Horror Film Exposure

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Beeboop

Active member
When making a horror film, how do I properly exposure the frame. I've read that you only want one stop underexpose?
 
Lol, yes I know he was joking. Everything would be overexposed. How about David Fincher' Seven or The Conjuring? How do you believe those movies are exposing the picture? I am assuming one stop under exposed or do you think they just eye the picture in the directors monitor until they have the correct lighting?
 
Beeboop said:
Lol, yes I know he was joking. Everything would be overexposed. How about David Fincher' Seven or The Conjuring? How do you believe those movies are exposing the picture? I am assuming one stop under exposed or do you think they just eye the picture in the directors monitor until they have the correct lighting?
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I don't know the answer. I assume they shoot it with 'normal' exposure and then create the look they want in post, but I may be wrong. Hopefully someone more experienced with horror can answer your question.
 
Beeboop said:
Lol, yes I know he was joking. Everything would be overexposed. How about David Fincher' Seven or The Conjuring? How do you believe those movies are exposing the picture? I am assuming one stop under exposed or do you think they just eye the picture in the directors monitor until they have the correct lighting?
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Read the ASC articles. Seven had some serious ENR work fwiw and was shot before you could expose using a monitor (it's shot on film and ENR makes exposure even harder, think a milder bleach bypass). Key lights seemed to be about at key when the actors were exposed normally in both. What defines the look is the shape of light (lots of bounce in Seven and both have REALLY different styles), contrast ratio, and post processing (ENR or the DI). If you're asking that question, you're asking the wrong question.

If you're metering your key light and you want to expose your subject at key, expose at key.
 
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I have no idea, but I'll make the following two guesses:

- You expose "correctly", then play with the footage in post (e.g. if you want to crush blacks, darken some areas or the full frame, etc)
- You get the look with your lighting, much more than with your exposure
 
Beeboop said:
When making a horror film, how do I properly exposure the frame. I've read that you only want one stop underexpose?
Click to expand...


You test in advance and come up with the production/post look which works best to tell your story. There are no hard and fast rules.
 
Samuel H said:
I have no idea, but I'll make the following two guesses:

- You get the look with your lighting, much more than with your exposure
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Right and you light the "edges", where your histogram is off to one side or another. Then you'd also play the angles, from way low, to way high and the closeups, from way close to way distant. In other words, whatever means at your disposal to unsettle the viewer, use it.
 
Beeboop said:
When making a horror film, how do I properly exposure the frame. I've read that you only want one stop underexpose?
Click to expand...

What era of 'horror' film are you looking for... In the case of classic Hollywood, the lighting often used pretty 'hard' but controlled light. Hence there was no 'over/under' exposure... the exposure was correct for the features that needed to be lit...

Also, in some cases 'shadows' were painted into the sets, rather than spend time with lighting...

Is "The Shining"(1980) a 'horror' film? Has pretty even lighting on a lot of shots...

Then there's the 'direct to DVD' horror which probably suffered from no budget for lights, and so the film was shot at 1-2 stops 'under' to given a 2x or 4x on the ISO rating... then push processed to compensate...
 
My suggestion is:
1. Use hard lighting.
2. Do NOT use fill lighting.
3. Put key light behind or to side of subject.
4. Or, for bizarre effect, light from below.
5. Keep the scary things mostly in shadow.

And suggestions other than lighting:
1. Use Dutch angles for tense moments.
2. Use sound effect of nervous breathing.
3. Play minor-key chords softly in background.
4. Hey, just have some fun! :)

And leave the "underexposing" for post.
 
Ken Hull said:
And leave the "underexposing" for post.
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If you watch a lot of BTS videos, you quickly figure out that's whats going on nowadays, at least on major productions. The sets are well lit(the light levels are way higher, even in the "shadows" than you think by looking at the final product) and then they bring it down in post. It's also how you get cleaner shadows. So you are more of less exposing "properly" or even a little over and then crushing in post.

When I got my first DSLR, I always wondered why so many still guys on the forums preached ETTR(Expose To The Right), meaning overexpose. Because I come from a background where you nailed exposure in-camera or slightly UNDERexposed if you had to, so you didn't blow the highlights. You didn't have the luxury of it being normalized in post. How you had to shoot on a 90's era Betacam is a lot different than how you can shoot on a s35 sensor digital camera recording in LOG today.
 
This question is like asking how to paint a pretty picture. What is horror? What is beauty? Jaws is horror. Friday the 13th is Horror. Blair Witch Project is horror. The Shining is horror. Aliens is horror. None of them were shot the same.

The OP asked such an open ended question.

I have opinions but without context of what you are shooting they are sure to be just useless.
 
Hi Beehoop, my silly joke seems to be disappeared.

For what my opinion is worth. Are you talking about creating atmosphere with exposure here?

I don't know your camera, but with the dynamic range of modern cameras it seems not necessary to under, or over-expose. I think it is easier to make corrections in post with correct exposed footage.

I was just thinking, is horror about the things the viewers are seeing or is it about the things they don't see?
Is it a monster with an axe, chainsaw or horrible sharp teeth? Or is it the unseen thing under your bed or in the next room? To expose something that is unseen is more difficult than exposing a monster I think. :smile:
Is it the story, the plot, the music and the sound effects that make the viewer expect horrible things to happen and thus makes the Horror, or is it the action?
I think all these components make the atmosphere you want to create. And exposure can add something to the suggestion you want to give your viewers.

I once (long, long time ago) saw a classic Horror movie about a teenage summer camp with some lunatics with knives etc. (I think it was Friday the 13th).
We played it with the soundtrack from the Pink Panther movies (Macini). That made it very fun to watch. Only shouted loud when the dead girl came from the depth of the lake and grabbed the hero.


Succes! Like to see your movie.
 
I have an A7S II and a Canon C100 MK II. I use the light meter to gauge exposure. Sometimes when I want the scene to look dark, the light meter on the A7S II will read -2.0 and start blinking. The light meter on the C100 MK II looks like a ruler. When I have incorrect exposure, I am more prone to grain and that's why I'm asking this question. I believe someone here earlier answered my question and the idea is to expose what I want to see correctly and not the darkness? Basically, I would have to buy a light meter to get good exposure on what I want to make visible in the scene?
 
With the A7S when using the Cinegammas, a slight underexposed seem preferable (-0.7 to -1.3), but with SLog you probably want to overexposed a bit and pull down in post.
I believe there's a spot meter, then you could put the spot where you want the camera to meter and judge exposure by that. An external monitor with waveforms could also be handy.
 
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