night exterior seaside shoot

[Guest Tom Lin]

The entire story of the film I'm starting happends all in one night by a remote seaside (remote, meaning practially no lights around, what-so-ever). I have a limited budget to shoot this (limited, but still enough for us to shoot on film). Can anyone recommend some films to see that are shot around a dark seaside by night, or any films that did a great job of pullng off a day for night. And how does one go about shooting something like this with a low budget. Most films people recommend to me are Hollywood budget films which our production can't pull off. Thank you.

[David Mullen ASC]

The entire story of the film I'm starting happends all in one night by a remote seaside (remote, meaning practially no lights around, what-so-ever).  I have a limited budget to shoot this (limited, but still enough for us to shoot on film).  Can anyone recommend some films to see that are shot around a dark seaside by night, or any films that did a great job of pullng off a day for night.  And how does one go about shooting something like this with a low budget.  Most films people recommend to me are Hollywood budget films which our production can't pull off.  Thank you.

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Well, if there are no light sources, it has to be moonlit and if you can't afford a big light on a crane, that probably means day-for-night. The problem will be darkening the sky enough; I don't know if you have access to digital efx to do that, otherwise, you're stuck with ND grads and Polas. And framing out the sky whenever possible (i.e. not really possible at the beach!)

 

I seem to recall "Interiors" having some beach day-for-night. It's mostly set at a house along the shore.

 

"Jonathon Livingston Seagull" shot day-for-night on b&w neg (Plus-X) with a red filter to darken the blue sky, then printed it on color print stock with a blue tint. You could do that if you don't mind that look (b&w with a blue tint).

[Mike Williamson]

Also Michael Mann's "The Insider" has a great day-for-night sequence on the beach. Pacino's character is on the phone and the camera is looking out towards the ocean, if I recall correctly.