Reflections

[Chayse Irvin ASC, CSC]

I was watching a bit of Munich today and one of the favorite shots in the film is this one :: Munich ::

What kind of different techniques there are to expose for glass reflections?

[Jaan Shenberger]

spot meter from the same angle as the camera lens... and obviously, the three factors involved are how well-illuminated the subject is, how dark the area behind the glass is, and how reflective the glass/material is. and also, use no pola.

Edited April 8, 2007 by Jaan Shenberger

[David Mullen ASC]

To some degree, it's something you can judge by eye in terms of how well the reflection reads. You lose a lot of exposure when reflecting the image off of glass, and it helps to not have a bright background behind the glass (a black background giving you the strongest reflections and a white background the worst).

 

You can see in the clip that the backlight on the actor is maybe two stops over or more, to create a reflection in the glass that looks about one-stop under.

 

This is a scenario where actually the video tap image from the film camera, no matter how crappy it is, can tell you whether you are getting a good balance for a reflection gag.

[Phil Gerke]

Also notice that they put his face on the darkest part of the room. Framed any way else and they would have been in trouble.

 

Good post, thanks.

[Daniel Smith]

I'd be interested to know what kind of a setup you would need to expose for night scenes like that. Any ideas?

[David Mullen ASC]

I'd be interested to know what kind of a setup you would need to expose for night scenes like that. Any ideas?

 

It's a rather complicated lighting set-up. The store interior is mainly by its practical lamps with a added few spots, maybe something like Tweenies (650w) or smaller, the backlight on the lead that creates the reflection could be a semi-spotted 1K tungsten. But the streets & buildings themselves are lit with a lot of big units hidden behind buildings and whatnot.