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Daylight car shoot...


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Hi there,

 

I'm shooting a low-budget short end of the month - about 60% in-car. God help me...

Shooting 4K Raw on the Sony F55, and in Brazil, so plenty of bright sunny days to contend with outside the car.

Lots of car rig shots - through the side windows, some on the bonnet looking back in through the windscreen and some from the back seat.

 

I wanted if anyone had some general tips - from experience - for getting a decent exposure inside. And that to boost the light coming from the the exteriors, rather than just a big general level lift inside. There isn't the budget for a low-loader for more than one day, at most so I need a more basic solution for lighting.

 

I'm planning to line unoccupied seats and actors' laps with white fabric - or perhaps kitchen foil for certain scenes - to bounce more of the light around that's coming into the car.

 

For the actors in the front seats, I don't expect I'd get enough level from mounted LED panels, and so am wondering if a 200W pocket par HMI rigged from the bonnet (and possibly a second one bounced off the interior ceiling, although this would bring up some light-direction issues...) would bring my levels up to a decent enough amount. There's obviously power issues there if we're wanting to power from the car's battery - although I think one 200w should be fine... (We're not likely to have a gaffer for the whole time but will certainly be taking advice on how to power safely.)

 

I think the F55 RAW will certainly help us in being able to safely over-expose the exteriors by a good 3 or 4 stops and then bring those down to a certain extent in post if necessary, but it would require a certain amount of masking in post I think I don't want to rely on that at all.

 

Any advice here would be really appreciated. I know everyone hates shooting in cars..

 

Thanks,

 

Jamie

 

http://cargocollective.com/jamiekennerley

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For hood mount and hostess tray shots, I usually squeegee some ND.6 gel onto whichever windows are in shot, if they are not already tinted (which most are, here in LA). As much as possible, I'll also try to keep the sun behind the car, so that I'm not having to deal with huge contrast between sun and shade inside the car itself.

 

I'm not a big fan of lamps on the hood, from a point of view of safety and also i think they always look sourcey and unnatural. I usually end up taping unbleached muslin all over the interior.

 

Best of luck!

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taping unbleached muslin all over the interior.

 

...good thinking, that man. I was thinking of shooting something in a car on spec, just to, you know, demonstrate the ability, but I fear it'd have to be green-screen and cheesy on a pocketmoney budget.

 

P

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Many cars nowadays in Brazil have tinted windows but we'll have an old car, so yes, the ND's a great idea. Reduce the need to light in the first place. I like it. I hear you with the lamps on the hood. I'm much more in favour of a gel and bounce solution if possible. Thanks Stuart.

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...good thinking, that man. I was thinking of shooting something in a car on spec, just to, you know, demonstrate the ability, but I fear it'd have to be green-screen and cheesy on a pocketmoney budget.

 

P

Phil, way back when I was shooting driving programs for the BBC, we had their machine shop make us a rail system that was fixed to a couple of Manfrotto sucker mounts on the inside of the windshield. That way we could have 3 or 4 cameras in the car without needing hood mounts or hostess trays. In those days we were probably using Pulnix lipstick cams, but the rig would easily have held a dSR if they'd existed. Those cameras had a very limited latitude, but with the N.6 on the windows, we could generally get a reasonable result.

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