250D overexposed one stop

[Dan Lahav]

I'm kind of a newbie so bare with me. I'm shooting out in the desert with 250D vision2. What does this stock look like overexposed 1 stop? I want lots of detail in the shadows of my actors faces but am not sure how to achieve this. They will be in a convertible with camera on a hood mount. I want the surrounding desert to pop while maintaining good exposure on their faces. The sun most likely will be beaming toward or overhead (unfortunately). Thanks.

Edited May 31, 2005 by Dan L

[David Mullen ASC]

Well, overexposed by one stop looks one stop brighter, unless you are talking about correcting out the overexposure somehow.

 

Actually, for desert scenes, it's not a bad idea to let a scene be a little bright-looking. "Raiders of the Lost Ark" let the desert be about a stop overexposed in most scenes. This gave them more "open" shadows and a feeling of heat and intense sunlight.

 

If you are talking about overexposing and restoring the image to normal brightness, yes, a stop overexposure would give you more shadow detail in post, but at the expense of some bright highlight detail. But it may be a good idea.

 

You could also overexpose by one stop and then pull-process by one stop to end up with a lower-contrast negative of normal density (brightness.)

 

If you want rich colors, not a hot pastel landscape, then you'd need to bring up some light into the faces of the actors so you could bring down the brightness to hold onto color saturation more. You also should try a Pola filter for the sky.

[Stephen Williams]

"Raiders of the Lost Ark" let the desert be about a stop overexposed in most scenes. This gave them more "open" shadows and a feeling of heat and intense sunlight.

 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

HI,

 

Thats interesting. For many years Douglas Scocombe the DP did not use a light meter!

 

Stephen

[oscar jimenez]

There is some interesting and beatifoul desert stuff I guess from Robert Richardson in "The Four Feathers" also. (???)

[John Pytlak RIP]

The 7205 has wonderful latitude, and up to one stop of overexposure would help increase shadow detail. As others have noted, a ligher print or transfer is often used to convey the impression of bright and hot.