Softening filters

[stephen lamb]

Hey all,

i am shooting a short film (well, video i should say) soon and i am interested in using some softening filters. I guess my main concern is ending up with a filter that is too soft, that really blurs things up. What i am looking for is sometthing that will take blown out highlights, and seep them out into their surroundings a bit. A have a specific shot in mind where i really want to try this out. I have the main character in profile, very close to the camera, so just his face is in view. He is in a classroom and he is getting made fun of by all of his classmates because they don't buy that he wants to be a pro football player when we grows up. In reality, he doesn't want to do it at all anyways, so here he is at the front of the class, really undergoing some serious stress. The teacher tries to help him by telling the class to settle down and be nice, but she just doesn't help at all. So i want to create a feeling where we see his anxiety very clearly and we also see the teacher behind him, but i want her to be in silhouette in front of the window, and i want the window to be blown out and have those highlights sort of melting into her, so that she is just sort of this nondescript character who seems very far away and detached. I am hoping to be able to shoot on the new Panasonic HVX. Do you guys have any suggestions for what softening filters ( or any other technique) that i might use for this shot? thanks,

Steve

[Andrew Alward]

Promist filters will do that effect. You can get different intesities of promist, from 1/2 pro, to about 5 pro(which is very strong) For that effect, I might stick to the lower rated filters, anywhere between a 1/2 and a 2.

[stephen lamb]

Promist eh? Thanks for the tip!

Steve