Beginner help, home depot lights?

B

bobbylong

Active member
i am starting out and with no budget and planning on testing out home depot lights, but i dont see how to pull off what all of you are saying to do.

i saw some examples using 3 point lighting (with home depot lights), but i dont see how this works correctly. i set them as a key, fill and backlight, but all 3 fail to do what they are suppose to do, but just light up the whole room. Turning off the key doesnt create shadows on the side of someones face, it just takes a little light off the whole set. i dont understand how everyone says to keep the background lit darker then the subject, but you cannot do that with home depot lights, can you? the key and fill light have to light the whole room, they cant light the subject and exclude the background, so how do i light a set without having it all lit the same way?

also, how do i get rid of shadows created by the subject... I mean if two people are in a room, how do i have them lit without having the wall behind them with huge shadows of their silhouettes in the shot? Do i need expensive lights to light correctly? because this home depot idea just makes it obvious you have tons of lights all over the set and it doesnt look good.

so if this isnt working for me, what do you think would be the best way to light with a bunch of home depot lights? Aim the lights on the ceiling and make the whole room brighter? point the light straight at the actors? (doesnt this brighten their face to where its obvious and unnatural?)
 
use more than 3 lights to light a scene. 3 point lighting is kind of like a starting point and you build on it.
set your lights up high and tilt them down to keep shadows off walls
move your subjects away from the walls
you can sometimes use diffusion to prevent harsh shadows on walls depending on the look you're going for
put barn doors on the lights if you can, or set up solids to block unwanted light spill
 
Control, control, control. The difference between professional lights and home depot lights are just that. With professional fixtures you can get sharp beams of light that can be set on spot or flood, plus barndoors to shape the light and prevent background spills. With a Home Depot fixture lights just spill everywhere and everything looks flat. Try shaping the light by getting solid objects to use as flags (beware of fire hazard), or put diffusion on the fill light to make it not so harsh compared to the key light.
 
Those lights are probably all the same intensity as well. You need the lights to be somewhat different; get different lamps, add diffusion, something to narrow the beam, etc. I also recommend clip lights, which come with a nice directional cone.

Remember, those work lights are specifically made to light up an entire room reasonably evenly.
 
okay thanks for all the tips guys... just wondering, i now have 4 clamp lights from home depot with 100w soft light bulbs... what would be the best way to use these on a set? should i point them up at the ceiling to light up the room, or should i aim them at the actors? if i aim them at the actors should i use something to diffuse the lights so they dont leave harsh hot spots?
 
Huy Vu said:
Control, control, control. The difference between professional lights and home depot lights are just that. With professional fixtures you can get sharp beams of light that can be set on spot or flood, plus barndoors to shape the light and prevent background spills. With a Home Depot fixture lights just spill everywhere and everything looks flat. Try shaping the light by getting solid objects to use as flags (beware of fire hazard), or put diffusion on the fill light to make it not so harsh compared to the key light.
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I second this, as I've said on other threads, control of light is everything. That's why grip companies manufacture 3/8" pin silks, flags, singles and doubles, ect, because DP's can never get enough control!

You could always build your own lighting control elements out of cardboard.
 
bobbylong said:
okay thanks for all the tips guys... just wondering, i now have 4 clamp lights from home depot with 100w soft light bulbs... what would be the best way to use these on a set? should i point them up at the ceiling to light up the room, or should i aim them at the actors? if i aim them at the actors should i use something to diffuse the lights so they dont leave harsh hot spots?
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Well one could go on for years about how to "use" the lights. That's all a matter of preference and determines a DP's look and concept.

generally in an interview atmosphere I never point a harsh uncontrolled light directly at the talent, i.e. an open faced flood directly in their face. I'll shoot it through a silk (mounts on a C Stand via 3/8"pin) to provide soft light, or perhaps shoot it through a Chimera. The Lowel Rifas provide an excellent soft light on a budget. I also use Fresnels which are more controllable and provide a sharp edged beam. You see, when you have an open faced light spilling everywhere, it bounces off the walls and creates more ambience, and fill, and many times can erase or taint the look you're trying for. Each light should be individually purposed and controlled. But that's just my opinion. I have used worklights before, pointing them at the white ceiling for some ambient bounce in a hurry, or using them to light a background. In my experience, they seem to be under 3200k, probably 2900k or so, and they'll be rendered a but warm under tungsten balance, but I could be wrong. Perhaps you can buy photo lamps to but in them, that are precicely matched to tungsten.
Hope I was of some assistance.
 
What about for lighting outside at night? Would these home depot lights work well or would they be to obvious? I'm going for a sort of creepy atmosphere so it would be okay if they add a surreal feeling. (I'm a complete noob when it comes to lighting)
 
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