85 filter

[Dave Plake]

I am shooting ISO 500 tungsten stock of a bonfire at sunset. There will be daylight so do I need an 85 filter? Or will the color temperature at that time of day be balanced for tungsten? I definitly don't want the image to look blue, but then again would an 85 be too much orange at that time of day? Is there another filter that is more appropriate or no filter at all?

 

Thanks!

 

 

question 2

during that scene in front of the bonfire, I'll need to shoot a couple of closeups of two people kissing. I was thinking of putting full CTO on a 1K fresnel and using a flickerbox to add light to their faces. Does anyone think this is a good or bad idea? You guys have any other ideas for throwing a tad more light on them while they sit in front of this bonfire?

 

Thanks again!

Dave

[Michael Nash]

I would stick with the 85 filter if you can see any blue skylight with the naked eye. You have to remember that even if the light of the setting sun is very orange, the light coming from the sky (fill side) is very blue.

 

If you want more exposure you could elect to switch to a lighter grade of warming filter such as an 81 EF, or even an LLD to keep the blues from getting too saturated. But with these you'd still want to do some color correction anyway.

 

You might need something more than a 1K for the fire gag, or simply use more than one 1K. But that's all relative to the size of the bonfire, the distance the actors are from it, and what kind of f-stop you need. There's plenty of other discussion about firelight gags here if you do a search.