black people

M

mrWr0ng

Well-known member
So I was working a gig yesterday, shooting a football practice for a show, which started at about 8am and ran until noon.

Unfortunately, it was extremely bright out, so both the other camera & i had on both ND filters, but we ran in to an issue later in post.

I generally shot wider while he shot the closeups, and he was concerned about blowout in my footage. See, 90% of the football players were black, so I kept my lens pretty open to keep their faces visible. But the complaint was that the skies in my footage tend to blow out (a little bit of blue but generally the sky is almost white). He, on the other hand, was shooting closeups and rarely had to deal with the sky, so blowout wasn't as much an issue.

Anyways, how would you approach this? Bright, hot sun, mid day, very dark people you're filming - would you blow out the sky to get their faces? Or would you let the faces go out to keep the sky blue? Is there a happy medium with the HVX 200?
 
Try and expose the players correctly and if there has to be compromise then the sky has to go... There are things like ND grads in post (Magic Bullet Looks has some nice stuff for correcting problems for stuff like this) where you can meet the best of both worlds in your shot but it probably won't work for everything. The worse thing you can do while filming anyone non-Caucasian against a sky background is underexpose them and create an unsatisfactory silhouette where there would be no need.
 
There isn't a perfect solution for that situation- best bet in the future is to find a happy medium with the other shooter.

The grads in Looks work really great for that sort of thing.
 
There isn't a perfect solution here, but if you're shooting a wide shot, the faces are going to be comparatively very small anyway so I'd try to hold as much of the sky as I could. You don't want your players disappearing into shadow, but you also don't want half your shot being a big ugly band of white blown-out sky either.

It depends on the shot. A silhouette would not be flattering at all, but if you get proper exposure on the sky, the uniforms, the grass, everything -- but the faces are a little dark -- that might be a better compromise than having great exposure on the faces and everything else blown out. That only applies to a wide shot, of course -- the more dominance the face has in the frame, the more you need to bias your exposure towards it. On a closeup, the face better look exactly right, and nobody will care about the sky.
 
In the future, is there any chance you can shoot from a higher vantage point? That way instead of sky, you'd be getting mostly grass as a background.
 
You really need a 6x6 butterfly kit, you can get one from Norms with everything you need except stands for about $500.00. In situations like this, the only logical thing to do is to even out contrast. You can rent HMIs and light it up or you can knock down the sun a few stops so your camera can expose the skin tones and some of the sky. Ideal would be an overhead silk and a double net behind them, that's what I use for outdoor interviews and it work great.

With just going in the bare sunlight, without more light or lowering the sunlight, you are never going to expose the people as well as the sky, video has way too limited latitude range for that. At the very least, a 48" FlexFill under their faces would have helped.

Dan
 
You probably should have exposed for the sky because he was getting close ups anyways to get the faces. Using a circular polarizer helps get the skies back in also.
 
puredrifting said:
You really need a 6x6 butterfly kit, you can get one from Norms with everything you need except stands for about $500.00. In situations like this, the only logical thing to do is to even out contrast. You can rent HMIs and light it up or you can knock down the sun a few stops so your camera can expose the skin tones and some of the sky. Ideal would be an overhead silk and a double net behind them, that's what I use for outdoor interviews and it work great.

With just going in the bare sunlight, without more light or lowering the sunlight, you are never going to expose the people as well as the sky, video has way too limited latitude range for that. At the very least, a 48" FlexFill under their faces would have helped.

Dan
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Dan, I think he was shooting action at a team practice- the usually dont let you set lights or rig anything around the field for safety/liability purposes.
 
LightMast said:
Dan, I think he was shooting action at a team practice- the usually dont let you set lights or rig anything around the field for safety/liability purposes.
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Hiya:

Wow, that's a tough one then. I thought maybe you were shooting interviews or someting like that. I can't think of a way to lower contrast short of blanketing the field with reflectors and HMIs, not very practical. There is not much you can do from a camera perspective, you are at the most extreme ends of the contrast range in one shot.

You will be amazed at how little latitude HD video has in situations like this. Unfortunately, this is one of those times when shooting film would be far superior, although obviously a lot more expensive. You have seen all of that beautiful S16 that NFL Films shoots in situations like this? That would be the way to do it right.

Good luck,

Dan
 
Pending on the shooting angle as mentioned above, graduated ND's might help, but if horizon/sky cuts behind subject then yes, a polarizer (or gaffing) looks to be all during shoot.
 
What about those Tiffen Low Contrast Filters? Supposedly they can being out more dynamic range in digital video. In addition, I would use a circular polarizer to bring out the blues in the sky.
 
I've used a bunch of the Low Con filters for DV, never for HD though. They were great for the VX1000!

I second the motion for using a higher shooting angle and CPL filter.

Good luck!

-ab
 
This is a interesting discussion. I've seen shows about tribes in other countries that some scenes have been shot in bright sunlight. I'll have to pay more attention next time. Wonder if it would be possibly to shoot the scene with the players darker contrast and correct it in post without it washing out the rest of the footage too far.

I tried a google on "shooting black people" I would not recommend it. NOT helpful at all and I think I might be on a FBI watch list now. (ok sorry that was bad, I don't discriminate, I hate everyone equally :| )
 
I tried a google on "shooting black people"
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ROFLMAO!

you're a shoo in for the days politically incorrect award.

Just popped a visual on making a blimp (aka goodyear) out of ND fabric - we could rent it for a fortune.
 
I often have the challenge of shooting at midday in a run and gun situation. But as another poster said the best way I have found to avoid the exposure problem is to leave the sky out. I have to remind myself that you can not control everything. Try to shoot your subjects in front of backgrounds that are shaded or dark which do not reflect as much light. IMO, in a run and gun situation like I assume you were in, small portions of the frame being overblown would not bother me. As long as the rest of the picture is within range and focus you should be ok.
 
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For wide shots.. the best thing you can do is an ND grad , kill the sky's brightness a little.
 
If it's a wide, locked down tripod shot, you could always try the more computer-focused approach:

Shoot the interviews properly exposed for the player. Then, leaving the camera in place on the tripod, shoot a clean plate properly exposed for the sky. You can use a mask in post. Assuming the player doesn't move a lot, you get pretty close to him with the mask, and then feather it off so you have a nice sky white only a little bit of brighter sky around the player.

Even if the player moves a lot, you can still mask the sky in as well as possible. Use a lot of feather to give it a smooth transition from the bright blown out sky to the properly exposed sky.

You can also expose so there is just enough sky that it is not entirely blown out, and then isolate the highlights in post and bring them down, and then bring up the midtones/blacks in post (not too much, of course, or you'll get a lot of noise, but just enough to even it out).

You could also then, if not blown out but on the edge, isolate the light blue colors of the sky and make them a darker, richer blue in post.

A polarizer would also help with all of this.

Just some ideas!
 
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