Woods at night ...day-for-night or generator?

D

Diagoro

New member
I am aware of a few similar posts containing helpful advice but none of them have seemed to clarify the best way to do this kind of shot - i have heard various responses:

I have been told to shoot day for night, coming down a couple of stops and adding a blue filter....but descrepancies lie in whether to shoot at dusk/dawn to allow for car/torch light to show up, or to shoot when the sun is full when contrast and shadows are fullest.
Having never done a day-for-night shoot (and obviosly not wanting to screw up the footage) I am a bit wary of this method unless someone could offer an 'idiots guide' to filming this way?

The other method i would guess would be to hire a generator / battery packs and flood the wood with some hard side light...a couple of blondes or something to mimic moonlight? I am after a horror feeling to the piece so am leaning towards hard lighting this way (if i can find cheap generator/batterypack hire!)
Any advice on lighting methods here would be very appriciated.

the shot will be of a person running through the woods...Which method would people go for?
 
Last edited:
I think it really just depends on the amount of $$$ you want to spend on your project and the "look" you're trying to achieve. You can accomplish quite a bit shooting day for night making a scene either feel "Romantic" or "Intense".

If you're budget's small, I'd recommend doing the "day for night" technique. Magic Bullet Suite has some post filters you can tweek to get the desired effect.

I'd also recommend you go and watch "28 Weeks Later" and rent "Imagine Me & You", both use the day for night technique rather well. "28 Weeks Later" uses it during the chase through the city streets (at night) and "Imagine Me & You" (an indie British film) uses it during a romantic/comedy scene in the forest. (This DVD also has an excellent commentary!!!)

Good luck!
-Lee
 
"Day for Nigth" is an illusion of the nigth. Thrugh our tv-movie education most of us agree for a bluish-cool atmosphere.
Now think what the nigth looks like:
- do you have a monitor you may trust, the difference between a nice day-for-nigth and a funny one is about details, and most of the sucsess lays in the framing.
At nigth the sky is black, no sky in your frame!
contrast is high, use dark back-grouds
high ligths are seldom,have brigth reflections but not too many
stop down but manage to have everything in back ligth to create a contour which will give some stucture to your frame
keep the ambiant ligth cool, try a white balance to 4500K or even 3200K
Large shots are easy to stop-down if you have a monitor, be carefull to give an idea of perspective in your frame, any brither line:a road,river ,electric line... will help. 3 stops are common and some time more, watch the monitor.
Faces are to be ligther, 1 or1 1/2 stop down ... but that is personnal: i always wish to see the faces of the actors, and i like them to be cool but not blue... that means i need ligth! Very often a piece of foam or reflective material is enough. Only be aware to have the actor against a dark back-groud: the difference between the large shot and the close up will be less.
If the character has a torche, have it flash the camera and dont stay wide; if you need the effect of the torche, shoot that peculiar shot at dusk or at nigth..Mixe the shots it will never hurt, but then donot go too blue.
Sorry i am long, and be carefull to have a sound track that enligths the nigth.
Have funn. Colin.
 
Also, something very important- Moonlight, generally is nowhere nearly as blue as you think in your head. Magic Bullet, CineFX, etc all overly saturate the blues, which makes them unrealistic. When I have done this in the past, I have shot underexposed by 3 stops in the BG, and 1 or 2 less for the talent, with the addition of an 1/8 ND. Then, in color timing, I bring out the blues, and then desaturate back down to a grey-ish blue hue. Also, be careful while shooting to avoid high contrast, for realism, you will want a nice overcast day, where the clouds are helping to diffuse the sun. Even on a cloudless night, the moon softens the shadows tremendously. Happy shooting.
 
I think you have to be real careful when doing day for night. I think lots of filmmakers can tell when it's done in a film. I watched "Lord of War" recently, and it was really obvious they just shot it in the day with a blue filter to make it look night. So sometimes it can be distracting and come off as unrealistic. Just something to be aware of.

Although, it is a lot easier than shooting at night with 5ks, gennys, and extra juicers!
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top