Lighting a large recording studio

[charlie ricottone]

hey, im shooting a live performance and im looking for some suggestions as to how to bring up the light level in the room. i really enjoy super soft lighting and the main performer is a female singer/song writer so i feel like super soft should work for the tone of the performance. here is the studio.
http://bit.ly/1w1nyos

i own three 1000w redheads, and a 3 light arri fresnel kit [350w, 350w, 750w]. i want to shoot at around f3.5 preferably at iso400 [native iso of my camera] but 800 would be fine as well

the ceiling is 22ft high so i was thinking about punching all three redheads through an 8x8 frame about 8' up and off to the side of the subject about 30 degrees. I would play the frame as close to the performers as possible.

 

the studio seems to have a few cans mounted to the ceiling so i could possibly incorporate those. ill be getting into the studio some time in the next week to take a look at it.

im not sure as to what type of diffusion to use to achieve f3.5. i really want to learn to calculate this on paper beforehand but im not quite there yet. i would appreciate any suggestions.

[David Mullen ASC]

You'll probably be fine with an 8x8 frame of Light Grid Cloth (aka 1/2 Grid Cloth) if you have three 1K's behind it. You can always soften it further with some intermediate frames (like 4x4) of something lighter like 250. If you are really worried about having enough stop, you could try 1/4 Grid Cloth instead but then definitely have a plan for intermediate frames to soften further. So my suggestion would be to rent the 1/4 Grid and Light Grid in 8x8 so you have the option of trying either.

[Jim Hoffman]

I would also suggest bringing a lot of flags/blacks to control your spill. Often times studios have sound diffusers and gobos used to control sound in similar ways that we control light. Raking smaller lights across them can offer interesting visuals but you'll want to reduce spill from your key.