do you always use lights?

[powerdog]

On a sunny day, in a room with plenty of windows, would you necessarily need additional lights to shoot an interview? I did some test shots with just daylight and they looked pretty good to me.

[Mike_Donis]

The good thing about using your own lights is that they are consistent - you don't have to worry about clouds moving in front of the sun, the time of day, etc.

But, the bottom line is: if it looks good, it looks good. If you were satisfied with what you were getting naturally, then why tinker with perfection?

[THiNSPiRiT]

Natural lighting can always be good. Might be good to have reflectors though or some way to fill the otherside when going with natural light simply because of the high contrast shadows... they might not always look good for what you're going for.

[HorseFilms]

I agree. Natural lighting is a great thing, as long as you still remember to control it so that it does what YOU want it to do.

[matthewd5]

i haven't used lights for interviews yet, i am just building up a light kit specifically for interviews right now.

that is because i have had a few interviews that were perfect content wise except something might come up later in the interview that really fit much better early on, but the light had changed and when you moved it farther up in the interview it looked stupid.

i am going for a consistent lighting scheme so that will never happen again.

plus there are some really amazing free articles out there from true hollywood pro's on different interview lighting techniques.

matthew

[powerdog]

Matthew, Excellent point about changes in natural light getting in the way of editing.

Any URLs you can provide for those articles?

[matthewd5]

i have to make a list because i use three different machines between home, laptop and office and the bookmarks get lost sometimes...

http://www.dvinfo.net/articles/lighting/graff2.php

anything from walter graff, and
http://www.cmpbooks.com/product/1164

[J_Barnes]

Bounce wit me, bounce wit me!

Sometimes its easier to use natural light then it is to fight it. Of course, sometimes it's easier to shun natrual light then it is to try and match it...it really depends on the day, which is why cinematography is an art of experience rather then study.

[matthewd5]

try and do an outdoor interview on a sunny day when you only have a small window to do it.

it has to be outdoors becuase it is a famous circus performer and his show is setup behind him and you really want that stuff in the shot, but at night he has shows non-stop and can't pause for an interview.

the sun kept shifting, as suns often do, and he brings up family history stuff towards the end of the interview that really would have fit perfect at the beginning when he was asked the questions about family history and getting started in the circus world.

matthew