window reflection

[Bazil Christodoulou]

hi everybody,

this is my first post at the forum and i'm very glad being a member of it.

 

we are shooting a short in a couple of days in which i'm dop-ing and i want some extra opinions about a shot.

the scene is a man who is walking on a pavement and the frame is his legs from the waist and below with a little pavement.

the camera is moving on steadicam along him by the side at low mode(parallel to him).

 

from the other side there is a wall and i would like to throw some windows reflection on that wall or maybe on the pavement.

the kind of reflection is that of a window that is hit by the sun making the light hitting the wall transparent just like when you resemble water on a face, this kind of transparency.

 

i've tried lighting a gel but due to marks or other faults on the gels, the reflection isn't good and constant from side to side

 

do you have any suggestions?

 

i hope i made my self clear because i don't know the english terms to explain the situation better

thanks in advance

[Martin Hong]

Have you tried crystal?

[David Mullen ASC]

 

we are shooting a short in a couple of days in which i'm dop-ing and i want some extra opinions about a shot.

the scene is a man who is walking on a pavement and the frame is his legs from the waist and below with a little pavement.

the camera is moving on steadicam along him by the side at low mode(parallel to him).

 

from the other side there is a wall and i would like to throw some windows reflection on that wall or maybe on the pavement.

the kind of reflection is that of a window that is hit by the sun making the light hitting the wall transparent just like when you resemble water on a face, this kind of transparency.

 

i've tried lighting a gel but due to marks or other faults on the gels, the reflection isn't good and constant from side to side

 

 

 

I don't understand how light hitting a wall can make it transparent or how the light can become transparent when hitting a wall.

[Bazil Christodoulou]

I don't understand how light hitting a wall can make it transparent or how the light can become transparent when hitting a wall.

 

ok, maybe i didn't express my self correctly.

when you light a subject with a gel in front of the lamp, the light that reflects back (to the direction of the lamp) looks like water reflection.this is the texture that i mean.but the problem is i want a rectangular shape(window) on the wall and not uneven shape.

if you notice a window hit by the sun you will see what i mean especially in the afternoon

 

i will try crystal or big pieces of glass.

thanks

[Mike Lary]

ok, maybe i didn't express my self correctly.

when you light a subject with a gel in front of the lamp, the light that reflects back (to the direction of the lamp) looks like water reflection.this is the texture that i mean.but the problem is i want a rectangular shape(window) on the wall and not uneven shape.

if you notice a window hit by the sun you will see what i mean especially in the afternoon

 

i will try crystal or big pieces of glass.

thanks

 

I think I know what you mean about water-like reflections from gels, but your wording is a little odd. Gels (regardless of whether they're mounted in front of a light source) can bounce reflected light in water-like ripples onto walls, and the effect is more pronounced as the gels are more warped or angled from the light's direction. It sounds like you need to create a cookie or to flag a large light source to create the window shape, then work the effect inside that shape. You could also try bouncing light off a bounce board covered in crinkled foil, but controlling the shape of the reflection might be tricky.

[David Mullen ASC]

It's going to be hard to create square or rectangular window patterns where the rippling light pattern is restricted to being inside of that. You'd need a pretty big set-up for that -- imagine a swimming pool in the next room with a wall of windows separating the pool from a corridor, and a single bright, hard specular source is bouncing off of the water, and then through the windows and then throwing a pattern of both the windows and the water ripples on the opposite corridor wall.

 

That's almost the scale at which you'd have to work, a large pan of water fairly far away reflecting a farther hard, bright source skipping off of the water in the pan (with someone stirring the water), and then a large wall of window cut-outs / cookies between the pan of water and the wall you want the patten to hit.

[Jon Rosenbloom]

I think I know what you want; we see that light reflected off of windows all the time in New York City. Using actual window glass sounds a little dangerous, though. You could try using square mirrors - which are pretty standard grip/electric items in the US - to reflect the sun, but then you'd still have to create the ripple effect. Maybe if you diffuse the reflections with frames of hampshire frost you can get a little closer to what you want. Or, maybe you just put a crinkled layer of 1/8th or 1/4 blue directly on top of the mirror. Or, you can make some square frames with Rosco shrink mirror gel (http://www.rosco.com/stage/mirrors.cfm?menuReturn=quickTheatrical), but don't shrink it so it stays loose on the frame. Of course, all this depends on working where the sun will help.

[David Mullen ASC]

I think I know what you want; we see that light reflected off of windows all the time in New York City. Using actual window glass sounds a little dangerous, though. You could try using square mirrors - which are pretty standard grip/electric items in the US - to reflect the sun, but then you'd still have to create the ripple effect. Maybe if you diffuse the reflections with frames of hampshire frost you can get a little closer to what you want. Or, maybe you just put a crinkled layer of 1/8th or 1/4 blue directly on top of the mirror. Or, you can make some square frames with Rosco shrink mirror gel (http://www.rosco.com/stage/mirrors.cfm?menuReturn=quickTheatrical), but don't shrink it so it stays loose on the frame. Of course, all this depends on working where the sun will help.

 

If he doesn't need the light to ripple with motion like it's being reflected off of water, but have a static ripple like it's being reflected off of warped glass, then it's a bit easier -- it's mainly an issue of multiple square reflecting sources (like panels with some rippled mylar silver) or one giant rippled surface of mylar or something and then a giant cookie of a window pattern to break it up, all at a sufficient distance (light to reflector, reflector to cookie) to maintain sharp patterns.