Critique my Lighting Setups for my first Short Film!

[MarkyMarkV]

Hey DVX forums,
I was wondering if you guys could critique the lighting from a few screen caps of my short film. Please, don't go easy, but keep in mind I'm micro/no-budget and have little actual experience lighting, just tutorials/videos I've watched. This is my first project I've used lighting on.

Left: Raw image
Right: Color Curved/Corrected

Setup: 2 clamp lights, 1 camera left and and above the actors. I used either a Neutral Density gel or CTB. I don't remember which but I think it was ND. The other was a floodlight in a clamp-light reflective hood bounced off the ceiling for fill.
Scene: Couple watching TV late @ night.
Gripes: The only problem I have with this shot is that the shadows cast by the actors onto the wall are too heavy. I probably should've used a diffuser, but refrained from doing so out of fear of melting it (again.)

Left: Raw Image
Right: Color Curved/Corrected

Setup: 2 clamp lights. 1 clamped off-camera to the bookshelf w/ diffusion. The other was clamped directly in front of the actress w/ CTB. I ran that 1 through a DIY dimmer switch and turned it down to about 30-40%.
Scene: Teenage girl doing her homework & talking to her boyfriend late at night.
Gripes: My DIY Boom pole in the background...no one told me it was there, but that is largely my fault. I can work some After Effects magic to remove it, but I'm not sure if I'll end up using this footage anyway. I am the most proud of this shot because to me, the lighting setup doesn't look out-of-place; it looks exactly like what you'd expect for lighting in a teenager's room, dark, slight shadows, one light source, etc.

Left: Raw Image
Right: Color Curved/Corrected

Setup: 2 clamp lights. Both lights are in the same positions as the lights described above, however the CTB light is redirected and turned up slightly.
Scene: Jessica confides in her friend about her relationship troubles.
Gripes: The edge of the light is visible at the right of the frame, but it reminds me of a vignette. Is it possible to use light as a natural vignette instead of adding one in post?

Left: Raw Image
Right: Color Curved/Corrected

Setup: Same as the previous screen-cap.
Scene: CU of Jessica.
Gripes: None that I can think of for this one.

Left: Raw Image
Right: Color Curved/Corrected

Setup: I had to rearrange the diffused light source and move it camera right, as you can see by the highlight in the door's wood. I left the CTB light in place and turned it up to fill in the shadows a little bit.
Scene: Reverse of the previous OTS.
Gripes: Highlight in the door bothers me a bit, as does the reflection in the TV. My first Color-Correction is a bit too green when compared to the bluer tint of the previous pictures. I'll have to re-adjust that.

I know this is long, but I want some professional/experienced input on these shots. We've only shot 25% of this short film. A lot more night-scenes to come, which I'll probably have to fake during the day.

Album for High Res Pictures.

 

[RyanT]

I think a lot of your issues lay in other departments rather than lighting, but I'll hold off on those until last.

The very first thing you have to tell us is what kind of movie you're making. If this is a romantic comedy, you're not super far off, but if its a horror movie you couldn't be further from what you've gotta do.

First grab:

Get rid of your fill for now, you need a TV gag, and TV's aren't always displaying the same color. Try two lights, maybe one blue, the other green, then dim them up and down and diffuse them a lot. You are spot on in your assumption that you needed to diffuse it more, TV's are one big source and as a result they're pretty soft.

You should also cut off whatever light is hitting that back wall. It's so white and it makes it almost look like you were trying to shoot it during the day time.

Also, I would question how necessary the fill is. Maybe try it without.

The second is the closest to being good, but here are the problems.

Where is this light coming from? Is it a lamp on top of her bookshelf? Maybe trying lowering the light a little bit and again flagging it off that back wall.

The other thing is you're getting a lens flare. Always make sure no light is hitting your lens, you can do another little flag on the lamp right side to get rid of this.

Also, using a dimmer and CTB at the same time is a little silly. The dimmer warms the light up, while the CTB cuts the light and makes it blue. Use a different lamp or walk it back with the CTB if you want it to be blue.

I'm not entirely sure what to say about the next one, I feel like it's mostly your framing that's off here, but I'll get more into that later. She also seems a bit underexposed.

Next one, she is front lit. It's not interesting to look at someone when their face is being lit as the same side cameras shooting from. If you had the line on the other side in the first shot, then you cut around to the other side of her face I'm sure it would have been much better. Seeing all those shadows helps us with the definition of her face and allows for more depth.

Next one. To get rid of the reflection of the light in the tv you can walk your lamp around more to her side and then cheat the TV to your left. I'm sure walking the lamp around will also get rid of that highlight on the door, but if that doesn't work, try either dulling spray or hairspray.

Also you've motivated the light coming from the camera left side this whole time, but now the key has switched around to the other side. Pay attention to that…

What are you shooting on and what are you using to do your color correction?

I feel like a lot of your problems are more production design and camera oriented than lighting. For how far along you are, I think your ideas of lighting are not too far off.

I'll just go through them again from a production design/composition perspective….

First one has too much headroom and the white wall behind them is just too much. Also you'll find that dressing your actors in things other than white will help you out quite a bit, the white always just tends to blow out so quickly.

The next one is not the worst. Maybe bring some elements more into the foreground. The depth is already pretty good though with the desk chair on the right, her in the middle, and being surrounded by all her junk. It almost feels a little too clean, but I think that's just the curse of white walls. The unfortunate thing is I feel like her room is just a little ugly though..It's not a bad idea to think of a color scheme and then try and implement it throughout your scenes. Keep that in mind...

Next one, it's focused on the background and you have so much space on the right side of the frame. Frame it up so the girl on the left is taking up 1/3 of the frame and the other girl is taking up 2/3 of the frame. The thirds are quite important, don't' forget em. Also too much headroom.

Next one. She's placed smack dab in the middle of the frame with too much headroom. Try and place her eyes 2/3rds up the frame. She's opening up to her friend too right? So you should have them share that space between them. Pan left to get rid of all the space on the left.

Next one…same thing with the other OTS. Pan right, use the thirds! Also too much headroom in this one.


Really, go buy a 35mm still camera and take pictures for the next well…forever. It'll make these framing things second nature, and you can figure out how to place objects in a rectangle without having to write a script, light it, edit it, and then cry about how it's no good once you get to the end a month later.

Good luck, hope this helps!

 

[MarkyMarkV]

I came close to tears only once.
I kid, but thanks for the lengthy analysis, I hope it wasn't too painful.
I'll just hit your points in order.

This film is a romantic drama, the rise and fall of a relationship. I'm shooting on a Canon HV30 (Yes DV tapes unfortunately) Because the camera I'm borrowing from my media teacher uses DV Tapes, I can't log & capture on my laptop. It's a PC and doesn't have fire wire ports unless I buy an express card expansion. I'll buy that as a gift to myself for Christmas or something. Anyway, I have to give the camcorder to my teacher, she logs and captures it, renders it, and puts it on a hard drive as 1 continuous clip which is an annoying process to have to go through. Additionally, this is my first time using this camera. I haven't had time w/ it to get used to it's focus system (the out of focus parts) and so on. And I'm using Sony Vegas for the color correction.

1st Cap:
We did shoot during the day, but the curtains blocked off all the sunlight. The blotch of super white wall is because of the light high up on the wall. I'd need to build DIY flags that won't melt/ignite. I'll look around for some. The fill I'll try to diffuse but I only have 1 diffusion sheet which I don't think will be enough.

2nd Cap:
It is assumed that the light is coming from a lamp somewhere on her bookshelf. Again, I'd need flags, so I'll work on that, but isn't the light spilling onto the back wall a more "natural" characteristic of a light in someone's room? Or does that not matter because it being film, we take liberties to remove things like that? I did notice the lens flare, but not until I had the footage on my own computer, which was after I got it back from my media teacher. As for my reasoning with using CTB and the dimmer together, I wasn't aware that the dimmer warms the color temperature up. Between the bed and the wall (off camera left) is about 3-4 feet of space, so I couldn't push the light farther away. I was forced to throw it on the dimmer so it wasn't as intense. I used CTB because I wanted to give the room a moon-lit feel, which I don't think I achieved in the raw image. You'll see I color corrected most of the images to have a bluish tint. This is to achieve that moonlit/night time feel I wanted.

3rd Cap:
I understand what you mean by the lighting being on the same side as the camera and I face palmed when you pointed it out. I watched a video on lighting the upstage side of an actor, but I guess I forgot about it. I think that's also the reason why the 2nd screen cap is closest to being good. It's lit on the far side of her face, as opposed to fully exposing the side of her face closest to the camera.

The door highlight: There isn't much room to move the light. If I move it to the side of her face, I'm thinking it'll be too bright. I also don't have 2 dimmers, so if I take the dimmer off of the CTB'd light, it'll be much too bright.

As far as flipping the key goes, I didn't want to do it, but I felt she needed more light on the other side of her face. In retrospect, I could've bounced it off a card, camera left, onto her face, but I hadn't thought of that.

For headroom, do you recommend zooming in slightly? Or moving closer, or moving the actor closer? What are general tips to follow for headroom?

To be completely honest, I neglected to storyboard this project. The "friend" of Jessica (the screen cap with the door highlight) wrote this, and originally I was going to leave it to her to storyboard it because this is her baby, but I'm going to be doing it now. I realize now that you've pointed it out that I spent so much time worrying about lighting that I neglected the thing that makes film, film. The camera. I wasn't thinking about why I wanted the shots or the emotional reasoning behind them; only that I needed certain ones. As I storyboard I'll keep in mind the rule of thirds, lighting the upstage side of an actor, and so on. Whether I'll reshoot these scenes, I'm not sure. But we still have 75-85% left to shoot, so I'll definitely keep these in mind.

Thanks for your feedback RyanT!

 

[RyanT]

1st Cap:
We did shoot during the day, but the curtains blocked off all the sunlight. The blotch of super white wall is because of the light high up on the wall. I'd need to build DIY flags that won't melt/ignite. I'll look around for some. The fill I'll try to diffuse but I only have 1 diffusion sheet which I don't think will be enough.

Try to bounce instead. A lot of times what is actually fill is really a light that is being bounced anyways, so it's usually more natural looking to do that. Things do spill a bit more, but if you don't have diffusion it could be a good way to go.

It is assumed that the light is coming from a lamp somewhere on her bookshelf. Again, I'd need flags, so I'll work on that, but isn't the light spilling onto the back wall a more "natural" characteristic of a light in someone's room? Or does that not matter because it being film, we take liberties to remove things like that?

Pretty much so, I would really suggest a single or a double here, but I figure it's much easier to flag it off completely than for you to get some sort of net.

3rd Cap:
I understand what you mean by the lighting being on the same side as the camera and I face palmed when you pointed it out. I watched a video on lighting the upstage side of an actor, but I guess I forgot about it. I think that's also the reason why the 2nd screen cap is closest to being good. It's lit on the far side of her face, as opposed to fully exposing the side of her face closest to the camera.

I remember when I had been in school for 3 months doing lighting almost every other day and I still did this. When my teacher pointed it out to me, I just died inside. I'm sure you won't forget it next time around though.

The door highlight: There isn't much room to move the light. If I move it to the side of her face, I'm thinking it'll be too bright. I also don't have 2 dimmers, so if I take the dimmer off of the CTB'd light, it'll be much too bright.

You're working with light bulbs right? Get different intensity bulbs if so, they make them in like 25w, 40w, 60w, 75w, 100w, 150w, 200w, 300w...you have more choices with light bulbs than you do with lights for film. They're so cheap and you won't have to be futzing around will all these dimmers all the time.

As far as flipping the key goes, I didn't want to do it, but I felt she needed more light on the other side of her face. In retrospect, I could've bounced it off a card, camera left, onto her face, but I hadn't thought of that.

Yup, this would have been a great solution. Maybe even just using the card instead, and bouncing whatever is left of the key back on her face.

For headroom, do you recommend zooming in slightly? Or moving closer, or moving the actor closer? What are general tips to follow for headroom?

I feel like this is sort of the bad thing about working with zooms. It's hard to grasp the idea that different lenses do different things, and if you're not used to thinking about lens choice, you'll often times just punch in, when really you just needed to walk the camera in.

Try taking a picture of the same exact thing with different lenses. Make it the same frame, same edges, same subject, don't change anything, just change the lens and walk back or closer accordingly. You'll see that the wider lens you use gives you more space inbetween the subjects, and tends to distort things, while the longer lens you use compresses the space, gives you shallower depth of field, and also tends to render shapes more accurately. For some movies you might use a 35mm for a closeup, while others you might use a 200mm. It all depends on the look you're going for....

Normal conventions though...if you don't want to "break the rules". They say that you start wider for your wider shots and then punch in for your close ups. So maybe a 24mm for your wide and then a MS would be a 50mm(normal lens) and then a close up is usually double your normal...so 100mm.

As far as how to frame them in the shot, just take a look at any movie and watch their headroom. Just give em a little, but not too much.

 

[Greg Smith]

The bluish tint doesn't work for me to suggest moonlight. It just looks like normal footage that'a been color corrected too blue. Your raw captures are just a little bit on the warm side and do need some work, but I feel like you went too far with the blue slider there. Getting a "moonlit" look means going for a dark scene first, with the light looking like it's coming through the windows at a low angle, and probably with very deep and unfilled shadows. That's not the look you're lighting for at all in any other respects, so I'd drop the idea of doing the color effect and just try to make it as neutral and natural as you can.

The glare on the TV in the last shot is really intrusive and needs to be taken care of forthwith (along with the similar reflection on the door).

And tilt down. There is excessive headroom in all these shots. Note that I didn't say zoom in -- tilt the camera, or lower it a bit.

I realize your limitations as a student -- I teach media courses in a high school, myself. (Heck, I'm thrilled when my students bother to add any light to their shots at all!) But with a little forethought you could do better even without any additional equipment, or even extra time spent on the setup.

- Greg

 

[RyanT]

Where do you live?

What I would also suggest is going to the nearest lighting rental house and tell them your situation. Just ask if you can buy some gel scraps or used expendables off of them for 10-20 bucks. I'm sure if you offer that, they'll probably just tell you to come down to the shop and give you whatever they can dig up for free. All the scrap gels and old pieces of blackwrap are of no use to them, they can't sell it anymore, and they were probably bought by three different productions before you took them anyways. I work at a rental house in san Francisco and the amount of gels and expendables that we just throw away is pretty crazy. You'll often times see me digging through the trash looking for the next big haul..

 

[MarkyMarkV]

I live on the east coast in New Jersey. It would surprise me if we had any lighting rental stores. I have gels from my media teacher so I'm good on that for now. I also spoke to her about the rule of thirds, dead space, and head room. I'm currently watching videos on those subjects as well as I storyboard the rest of the film. Thanks for all of your help and for making me realize I was basically bungling around with the camera. I might post a continuation once I get more footage for my next segments for further critique. But really, thanks again!

~Marky Mark V.