Sunset shot..?

[Guest Adam Rench]

Hi all,

 

First post here. As you can see I'm a student just starting out in the ditial film industry. I guess I'll first just post what I have available to me as far as equipment.

 

Sony HDR-FX1 (NTSC)

Avid Xpress Pro (waiting for them to release their HDV codec next year to natively edit in Avid)

 

OK, now that that's out of the way...

 

I really love the look of Michael Bay's movies. In particular, "The Rock" and "Armegeddon". The scenes in which I really get impressed are the ones that he usually does his montage or slow motion scenes. In particular, in The Rock, when Nick Cage falls to his knees with the two flares in his hands, the lighting in that scene is absolutely beatiful. Now, I'm thinking that he gets that look by filming right before twighlight. Am I correct? Have any of you filmed to get that look that I'm describing? If so, what are some tips or recommendations for filminging in that light?

 

Thanks!!

[David Mullen ASC]

It takes a little more time to shoot when it has to be at a specific time of day because you want to be there early enough to set it up in case of problems that will cause a delay. Other than that -- a certain inefficiency -- the issues are light level (what stock to use if you want to shoot high-speed at sunset) and balance (i.e. you're framing against a sunset sky; do you want a silhouette or do you need to add enough fill light to read the shadows? This will depend a lot on how clear the weather is when the sun sets; if it's very clear, you get a very bright sun so balancing to that is difficult.)

 

I recall reading that Unsworth shot Nastasia Kinski in front of a large mirror reflecting the setting sun in the first scene in "Tess" in order to balance her with lighting easier (looking at the shot though I'm not sure why because it was not a bright sunset.)

 

Speaking of mirrors, I just found out on the DVD of "Tess" that they used a large mirror at the back of the milking barn to make it seem twice as big, causing Unsworth to complain "how am I supposed to light this?" since the shot makes a 180 pan across the mirror and sees the whole room, with small windows and a low ceiling, ending on seeing Tess outside approaching the doorway in full sunlight. But he figured it out.