Justin W. King

It may be too late, but I would first ask you these questions. They will influence how you light the room. 1) What time of Day is it? 2) What is the Weather? 3) What lights have the characters turne on? 4) Are lights turned on and off through the course of the film?

I went to their store in New York, and one of the employees said that you can send the footage in and they will convert it to video for you.

I think any colors will work even white, depending on the skin color of your actors, the medium you are recording to, and most importantly the story you are trying to tell or atmosphere you are trying to create. Contrast equals interest, but sometimes you don't want contrast, and that's when white on white is what you need.

I wonder if there is anyway that you can do the entire scene day for night, that way you wouldn't have to deal with the jaring effect of switching. Or you could be like Godard in "Band A Parte" and ignore the visual indications of night and day completely. Although I have a strong feeling that this is not really a good option for you so I would see if you could do the entire sequence day for night.

I think the more accurate way to say what you are suggesting is that you will be measuring the contrast of the lighting not the scene. For many Cinematographers, this is all they need, except for more difficult situations where it might be impossible or difficult to get an incident reading. An example of this might be photographing a sunset, or a snowstorm, etc. You don't have to expose skin at zone 6 unless you really want to. Everyones skin is different colors, and naturally falls at different zones. Under or overexposing skin will yield different results, and could be useful for what you are shooting. For example I've noticed that underexposing a person who has shiny skin can make them look sick. The news media got in trouble a while back for darkening the faces of african american criminals, because it tended to make them look "more guilty/ criminal". Anything else can be exposed at whatever level you want it to as well. You can either decide these things with or without a spot meter.

I am sure the sensor is still good enough for the task at hand, since the Scarlet processors are not as strong either and the feature set is not as rich... I was refering to these articles. The Scarlet X camera from RED, at last And also this article Canon’s New Digital Cinema Camera I'm sorry that was a typo, What I really meant to say was I still have not seen footage from the Scarlet. And I don't mean footage from the Epic. I agree, I imagine it will be hard to spot, but we won't know for sure what the differences will be until we see it ourselves. I think that was what they were going for in relation to the F3. I think Mobius does very little to show off the one feature that the camera has over most or all of the cameras, (even the Alexa according to Laforet) which is it's low light performance. Even though it has two stops less latitude than the Alexa, it has really great Low Light performance, down to 20,000 iso. Some people saw the grainy images in Sword, and complained that it had horrible low light capabilities, but they might not have realized that it was shot at 20,0000 iso, look at the behind the scenes of Sword to see the details. I believe that it is a look that can be used to tell a story. But the thing that is really amazing about the low light performance is the "XXIT" short film, when he talks about shooting green screen with 16,000 (sixteen thousand) iso, without artifacts. When I first heard on I didn't catch on and thought they sai 1600 iso, and thought so what, then I realized they said sixteen thousand iso. Looking at all of the behind the scenes is very informative. All the information is on Canon's website Canon Cinema Eos. Vincent wrote in his blog, the following: I don't think this is enough for me to want to buy the camera either, but it is good enough for me to test, and consider renting if I want to do some low, low, low light shooting for a film in the future. I just have to hope I don't need to do any slowmotion, or they come up with an upgrade.

I don't know how you could argue that the scarlet competes with an epic. Ha Ha Ha! The scarlet has al the reject epic sensors, slower processors, and less functionality. It is designed for a stills shooter who wants to make movies. HDRx is what seems interesting to me about the EPIC, and you can't even do this at 24fps with the Scarlet. I sometimes wonder if people are really looking at the numbers. Because honestly, There are a whole lot of numbers still missing from the scarlet list, but most importantly what does the scarlet look like? I'm sure it will look great, but It's not going to look like an EPIC, because it can't even match the frame rate/resolution/HDRx of an Epic. I guess we'll see in a couple weeks. When I see the footage from the Scarlet, then I'll know wether canon should be nervous. I think in the end we will see that both are great cameras and that although Scarlet might have the numbers on its side, The two cameras will perform competitively against each other and the real cost of both devices will be similar. The one thing that the Scarlet seems to have the C300 beat on is the frame rate. Any other observations will have to wait until we can see some Scarlet footage.

If I where you I would get a very bright daylight balanced light (relative to your regular scene light) and use that for lightning. You can gel a tungsten light if needed, but you loose two stops of light, so you would have to consider that when picking the light. You expose for one frame, and you have a flash of lightning. I would suggest photographing a copy of the frame without lightning as well, incase you decide to do something different in post. I think shooting tests will allow you to figure out how you want to time the lightning. Good luck, I hope this helps. I would also test to figure how bright you want your lightning to be.

On paper it doesn't look that amazing, but the footage looks really great for the price. Sure it's missing some of the numbers of the Scarlet, but It has great low light performance, and I liked the look of it in the low light footage I saw (Sword at the http://www.canoncinemaeos.com/ website) The only major problem I see with it is that it does not do 60fps 1080p. I imagine it's apparent lack of 4:4:4 support could be an issue, and I know some people where hoping for 4k recording. I think it would make a wonderful rental, and I can't wait to see what they come out with next. I hope they can fix the 60fps problem with a firmware upgrade, I wonder what the resolution would be if you recorded 48fps on the camera, because you can increase the frame rate by 1 frame increments.

I don't know if this is for product shots or part of a short film, but Back light usually looks good on equipment, especially if it's colorful and comes from diffuse surfaces, in the same way that it looks good on cars (although it will look different from shiny cars). Side light can help too. Look at Some of ETC Source4 and Selador Product shots, among other things.

I've never used that camera, but there is a link about Andy Shipsides' experiment to find out how to rate the ISO for the Sony F3. I hope this helps, I don't know if it's the same thing that you've already been doing, but here it is. Abel Cine

Maybe you can show us some examples, so that we know where you are coming from, and might be able to get an idea about where you want to go with your lighting. Everyone will light differently, maybe with minor corrections you will be able to achieve what you want to achieve. It would be better for us to help you find your way to lighting than for us to impose our way of lighting on you.

Don't just use fluorescent lights though, if you want it to look like fight club, because he mixed fluorescents with tungsten.

From the little that I read Kino Flos are not the type of fixture you would be looking for. Kino flos by their very nature are corrected for daylight or tungsten, although you could be regular fluorescent tubes and use them. This might have been what you meant before, but I think the fluorescents in use are actually practical fixtures fluorescents. Supposedly, Cronenwth used work lights and natural lighting as much as possible. I am sure someone else can talk more about what he might have used. This is according to wikipedia, so take it with a grain of salt, but I leave you with a still from the film, notice the light pointed at Lou. A lot of the Look comes from how the negative was treated afterwords, and the colors used in the production design, in addition to what was done in camera. Wikipedia has the following information about the cinematography for Fight Club,

What if the table was a light?

This is really cool. Did you edit in camera? What type of light did you use in the subway? Was it a Mirror? I hope you can recover some of your other footage.

Thank you; it seems like a reasonable package. I'm sure I could ask for bigger lights for days that we might be shooting larger scenes, if I start off with a package like this. At four weeks that would be less than 10 percent of the budget, which seems practical.

How large of a lighting package does a gaffer get for making a $150,000 dollar film, for a 4 week shoot? What is a reasonable amount in a daily, weekly, or per shoot rental, or how large of a rental truck could be reasonably asked for or expected? What size lighting package would you hope to see on such a project? Thank you for your help and advise.

That is very true, I am glad you corrected me there. I only put the sensitivity part there because because the more sensitive cameras allow you to achieve light levels comparable to what you might find in the theatre. But then again theatre lighting has gotten a lot brighter than it used to be, just compare Tharon Musser's Chorus line plot, to SpiderMan the Musical. But it is true, DPs, have been lighting by eye since the beginning, with the added challenge of needing bigger lights.

What everyone has already said is useful. I think there is one thing that you should know, if you don't already know. I believe theatre lighting can be useful in your goals to be a DP, but you aren't going to learn it as an electrician. You would need to be a lighting designer. Although some Lighting Designers work as electricians, it is not a prerequisite to being a lighting designer, other than the fact that you probably won't have many electricians working for you when you first start. Just being a lighting designer isn't enough though, you have to think beyond the realm of textbook theatre techniques, and learn to observe light, and study both theatre and film lighting. Also you should not use color as a crutch. Color is easy to misuse in theatre, but when you do the same in film it tends to look bad. Also, the biggest thing that you don't have access to in theatre are large diffuse sources, because they are so hard to control in theatre. Make sure you see the difference between a leko with frost, a 2k with diffusion and light through a 4x4 silk, on camera because that is one thing you don't really learn in theatre. If you really observe light as a lighting designer, then you will be in a better place to light people moving through space from multiple points of view, which is something that takes some of the filmmakers I have studied with a lot of time to learn. Now that cameras are more sensitive than ever, DPs I've met set their lights by eye, and then meter to make sure the contrast fits the camera, and lighting design is one way to develop an eye for light. Theatre Electricians, don't get to learn about light, they learn about the equipment, which is not very useful for Filmmaking (except the S4, which has become more popular on film sets). The don't get to sit in tech and see how the lights are used, and why the designer makes the choices he makes. Justin W. King ------------------------------------------ Light is Light. It doesn't matter whether its coming out of a 2 million dollar chandelier at an architectural installation, a 20k fresnel on a film set, a 2k fresnel in a tv studio, 26 degree fresnel in a theatre, a followspot in a concert, an area light in a 3d program, or the sun when walking to your car after work. Each lighting industry has it's nifty techniques, and they are all valuable in every other field of lighting.

I don't know if this is too late, but from what I am hearing it seems like you are using this stuff only for your reel. I would only borrow or rent equipment. Once you decide to rent or borrow equipment, you need to figure out how large an area and what method you are using to shoot, as well as the type of camera. If you can do your effects day exterior, you might not need any lights at all. You are probably best of asking someone who knows lighting to help you out, so you can spend more time on your vfx work.

That is cool. After studying theatrical lighting there, what direction did you move in? Is it possible to work in both theatre and film? I am planning on graduate school in New York, which has a lot of both. Do I need to go to school, or can I continue learning the rest by reading, and practice. I have had some experience with 16mm film, and videolighting/cinematography. I just wanted to know what your experience was like. Thankyou, Justin W. King

I first began lighting working with television for speakers, then transitioned to theatre, but I watched movies to learn to light thatre. Now I am thinking of making the transition back to film. I first began lighting working with television for speakers, then transitioned to theatre, but I watched movies to learn to light thatre. Now I am thinking of making the transition back to film.

I am a lighting designer, and plan to go to graduate school at NYU, to study design for theatre and film. instead of joining the film program. What are your thoughts about making a transition from theatre lighting to film cinematography. I have shot several short films, have a solid grasp of lighting for video and film. What recomendations would you make about working in both fields. Justin W. King