Lighting

[Guest human]

I see in movies that the skin tones are more reddish then real in movies. How do you do that, with filters on the light or on the lenses. Or is the color changed during film processing?

 

I am new to cinematography.

 

Thanks.

[John Pytlak RIP]

Film stocks do vary slightly in color reproduction. For example, the new Kodak VISION2 films tend to have slightly less color saturation and a more "natural" rendition of varying flesh tones.

 

Of course, color balance of the entire scene can be varied by the "color timing" or grading of the image by the lab color timer or telecine colorist. And with video or digital intermediate, you can have control of selected colors in the scene. Or it could be a simple matter of the makeup used.

 

There are also spectrally selective filters that can make certain colors more saturated, such as the Tiffen "Enhancing Filter":

 

http://www.tiffen.com/Page12-23.pdf

[Guest human]

Thanks John. Now I got the answer.

[Michael Nash]

TV broadcasts and badly tuned sets can alter the chroma of skin tones as well, for movies viewed on video.