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controlling massive green spill - ideas?


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Hey everyone

 

I have an upcoming commercial where we will be shooting inside a beautiful home looking out onto a garden... a very, very green garden. In the afternoon with direct sun the green bounce off the lawn turns the entire house into a green monster.

 

Some of my shots feature the garden through windows. Some of them are on that patio (pictures below).

 

How would you go about controlling the spill without completely blocking out the lawn?

 

An auto white balance is the obvious first choice, However I am afraid that doing so will sap the greens out of the exterior scene. Would it be significant enough to do so?

 

Must my key source be punchy enough to negate the spill?

 

 

I really want to hear how people go about controlling spill on this scale

 

 

 

post-53600-0-86823500-1533302305_thumb.jpg post-53600-0-08232600-1533302314_thumb.jpg post-53600-0-27921900-1533302329_thumb.jpg

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Some white bounce fill would help for the wider shots and once most of the lawn is out of the shot, I'd cover it with something like unbleached muslin or a white scrim if you can find that (depends on whether people have to walk on it.) It's really only the near lawn that is bouncing green up under the roof, I wouldn't worry about the distant lawn.

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I worked on Pan Am where one night interior scene got reshuffled and became a day scene. A large 30 x 70 green screen hanging outside a window for a long steadicam shot became a green bounce from the sun. The solution was to get rid of the small tungsten and bring in large HMI’s like 6k’s.

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Some white bounce fill would help for the wider shots and once most of the lawn is out of the shot, I'd cover it with something like unbleached muslin or a white scrim if you can find that (depends on whether people have to walk on it.) It's really only the near lawn that is bouncing green up under the roof, I wouldn't worry about the distant lawn.

 

Yes, great! I was considering the white/black cloth over the sections of lawn we won't be seeing in shot. Then punching as much of a clean source of light onto the subjects for mid-tight shots.

 

I Have the Skypanel s360 at my disposal, which can be dialed to match closer to my ambience, rather than fighting it. Then dial out that green in white balance in camera to match even closer (Shooting 4444 so I need to get that white balance looking good)

 

Does this sound like a terrible idea?

 

I worked on Pan Am where one night interior scene got reshuffled and became a day scene. A large 30 x 70 green screen hanging outside a window for a long steadicam shot became a green bounce from the sun. The solution was to get rid of the small tungsten and bring in large HMI’s like 6k’s.

 

 

Good suggestion. Enough 6k's would essentially cancel out that spill, but, we need to work fast and light with a minimal lighting crew.

 

Just don't film when the sun is so high, wait to the sun is cover by the house or when is down and the spill don't "tint" so much.

 

I wish I had control of our schedule ;)

 

 

Thanks for the suggestions thus far guys. Always appreciative

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There's a lot of theatre scrim that would help you. Sometimes they call it sharks tooth and you can get white and black or muslin off white. Cheaper by the roll to. You could probably sell it off afterwards.

 

 

I probably wouldn't use sharks tooth due to the haziness it give off but some double net could cut down the spill whilst still seeing outside (and gain a stop) then shoot clean light into the scene with a big source of Bounce through diffusion or HMI. I will also cover the lawn with white material where not in shot.

 

I think this will be my plan.

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  • 2 months later...

So the shoot is done...

 

For anyone Wanting a conclusion to this lighting situation...

 

Here is what we did on the day.

 

Laying out as much textile over the grass, especially the first four metres away from the patio, worked wonders. The green spill was cut down significantly.

 

I actually dialled in a bit of green on my key (skypanel S360) and then auto-white balanced to remove the green from the scene entirely. The gaffer did look at me quizzically for a few seconds before he did so.

 

If i recall the camera colour corrected itself to -2.3, which in Arri terms is not a huge amount in comparison to the original amounts of green that were present. Midtones and shadows lost their sickly hue and we did not compromise on changing the hue in the background. A well matched scene.

 

Its great to be able to work the skypanel so quickly to add in that colour.

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