help matching two shots with different lighting

T

Taylor R

Member
I'm trying to match the look of these two shots:

http://i47.tinypic.com/33ytixg.png
http://i49.tinypic.com/643qqs.png

I'm using FCP 7. I also have access to Color, but I'd prefer to make this happen within FCP. After messing around with 3 way color corrector for the past hour, I'm starting to get nervous that this may be more difficult than I originally imagined. We began filming at 6:45 pm and with the sunset and clouds, the lighting changed pretty quickly over time.

Any help or advice is greatly appreciated. Thanks in advance...
Taylor
 
I don't see much hope for matching the two shots. There is such an exposure difference between the two that one most likely won't be able to match them for good looking inter-cutting. Also that while color balance match could be accomplished, the fact is that one is sunlit the other is not. You might consider a dissolve between the two in order to soften the jump and also blow up the more close-up of the two to create a greater compositional difference. . . this might help to separate the difference a bit. Best to either hold for sun light or hold for overcast and get exposure right, regardless.
You should pick a better time of day to shoot. Condition change dramatically in late afternoon (colorimetry, light angle, etc.). It is a challenge for the most experienced crews. Shoot while conditions are more stable. I would suggest re-shooting and work out a consistent exposure control method.
 
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That dark shot is gonna be tough. I tend to do tough shots like this in after effects though. I would put the shot with the look you want in a comp; layer the shot needing work on top of it; and mask half of the top layer so you can see both shots. I'd probably start with levels or curves on the top shot.

The cool thing about AE is that with a click of the mouse you can view individual channels (red, green and blue) as grayscale. This can really be an "oh wow" moment, especially when you set levels to work on just the channel you are viewing. It becomes instantly clear how much density you need in shadows, mids and highs to match the shot. You can often blow through each channel and very quickly get to a "close" point where you can then finesse viewing the full RGB image.

When you blast those dark clips open, they may look pretty funky and noisy. You may need to reduce their noise; you may find the best fix is to then give all the shots a stylized look - add film grain, reduce or blast saturation, tint them, add some glow, whatever - something that "glues" them all together visually and is far more visually prevalent than the mismatches. This of course take the overall look in a very different direction than what you initially sold the client on. If they feel like "everyone involved" was part of the reason why the shoot got out of hand, then you're a hero and hopefully they dig the more stylized version. If they feel like it's all "your fault" you may have to either say "yes it was and this is the best path to repair it", or really try to sell them that this new look was an awesome creative discovery and the project is just screaming out for it.
 
Just bump up gamma in dark one then adjust white balance, not that hard to make it brighter especially if theres no black in the frame
 
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