futerfas

Why the water based? I usually get the F-100 for something big like a church. -- They're fire-breathing dragons if you want them to be. Is that water based? I'm no smoke machine expert, but I've had some that don't work at all and others that can make it so thick you can't find your way to craft service. The F-100 is typically used in big arenas, from what I understand. I don't think we'll have a Special FX dept. on this job -- which means it will be a PA pushing the button and bugging me about the "smoke level" every 3 minutes. -Graham

Get a good Key Grip and look for the solutions. There is always a way to put up a rig, depending on what you want to achieve and your budget\ingenuity. C-Clamps with cribbing, Pole-cats and wall spreaders are amazing. Clamping above drop-down false ceilings are options, or maybe scissor clips if it's a false ceiling grid. I've been able to talk some locations into letting us drill baby plates into the ceiling, but some places won't allow it - for good reason! Even on low-budget shows, I've been really impressed with our ability to hide hanging lights and make them work. My gaffer would recommend getting some Socapex to keep the cabling manageable -- we got bit by this recently, and it was a mess that cost some time to move. We just didn't have the right stuff. If there are recessed light sockets, you can get these handy grip items from Modern Grip Equipment ($30 each) that are made of plastic and have a baby spud on one side and a medium screw-in base on the other. These will screw in where the light bulb is and put a baby spud for your light. Molded plastic or PVC so they don't conduct electricity. Then buy a small pig nose at the hardware store, and you can get both a spud and a little power for a small light (I don't recommend more than 300watts or so because of the small wires inside). Also, I've had the idea to put up a truss grid supported from the ground, if you can hide the legs with art department (columns or dressing). This is a little more intense and expensive. And the other idea I've used is to tape white showcard to the ceiling and bounce a Source 4 or a Tweenie on a pancake into it. This will at least bring up your ambience, though it's not necessarily pretty. An opposite problem I had was in a location with white ceilings and light hardwood floors, and I wanted to cut the ambience down. I wasn't allowed to hang any lights or attach anything to the structure. The production never used the location, in the end, but I had the idea to fill garbage bags or visqueen with helium to put black on the ceiling and knock down the bounce. Admittedly, I've read this idea in American Cinematographer once, but can't remember the exact details of material and so forth, so if anyone remembers this or has experience with it, let me know. -Graham

The tungsten could wash out the light coming from the flos, but it won't techincally alter it. Use flags and light placement to keep the light from spilling on to everything, and hopefully it's not a white or light-colored prison block, which will bounce the light all around. Also, keep the tungsten light as hard as possible, and if it's just glowing the windows of the doors, then keep it as dim as possible, too. If you want the flos to be more green (remember that film is very "blind" to the green part of the color spectrum), you can add magenta to the tungsten and time it out later. The flos will also appear more blue than many people would expect, because you're probably using tungsten film and you now have a "white" reference that is warmer than the sun or HMIs. -Graham Futerfas

I have a shoot coming up where the director wants a shaft of light coming through stained glass in a church, and I know this can pose many difficulties. I've seen DPs try and fail to achieve this effect, having worked as an electric for a long time. Has anyone had a lot of success with this? Obviously, I need a smoke machine for the interior to show off the shaft, and I'll probably need a big light (12K PARs and Xenons come to mind). I'm wondering if I can achieve the desired result with a 4K or 2 (we don't have a huge budget), or maybe even figure out when the sun will be in the right place (sunPATH) for the shot. I don't want to melt the glass or the typical lead lining of the glass. I also have seen stained glass that is too thick to penetrate. I haven't yet seen the location, which will answer some questions. Any thoughts? What has worked for you? -Graham Futerfas