Headcase (2008)

H

Huy Vu

Veteran
Hey guys, just want to share a few frame grabs from a project that I'm DPing. It's my friend's final project for his film production class. We shot today and will be shooting again next week. I'm quite please with how it's coming along so far. The house we got to shoot in was just an awesome location. I recently got the Cool Lights CL-455 and it's an incredible product, and helped tremendously during this shoot. I can't believe how I've managed to shoot without it.

So without further ado, the frame grabs!

1.jpg


2.jpg


3.jpg


4.jpg


5.jpg


6.jpg
 
Grabs look great!

Grabs look great!

Would you have time to provide some details on this project? Equipment, set-ups, etc., would be valuable to a lot of us.
 
Thanks metro. I used the XH-A1 with Letus Extreme. I had three Canon FD lenses: a 24mm f2.8, a 50mm f1.4 and a 135mm f2.8. A lot of the ECU were shot with the 135mm, which is my favorite lens.

As to lights, I have a Cool Lights 455 fluorescent for fill, a Britek 1k tungsten with softbox ad my main keylight and either a Britek 650 or 300 as backlight. Most of it was lit with just the Cool Lights and the 1k though. I rotated the shaded lamps around a lot, if you noticed it's the same lamp appearing in different places in several shots.

The real star is the house itself. It's filled with so much stuff that every shot has a great texture to it; really a testament to how important production design is. In our case, production design was already done for us by the owner of the house :).

If there's more details you would like to know then just ask.
 
Thanks for sharing.

Thanks for sharing.

You're right about the location. Nice rich colors. Interesting textures. All of the actors look good on film, but the older woman really takes the screen. At least from the grabs, she looks like she could steal scenes.

How long is this shoot? How many set-ups? I also would like to know about Canon lenses vs. Nikon, in your opinion. And what equipment you where most impressed with and vice-versa.

I know you're busy, so whenever you have time....Thanks
 
metro2307 said:
How long is this shoot? How many set-ups?
Click to expand...

We're mostly wrapped, although there'll be pick up shoots on Wednesday and Saturday. We shot for four days so far over the past two weeks. The first two days and the last day weren't bad, only about six hours, about four to five pages per day. The third day was pretty grueling; we went from 2 pm to 2 am. We still don't have all the coverage that we'd like, hence the pick ups.

As to set ups, we did our best to keep the whole film inside the house. Originally the scripts called for more exterior locations but it became clear that we won't be able to get the locations within the time available, so that was changed. In the house itself, there were three main locations that we had to light: the living room, the kitchen and the area around the piano.

The living room was the simplest setup. You can see what we used here

_MG_4699.jpg


_MG_4685.jpg


That's the Cool Lights in the first picture and the Britek acting as back light in the second picture. We basically kept the same setup for all of the scenes, except toward the end where we turned off the Cool Lights to provide harsher shadows.

11.jpg


The piano setup uses the 1k with softbox as key and the Cool Lights as fill, a variation that I use again and again for the rest of the film. We simply move the lights whenever we have to get a reverse shot. This is a difficult task in itself because the Cool Lights is quite heavy to lug around; I wish I had bought the lighter portable version instead, but money was tight.

The kitchen was the trickiest to light because sometimes the scene takes place in the day and sometimes at night. For the day scene it was pretty simple, we just put the 1k out in the window and the Cool Lights in the back of the room.

_MG_4734.jpg


For the night scene, it was basically a constant game of moving the lights whenever we need to get a different angles because that kitchen was so big we couldn't light it all.

metro2307 said:
I also would like to know about Canon lenses vs. Nikon, in your opinion. And what equipment you where most impressed with and vice-versa.
Click to expand...

I think Canon FD is a good and cheap alternative to Nikon. The glass is just as good, and all you need is a simple modification to the lens to get full iris control. The 135mm is my favorite for close-ups. I wish I have a faster lens than the 24mm f2.8 though. It loses quite a bit of light.

I would have to say that I'm most impressed with the Cool Lights. I bought it just a few weeks ago and this was the second project that I've used it in. It is truly beautiful to have a light that you can leave on for extended period of time without worrying about cooking your talents or taxing your household circuit. The soft light works great as a fill and it's nice to not have to worry too much about casting harsh shadows everytime the light is on. It's not exactly light though and I wish I have bought the portable version, but this light is simply an amazing tool at a very reasonable price.
 
Just got back from the last day of shooting. Didn't get as much done as we would have liked, but I think there's enough now to cut it together.

Here's about six minutes of it that I put together yesterday. Color grading aren't final, sound mix isn't final and music are just some temp tracks I threw on there. Some of the shots will be replaced by what we shot today.
http://www.girlfromyesterday.com/Videos/Shrinking.mov
 
Wow! I watched it twice, the second time without sound so I could focus on the camera work. Very, very nice work. I like the rack focus at the transition and the pan at the start of the second part. Great timing and pace. Lighting was perfect for the story. Everything was in focus, nice film-look. Even raw, the colors look good and rich. Good acoustics in the living room, so sweetening shouldn't be too tough on those shots.

Good job. Would like to see more of this project.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top