Interior Car Lighting - Daytime / Nighttime

adrianmpruett · May 21, 2008

so i'm gearing up to shoot a new HD docu-soap for CBS and a majority of the show will take place inside cars.

i'm trying to decide on the best design will be for aesthetic-functionality and be able to be used 360 degrees and possibly seen at times. my first through was to use 6-8 lumapanels around the interior of the car attached to the roof of the car that would hopefully bring up the ambient light enough during the day that when used in conjunction with a non-reflective ND .6 tint / ND.9, would keep the image from falling into a nuclear nightmare scenario. because it's a docu-series, i wouldn't have the luxury of moving things to fit into a 'best case scenario', so i need something easy and durable that does not need to be maintained constantly throughout the day. i figure the lumapanels could also be color corrected to work as tungsten at night.

the only other option i can think of is using kino-car kits or mini flos and creating a 'ring of fire' around the edge of the roof interior, front to back and along the sides attached with monofilament, but i don't think the fc would be enough to dramatically effect the slope of the HD stock. also the bulbs would have to rate 56k and not be used at night, unless we added another strip of bulbs. that plan seems like a two-fold disaster as it requires too much work and doesn't put us where we need to be with the the amount of fc we would need.

i love LED lighting for nighttime car interiors but could i use a bunch of 120w 52" LED strips all over the interior where we need it for daytime use?

thoughts? comments? really could use some practical advice if anyone has any.

Edited May 21, 2008 by adrianmpruett