Balancing tungsten to sodum vapor

[Matt Irwin]

I've got a low budget night shoot coming up that takes place on a pier lined with sodium vapor street lamps. The lamps actually provide a lot of illumination and we want to incorporate them into the shots, so I need to find a gel recipe to balance some tungsten and 3200k flo units to the vapor lights.

 

Of course the color temp varies among sodium lights; I'm looking for a recipe(s) that will get me in the ball park so I can do some tests.

Any favorites? (We're shooting on an HVX200 in 720)

 

Thanks,

[Stuart Brereton]

Matt,

 

There is a discussion of gel packs to match Sodium Vapor towards the end of this thread:

 

click here

[Matt Irwin]

Matt,

 

There is a discussion of gel packs to match Sodium Vapor towards the end of this thread:

 

click here

 

Lee Apricot 147 and Rosco Cal Colour Yellow 15, huh? Cool, I'll give it a try. Thanks!

[Stuart Brereton]

You should have a look at Michael Nashs' suggestion too. It's a very good match.

[Robert Hughes]

But, at the risk of restating the obvious, it is practically impossible to balance sodium vapor light to anything, as the light is a discontinuous spectrum; orange and deep violet only. How can the color temp of sodium light vary between units? Also, from my experience these lights have about as much color as sepia toned b&w. So you probably don't want to match your tungsten and kinoflos to them if you want any color in your foreground.

[Matt Irwin]

But, at the risk of restating the obvious, it is practically impossible to balance sodium vapor light to anything, as the light is a discontinuous spectrum; orange and deep violet only. How can the color temp of sodium light vary between units? Also, from my experience these lights have about as much color as sepia toned b&w. So you probably don't want to match your tungsten and kinoflos to them if you want any color in your foreground.

You are correct. I don't plan on white balanceing to the sodium vapors-- I'll be at 3200k. I need to gel certain lights so I can put/enhance those colors where I need them. There will probably be pure 3200 key as well as some motivated blue somewhere to compete with the heavy orange.

[Robert Hughes]

Ungelled automobile headlights may be appropriate. Let them go slightly yellow and don't attempt to balance to the sodium lights.

Edited April 1, 2006 by Robert Hughes

[Stuart Brereton]

Matts' original query was that he needed to balance some tungsten units to some sodium vapor ones which were actually in his shot, hence the need to find a gel pack that matched. Although Sodium has a discontinuous spectrum, it is possible to achieve a very close visual match with some the the combinations that have been suggested.