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Lightning Effect


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Hi All, 

Can anyone shed some light on creating thunder and lightening effect. Both interiors and exteriors.

Exteriors on a road with a car in a wide shot and interiors when the character is sitting in a room with the rain and lightning happening outside the window and the effect seen inside the room.

 

Thanks,

Kavish

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Hi Kavish, 

I had to fake two lightning effects in interiors and exteriors some years ago (before Skypanels ?) and what I did was to place a shutter in front of the "lightning light" which my spark could open and close at a certain speed. 

Nowadays I'd probably use either that or a Skypanel with the "lightning" effect. 

https://www.arri.com/en/learn-help/lighting/skypanel-effects

Have a good day!

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The shutter system sounds interesting, was it like a electromechanical mechanism?

 

Skypanels do have the lightning effect, will have to check how they can be used. However what about wide exterior shots? Here are some stills from Shutter Island. Note the lightning at the windows, pretty much how I would want to make it look like..

From the ASC article, Rodrigo mentioned using nine-light-mini-brutes but for an interior sequence. He had them on dimmer where the operator played with the dimmer intensity.

Here are some stills from exterior and interior shots from Shutter Island.

 

Thanks,

Kavish

LExt1.jpg

LExt2.jpg

Lightening Window 2.jpg

Lightening Window.jpg

Edited by Kavish Agrawal
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24 minutes ago, Kavish Agrawal said:

The shutter system sounds interesting, was it like a electromechanical mechanism?

 

 

No, it was kind of a metallic venetian shutter and it was manual ?

For interiors they work really well, for exteriors, if it is a mega wide shot you only need a more powerful light!. 

I'd definitely check the skypanel, they are on the money and if you have to do a really wide shot you can use a S360!

 

Edited by Miguel Angel
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I haven't used them personally but some rental places carry 'venetian blind' type shutters that are controllable via dmx. They are designed for HMIs in a variety of ratings so you could dim a high power, unreachable daylight source if you want to. Might help you get the hard light through the window effect you want for the interiors.

39 minutes ago, Kavish Agrawal said:

The shutter system sounds interesting, was it like a electromechanical mechanism?

 

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14 hours ago, Miguel Angel said:

No, it was kind of a metallic venetian shutter and it was manual ?

For interiors they work really well, for exteriors, if it is a mega wide shot you only need a more powerful light!. 

I'd definitely check the skypanel, they are on the money and if you have to do a really wide shot you can use a S360!

 

Mole Shutters! Love them, but they’re expensive and hard to find if you’re not in LA. There is a DMX version available.

As Miguel says, Skypanels work well for this effect on interiors, although the manual Mole Shutters give you more freedom if you want a specific timing. Personally, I found the ‘Paparazzi’ setting look the most convincing due to the slower decay. Maybe you can program them, but I don’t know how. 

On big exteriors like you’re describing, you’d probably use something like Lightning Strikes: http://www.luminyscorp.com/index.php/lightning-strikes-2/

Not exactly a budget option though.

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On 7/4/2020 at 5:36 AM, Satsuki Murashige said:

Mole Shutters! Love them, but they’re expensive and hard to find if you’re not in LA. There is a DMX version available.

As Miguel says, Skypanels work well for this effect on interiors, although the manual Mole Shutters give you more freedom if you want a specific timing. Personally, I found the ‘Paparazzi’ setting look the most convincing due to the slower decay. Maybe you can program them, but I don’t know how. 

On big exteriors like you’re describing, you’d probably use something like Lightning Strikes: http://www.luminyscorp.com/index.php/lightning-strikes-2/

Not exactly a budget option though.

Thank you so much, like you said Sky Panels are a great option, will test the decay effect it offers and compare it to the Papparazi effect and figure. 

Thanks for link of lightning strikes!!

 

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