Day Exterior

[Mate Widamon]

Hello Fellow Cinematographers out there!

 

I am a young DP from Budapest, shooting my first ad in Paris next week.

It is a day exterior, right in the mid of Trocadero by the Eiffel Tour.

I'll have a street musician jaming on glasses with water in them (it is a min water ad) and about 30 extras stood in half a circle around watcing him playing.

Since I am supposed to create late afternoon, my intention during the day is to soften the sun with a 20'x20' silk frame and use a 12/18KW Arri HMI Fresnel for 3/4 backlight as my key (sun) wich I 'd also use for a touch of fill from underneath bounced back from a polly or silver ref. board. I would also place a black Gryffolin frame on the oppposite side as negative fill (we'd like a contrasty, slightly blueish look) and for the backgrounds I would fire a 6KW Arri SunPar getting a hot spot. (mainly medium shots, shooting wide open, 50mp/s with an SR3, set of Cooke S4 Primes on Fujicolor 64-D in the view of video positive)

For close ups of the guy's hand playing with sticks on the glasses of water I would use a 1.2 Arrisun 3/4 backlight as key through diffusion frame, a daylight kino from half underneath and again would also create some hot spots on the glasses with the use of mirrors.

Any comments and advices on this concept are greatly appreciated especially regarding lighting contrast ratio.

I would also have a Medium-CU dolly profile shot of the guy having the sun in the background. Should I increase fill in a great deal on the guy's face to be able to see the sun in the back insted of burning out sky? Any special filters for this effect above Polariser? Also wondering how to create nice flares enhancing the hot feeling.

 

Many Thanks,

 

Máté Widamon

[oscar jimenez]

I did a shot not so long ago, I "underexposed" my readings on the background and added some light to "emulate" sun at dawn in its last minutes. I used a Spot meter and "placed" blue part of sky on zone V and started working lightning based on that, so tried to keep highlights on people's skin on Zone VI ( that was caucasian people ) and Using CTS or CTO's on HMI's that helps too. Besides that, I think you have a lot of equipment to play with!!!!

Good luck

Oscar

[Mark Sasahara]

When facing the sun, the Polarizer won't have too much of an effect other than acting as ND.

 

Be careful, do not look directly at the sun through the viewfinder, you can burn out your retina. You will not know it until it's too late. Use the onboard monitor. If I remember correctly, you cannot feel it when your retina is damaged. I couldn't find any info . Any time you are looking at the sun through an optical device, like a camera viewfinder, or telescope, binoculars, you run the risk of burning out your retina.

 

You could get the glass guy in silhouette and have just the highlights reflecting off his face. You would have to stack a bunch of ND in front of the lens and/or stop down. Take a reflected reading off the sky. If you decide to use a light, be sure not to fry the poor guy. Or use mirrors to rake light across him on the camera side. Maybe use a color filter to add some warmth to the shot.

 

If you are looking at the sun, you'll get plenty of flares, a zoom may help you get more. I think an Angenieux might be good. I'm not sure how much it will lower the contrast from veiling.

[David Mullen ASC]

Yes, if you want to expose more for the backlit sun and the sky, you might want to pump up the fill on the person to keep them from going silhouette.

 

Polas won't help; they are most effective at a right angle to the sun.

 

A light diffusion like a ProMist will increase the flaring and halation, but you may get enough pointing the camera right into the sun without filters.

[Mate Widamon]

Many Thanks for your replys,

 

although I don't quite understand what you mean Oscar, I would greatly appreciate if you could explane again.

Just to make it clear I'd like to have a medium profile shot of the guy from slightly underneath. I'd like to expose him correctly or one stop under whilst being able to see the shape (a star shape) of the sun in the background max two stops overexposed otherwised the sky would be burning out, I thought. If you suggest underexposing the sky (lots of NDs) how can I keep the guy's face correctly or only slightly underexposed (lots of fill)?

The scene supposed to be late afternoon, but my only chance is to shoot it at dawn.

My other concern stopping the iris down is breaking consistency since the rest of the spot will be shot wide open to achieve shallow depth of field. Would this shot stand out? I assume, would need an enormous amount of ND running wide open for this shot.

 

Thanks again for your advices,

 

Máté Widamon

[J. Lamar King IMPOSTOR]

You're probably going to be better off taking a spot reading of the sky close to the sun and trying to balance the fill on the guy to that reading. Then maybe hitting him with an additional hot edge. You're going to need TONS of light to avoid the guy becoming a silhouette if you're saying you want the ball of the sun to only be two stops over.

[oscar jimenez]

Fighting against the sun??? What's bad about having almost a siluette? that's a beauty, if you are having sun in frame. things to watch out for: optics should be sharp and clean, sun reveals everything. And... Peple if they are placed on zone 4 should reveal detail on skin and faces, the edge given by sunlight hitting the actors may be on 10 or zone 9. Add a 12x12 silver and maybe use a hard 42x42 to add more fill. As you said, you had a ton of HMIs, so yet, better to add fill.

[Tim J Durham]

Many Thanks for your replys,

 

although I don't quite understand what you mean Oscar, I would greatly appreciate if you could explane again.

Just to make it clear I'd like to have a medium profile shot of the guy from slightly underneath. I'd like to expose him correctly or one stop under whilst being able to see the shape (a star shape) of the sun in the background max two stops overexposed otherwised the sky would be burning out, I thought. If you suggest underexposing the sky (lots of NDs) how can I keep the guy's face correctly or only slightly underexposed (lots of fill)?

The scene supposed to be late afternoon, but my only chance is to shoot it at dawn.

My other concern stopping the iris down is breaking consistency since the rest of the spot will be shot wide open to achieve shallow depth of field. Would this shot stand out? I assume, would need an enormous amount of ND running wide open for this shot.

 

Thanks again for your advices,

 

Máté Widamon

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

Shoot the profile shot when the sun is no longer in the frame and add it in later in post. That way, you can light the guy however you want, unaffected by the actual sun. For the "nice flares enhancing the hot feeling" try a Schneider Black frost filter. That's what they use on CSI: Miami

for their exteriors.

[Chris Cooke]

Have you thought about using a graduated ND?

[Mate Widamon]

Thanks again for all replys,

 

My shooting went really well! First time I used Cooke primes on Fujicolor 8622 and I am truly amazed by its colour reproduction!

My opening shot against the sun worked out nicely; I had the key (sun) one stop over (incident) and the guys' profile (bounced back the sun) a stop under at F Stop 8. I used 1/4 Promist and it gave me beautiful lensflares, thanks David!

For all tighter shots (under butterfly frame) I used lights and I am so glad I ordered an 18K bulb to the 12K HMI because I really needed that when having 3/4 backlights on two-three mediums in the frame. Above four people I needed the 6K Par too, and I was also lucky enough having the sun so I made hot spots on the background architecture with the use of mirrors.

Even though I only had 64 ASA, but I was running wide open for shallow depth and I don't really see the chance getting the job done properly with smaller units when you have to balance your exposure on your people with the sunny background.

What sort of units do you guys consider using on exterior projects? I was familier with Arri and Desisty, but this time in France I used LTM HMIs.

 

Thanks&Regards,

 

Máté Widamon