Lighting an appartment

Christophe Collette · December 21, 2006

Hi, I just finished a commercial for an insurance company, if I get a link to it, it will be posted but I don't think it will be released til january. I got some feedbacks from the prod, they absolutely loved the close-ups but were not astounded by the larger scenes. They said it looked a bit fake.. To me, It did not look fake but looked a bit plain... The order was soft and moody, as if there was just natural light... the appartment was pretty luminous but I was shooting 7217 with an 85b (had to shoot 7217... Budget was tight and the prod house had the film, so they asked for me to use it...) which kept me from shooting with just plain daylight. I added a couple of 6K fresnel through a light silk diffusion which were outside the building and were aimed just a tad above or beside the windows so that I do not get hot spot and light appears to flow in naturally... It brought my reading inside in the middle of large room I was lighting from f 1.3 to f2.8. Inside, I lit my actors with an Image 80, large kino, 8 tubes, which was also diffused with silk on a 6x6, backlight in the hair was another kino without diffusion tied up to the sealing (deported) behind the actor which I kept a stop over my main. I tried to keep a bit of contrast in the faces lighting from one side only 90 degrees to the left side, no fill on the face, but anyway it was really soft so I did not really need more than a bounce board, Basically I tried to mimic the light I had in the appartment but reinforcing it and making sure my subjects were popping out of the background a bit... But the whole place was white, I used negative bounce here and there in a few set ups in order to give a bit of modeling in the light but it was a bit too lit, the kino englobed everything even when placed the closest possible to the subject and exposing for that. The close ups were beautiful, very real, but in a large view, it looked blank... The place was small, hard to conceil lights, I use catpoles the closest to the wall as possible and deportations...

I am just starting my career Dping, have been climbing up from cheap music video to commercials in 6 months, I do not quite feel I have the knowledge to do what I am doing but I am doing it. What are possible options in such a place to make things more moody without going hard with the light... I'll post a photo so you get the type of light I mean, in this photo it is natural light...

I thought of an Hmi through a chimera with eggcrate maybe, more contrasty than the image 80 diffused... Maybe undiffused image 80 to bring the reading from the subject at a higher ratio of difference to the background... Hard light fake window patterns coming inside shots.....

I was shooting with Cooke S4 lenses, kept a constant f2, so I used a ND3 or ND 6 once in while...

What would you do?? I know this is very up the air without seeing theplace and my images but I am asking anyways....

Here is a commercial that very much looks like my footage in the large scene altought I did not have that amount of space to play with lights and only had a few lit practicals here and there with "daylight" bulbs...

www.jetfilms.ca, you click on directors, find Maxime Giroux, look for the commercial entitled "Comte-Le temps s'arrête...."

How would you make this less bleak while keeping it soft, I mean by less bleak, to sort of have denser areas...

And here is the photo, forget the window there...

And another one...

Thanks a ton, I know this is a weird post, I am just trying to see differently.

Christophe

Oups I posted twice the same image, sorry! I have trouble with other one, anyway, you get where I am going.

Thanks!

Jonathan Bowerbank · December 21, 2006

I tried to keep a bit of contrast in the faces lighting from one side only 90 degrees to the left side, no fill on the face, ...

This seemed strange to me, for an interior that's supposed to be daytime. Maybe had you increased the amount of fill it wouldn't have looked so "fake" to the producers.

Mixing kinos with 6k fresnels can be chancy too, if you're not quite sure how to handle them. Eggcrates help to direct the light better, but the transmission of the different kinds of lamps is noticeable...possibly even to the untrained eye.

You probably could have kept it really simple, with the 6k's outside the window for your main source/key, and then a bead/bounce board to provide the amount of fill you needed on your actors. Just an idea.

Daniel Carruthers · December 21, 2006

hmmm, i think the shot looks great.

Christophe Collette · December 21, 2006

Hi Jonathan, light temperature was not an issue I had a color meter and checked it all previously, anyway I was transferring on the Spirit, we were going for a slightly warm desaturated look... So even If I had had tungstene bulbs in my practicals, it would not have mattered much since they were not giving much light and I could have easily color correctedthem in post. But I had daylight bulbs which not quite daylight, more like 4200K but I was going warm in post.

I will post another photo in a new thread, I have reached the limit, this was done shooting flash with a small 2x3 chimera... This is the sort of light I would like to create in film which I have not yet been able to... ... See, the shadow is soft, althought the light is punchy, all in all it still looks like soft light but it's got more crunch than those kinos which I am starting to consider not using anymore... But all the chimera experience I had in film were not concluding, I once had a 3x4 chimera on a 1.2k HMI placed about the same way as in this photo and it looked mushy, nothing like this.... It's this in between soft and hard that I'd like to attain, any ideas?

I just thought of THE perfect example: the Calvin Klein CKOne ads from Mark Romanek,

http://www.markromanek.com/spots/03.html

Both the one of the guy and the girl. This looks real. Natural light I mean.

C

Jonathan Bowerbank · December 22, 2006

hmmm, i think the shot looks great.

Those weren't his, Daniel ;)

But I agree, they do look pretty good, ha ha

Christophe Collette · December 22, 2006

They are actually mine! A fashion shoot from last spring, but not from the commercial I am refering to.

I tried posting the photo, it does not work so sorry I don't have more photo for reference...

Jonathan Bowerbank · December 22, 2006

Hi Jonathan, light temperature was not an issue I had a color meter and checked it all previously...

Oh, it wasn't color temperature that I was trying to address, but the general transmission and wrap around effect of the different types of light. A diffused fresnel and a diffused Kino are going to have different looks, respectively.

I like the cross key used in that Mark Romanek commercial, again, it was probably really simple how they did it. 5 or 10k's with 216 diffusion or muslin can get you that kind of midland between soft and hard edges. Chimeras work great too, I haven't worked with them on a shoot yet, but I demoed a Chimera pancake not long ago and I really loved how it looked. I plan on using one sometime soon.

freddie bonfanti · December 22, 2006

as Jonathan suggested,

keep it simple, Savides does the same in those commercials. i reckon big source through diffused material (or big source far far away) and soft bounce back

G McMahon · December 22, 2006

My interpretation of your question is that you like the softness (quality of light) but aren't satisfied with your contrast (looks too bleak). I believe your contrast is coming as your source is close to the window (which you are exposing for); therefore your inverse square law is not allowing a decent throw. Look at backing your lights outside the window off, or cut down your ratio internally, bouncing light of ceilings to get the stop you want. Or maybe overexposing the subject close to window.

I must say, 6 months. That?s a very light sentence for the work your getting, good for you.

Hope this is what you were seeking.

David Mullen ASC · December 22, 2006

Looks great, I'm not sure why the producers think it looks "fake" -- there is only one source and it's coming from the window! Yes, there is more fall-off than natural window light would create, but most people wouldn't catch that or care, not with your subject standing so close to the window.

Chayse Irvin ASC, CSC · December 22, 2006

Looks great to me. Perhaps the producers were just busting your balls maybe?

Christophe Collette · December 22, 2006

Hi there, thanks everyone for your replies! I am really sorry if I confused everyone with my photo... This is a photo of another shoot, which we used as reference for lighting alongside Mark Romanek's CKOne spots... I do not have images from the commercial I am refering to yet... I think G McMahon and Jonathan read through my novel and understood where I was going! I am unsure of what light to use to mimic natural light coming from a window in a place where I don't have a window maybe.... I used that diffused Image 80 and true, the wrap around quality of the light it gives is nowhere close to the light coming from a window, like in the photo I posted of the girl by the window.

Imagine this photo without a window but a wall a little farther and that the light quality was the same but artificial, what light would it be? I understand I need a large source, diffused probably, so that's why I went for Image 80... But I needed something a little less mushy, punchier but still soft and large... Maybe a bunch of small fresnel behind one large diffusion...

Thanks, and sorry for the confusion!

C

Jim Feldspar · December 23, 2006

Looks great to me. Perhaps the producers were just busting your balls maybe?

Yes, then they can make you worry and keep your rate down as long as possible.

Who knows, but I hear stories, usually by grads who are so happy to be getting higher

end jobs and building commercial reels that they'll take the abuse for a while until they

feel secure and know that people will hire them other than the ones who'll "give you

another chance but you have to (work cheaply.)"

Brian Baker · December 23, 2006

Althogh my expereience pales in comparison to you guys, I have noticted one thing from my shoots; that I don't like diffusing KINOs. For the most part, it sucks too much of the light out of the unit, and doesn't spread in a pleasing way.

And based off the discussion, I'd probably say that you could have done more with the window light too... and then mabe bounce some smaller HMIs units onto the subject -- just so they wouled pop out a little bit, and you wouldn't loose the contrast given to you by the bright window.

Did you "blow out" the window? Just curious -- if so, what stop did you rate it at (if you remember)?

Finally, I like how you aimed the window HMIs to avoid hotspots and keel a nautral flow... *learned*

Satsuki Murashige · December 25, 2006

"I was shooting 7217 with an 85b ..."

If you were shooting for telecine, you could have shot without the 85, giving you an extra 2/3 stop to work with.

"The close ups were beautiful, very real, but in a large view, it looked blank..."

Are you saying that the wall behind your actor was lit too flat, or that the actor's face was lit too flat? Because when I look at your reference still (which looks great, by the way!), what I notice first is that the back wall has a high degree of fall-off, almost like you darkened the left side with a soft matte in post. You might have been able to get away with doing the same thing to the wide shot in telecine (Of course, I'm sure you would have preferred to get it right on the negative).

Good luck, six months is a very short time to be getting such work. Hope I'm that lucky some day!

Christophe Collette · December 27, 2006

Hi there, I did blew out the windows, tried to keep an F2 inside, I was a good f4.5 right by the window. I'll post some images early january once I get my hands on the footage. Thanks everyone!

C