Lighting interior doorway.

[Joey Kopanski]

I'm shooting a short narrative that involves several scenes of two people talking at interior doorways. I've attached photos below to give you a sense of the framing as well as photos of our actual location.

 

Our lighting package includes a couple aladdin LEDs, a leko and a skypanel s-60. My plan is to use the aladdin's to key the man from camera left and possibly tape a bounce to the door to get a little return on his fill side. I'm unsure if that plan will work due to the tight space and won't be able to scout this location in person until the day before our shoot next week. Do you guys have any advice/better ideas on how to light these characters in the doorway?

 

Concerns:

• We will be cutting on the action of opening the door so hanging something overhead in the doorframe doesn't seem possible since we will have to capture the action of the door opening. That is why I'm thinking keying from the side might be better.
• Limited on space (see photos below). I'm worried about sneaking lights too close and making it feel too sourcey.

Any advice would be much appreciated, thank you!

 

[Christopher Santucci]

I would key them from a high angle above the actor close to camera. Could be a hard source, or as diffused as you can manage. It'll look better this way than the alternatives unless you could back them out of the doorway a little so larger/softer side light was possible. If you manage that key so it's a little less bright than normal, it'll look less sourcey and you could put a hard side light on hallway guy and a hard back edge on the girl.

 

As for the door opening, try flagging the key until the door clears the frame.