Fluorescent Issues

[Ryan Kirkpatrick]

Hi,

 

I'm shooting a short a couple weeks from now on the Alexa, with one scene specifically taking place in a convenience store.

 

The action happens during the night, but we're shooting the majority of it blacked out inside during the day with a few shots travelling in and out once the sun goes down.

 

My issue is with the fluorescent lighting in the ceiling. It has to play in the shot, and the director wants a cool cyan look to it. However, the bulbs are T8 fa8 single pin which Kino doesn't make, to be able to re-bulb the exposed fixtures. So I figured I'd go with 4100K Cool-Whites, and use a colour meter to correct my added sources with plus green (and compensate in camera on the Alexa).

 

I'm unsure what to do once the blacks come down of the windows, and we're travelling in and outside, and introducing sodium street lights and a police car.

 

Do I try to block as much street light as I can with a 12x12 or should I try to work with it? Is there going to be too much magenta in my exterior if I'm correcting for the green in camera? Is this the best approach for this situation?

 

Thanks

[JD Hartman]

Since you can't re-tube, you could experiment with gelling the existing tubes to get the in-camera look you want. Are you sure the streetlights are HPS (high pressure sodium)? Some streetlights are Mercury vapor, newer ones are induction fluorescent. In many towns/cities/'burbs, you'll find a mix of all three, no rhyme or reason to their placement.

[Ryan Kirkpatrick]

Sorry for the delayed response.

 

They are high-pressure sodium. I can re-bulb the fixtures, but only with other Flourescents in order to make sure everything is either 4100 or 3500, depending on the bulbs. I can't gel them though, because we'll be seeing the ceiling in some shos

[Kevin Pham]

I too would like to know the answer to this situation. Please let me know your solution, Mr. Kirkpatrick!

[Ryan Kirkpatrick]

Shoot date for that scene is Oct 27. I'll post what I come up with

[Daniel Singer]

I may got you wrong, but if you gel your fluorescents tube by tube you won´t notice through the camera that they are gelled.

[David Mullen ASC]

Cool Whites are already going to give you that cyan look if the camera is set to near 3200K with no green correction added.

 

The issue is really the sodium streetlamps, which will render yellow-orange-green -- they are not continuous spectrum sources so you are best off just embracing that look because you can't correct them with gel or filters, they are missing the wavelengths to get you other colors. At best, you could just time them / white-balance to look white-ish / neutral but the image will look a bit desaturated due to the lack of other colors in the spectrum.