How important are color conversion gels?

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I plan to do a family history video in a room with some ambient light -- no direct sunlight. I am new to professional lighting and plan to use a small Softbank with a 650W fresnel and one or two 300W fresnels to establish three point lighting.

I do not have a color meter and the DVX100 does not appear to give color temperatures other than the presets. The temp is required to determine what CTB to use.

Should I take a guess at the CTB, cover the windows (not easy but doable) or -- not worry about it. I am trying to make sure I have done a decent job with the lighting.

Any suggestions would be appreciated. Thank you.
 
Re: How important are color conversion gels?

Rather than trying to gel the windows with CTO (if it's gonna be a pain), I'd use your best guess at the CTB level and gel your lights. Then white balance under that and you should be good to go.
 
Re: How important are color conversion gels?

If the ambient light isn't directly impacting your subject, there's a good chance your fresnels will overpower it anyway, rendering it irrelevant.

Color temperature meters are wonderful (and expensive) devices, but the best color temperature-gauging device you can have is an NTSC monitor on the set with you. The wonderful thing about video is that you get to see exactly what it's going to look like, while you're shooting it, so take advantage of that: set up a monitor, set your lights, and then look at what it really looks like on a properly-calibrated monitor. If there's too much color temperature difference, try using a 1/2 CTB or so and then check the results on the monitor again. That'll give you a much better sense of what it'll really look like than a color meter would anyway. (by that I mean, a color meter may be a more precise technical tool, but, what it looks like is what it LOOKS LIKE, regardless of what the color meter says, you know?) ;)
 
Re: How important are color conversion gels?

Thanks very much for the suggestions. I will do a manual white balance and use a monitor to check the color.
 
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