So I did a light test and have a colour question

[John Milich]

I've been setting up to shoot a night bedroom scene. I'm using a 1K fresnel through a blue gel with a DSLR balanced for tungsten. All in all it worked out quite well. My only concern was the fact it was a little to blue for my liking. Just want to know what I should be doing in order to make the light a bit more white so to speak.

 

Thanks

 

 

[Zac Fettig]

You could nudge the color temperature on the camera a little higher. say 5500K instead of 5300K.

[David Mullen ASC]

If you have a Full CTB gel on a tungsten lamp and set the camera to 3200K, it would be fairly blue, depending on the exposure (it will look richer and bluer if exposed darker). You could set the camera to something like 4300K to cancel half the blue, or replace the Full CTB gel with 1/2 CTB, for example, which is the more common approach -- most shoots carry a selection of CTB and CTO gels in various strengths for this reason.

 

Setting the camera to 5500K would almost completely cancel the effect of a Full CTB gel on a tungsten lamp.

 

Now I'm assuming you aren't using some odd party gel super-blue color like Congo Blue.

[Zac Fettig]

Whoops. My bad.

[John Milich]

If you have a Full CTB gel on a tungsten lamp and set the camera to 3200K, it would be fairly blue, depending on the exposure (it will look richer and bluer if exposed darker). You could set the camera to something like 4300K to cancel half the blue, or replace the Full CTB gel with 1/2 CTB, for example, which is the more common approach -- most shoots carry a selection of CTB and CTO gels in various strengths for this reason.

 

Setting the camera to 5500K would almost completely cancel the effect of a Full CTB gel on a tungsten lamp.

 

Now I'm assuming you aren't using some odd party gel super-blue color like Congo Blue.

It's a Ful CTB. There is some tungsten lights in the scene so I need to stay in that 3200 area. I tried a test with a higher temp and the tungsten looked awful. This is a low res capture of one of the test shots. It was also the 650 watt, not the 1K at f2.8 from about 20 feet away from the ligt source.

 

 

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Edited October 9, 2013 by John Milich

[Mark Kenfield]

Just drop down to a 1/2 CTB if that's the case.

[Stuart Brereton]

There's no rule that says moonlight has to be Full CTB, or any kind of CTB for that matter. There are many blue and blueish gels available in a variety of strengths. Experiment until you find one you like.

[John Milich]

There's no rule that says moonlight has to be Full CTB, or any kind of CTB for that matter. There are many blue and blueish gels available in a variety of strengths. Experiment until you find one you like.

Agreed, I personally prefer the more steely brighter white light. That's what I'm after anyway.

[Peter Mosiman]

Steel Blue is a fantastic alternative for a moonlight effect. It carries a little green within the blue which takes the edge off the blue IMO. But again, like everyone's said before, it all depends on what you're looking for.

 

It's also extremely helpful to experiment and test with all kinds of kelvin temp's while your light source is up, so you can get a feel for what temperatures do what to the colors. It's fascinating really.

[David Mullen ASC]

Agreed, I personally prefer the more steely brighter white light. That's what I'm after anyway.

 

Keep in mind that if you had exposed that shot with the Full CTB brighter, it would look less blue.