, sea and fog in post as in your lower photo. And I doubt that you want to fill the whole stage with artificial smoke.

At least when having fog, then the light should not be too harsh = no great contrast between shadows and lit objects/actors. So even the shadows on the boat shouldn’t be completely black because of the diffuse light. Hence it might be possible to alter the background in post. (That’s unless the actors are wearing black clothes and unless the boat is painted black.)

 

Not sure whether front or rear projection would work here as you would have to synchronize the boat’s movements to the projected images and as the screen might cause reflections and maybe even a „glowing sea“ that would ruin the scene. I would rather fill the area around the boat and the „horizon“ with green blankets (if you want to stay on the extremely cheap side).

 

I hope that someone else can add some more helpful hints.

Good luck!

Our VFX budget is limited to the plan to shoot in a black box was made to limit the amount of green screen and vfx necessary

[Aapo Lettinen]

2 hours ago, Joshua Echevarria said:

 

We had a plan to create two 4x8 “pools” with pool liners and that would only be a few inches deep. The concern is that the studio wouldn’t allow it and that it actually wouldn’t be big enough to fill the frame.  We’re still entertaining this idea but we wanted to explore other options.

I was meaning more like a 40ft x 20ft pool which never needs to be moved for being so wide. Add just enough water so that it reflects and hides the black tarp surface. It is much safer for the studio if it is so wide that it can stay stationary for the whole shoot. Moving pools like this when they are filled could damage the plastic making it leaking but if it is laid down once and then filled and stays stationary there is very little risk 

[Brian Drysdale]

1 hour ago, Joshua Echevarria said:

Our VFX budget is limited to the plan to shoot in a black box was made to limit the amount of green screen and vfx necessary

Given how cheap green screen is these days, it can be the cheapest method to do VFX these days.

The cheapest method would probably be to shoot at night on a large enough pool/pond/lake, and have some light reflected from the surface, with no lights in the background. 

[Joshua Echevarria]

5 hours ago, Aapo Lettinen said:

I was meaning more like a 40ft x 20ft pool which never needs to be moved for being so wide. Add just enough water so that it reflects and hides the black tarp surface. It is much safer for the studio if it is so wide that it can stay stationary for the whole shoot. Moving pools like this when they are filled could damage the plastic making it leaking but if it is laid down once and then filled and stays stationary there is very little risk 

I had proposed that first but there was concern with that being okay with the studio.   

[Don H Marks]

I have seen 'water effect' plastic sheeting. 

 

[Joshua Echevarria]

5 hours ago, Brian Drysdale said:

Given how cheap green screen is these days, it can be the cheapest method to do VFX these days.

The cheapest method would probably be to shoot at night on a large enough pool/pond/lake, and have some light reflected from the surface, with no lights in the background. 

Honestly I’d prefer to just shoot on a small lake or something

[Aapo Lettinen]

5 hours ago, Joshua Echevarria said:

Honestly I’d prefer to just shoot on a small lake or something

Or flooded parking lot like they did in LOTR ?

[David Mullen ASC]

You could do the old-school trick of stretching long strips of shiny clear cellophane plastic in horizontal lines in the background and reflecting a light off of them as a fan blows them to create a shimmering effect of light on water. If it's out of focus, it will add some life in the background.

[Brian Drysdale]

I was wondering about that, I'd forgotten about cellophane, my mind was focused on Mylar, which would be too bright.

When I see "The Guns of Navarone" these days, I keep looking at the sea in the background of the guns set and asking myself if they used that old school effect or blue screen. It was build on the studio backlot. 

[Joshua Echevarria]

On 4/11/2026 at 9:36 PM, David Mullen ASC said:

You could do the old-school trick of stretching long strips of shiny clear cellophane plastic in horizontal lines in the background and reflecting a light off of them as a fan blows them to create a shimmering effect of light on water. If it's out of focus, it will add some life in the background.

We considered that as well but the sound would be an issue

[David Mullen ASC]

The sound of cellophane gently blown by e-fans in the background is worse that actually shooting on water??? At some point, getting perfect sound shouldn't mean shooting something that is less believable visually.

[Aapo Lettinen]

Yes some compromise is needed to get forward on this I think. Either the studio gives up and lets you use real water, or you shoot outside and get more budget for logistics and possible adr, or getting resources to use vfx, or the cellophane is used and adr used on dialog if needed.

OR. You would use cellophane on wider shots and if it creates too much sound you shoot the wider shots mos where it shows in background. Then on all parts which have dialogue you just shoot tighter shots where the cellophane area does not show and switch off the fan temporarily. It should work perfectly in editing as long as you have some wider shots existing at all to sell the idea of being on water.

In tighter shots it should be possible to create some water effect by other means if the background is blurred enough and the effect is absolutely needed. But if it exist in wide shots and sound design is good, the audience won't question the closeups at all even if the don't have any effect at all

Edited April 14 by Aapo Lettinen