Lighting a surreal forest night scene

T

TH4T_Film_Guy

New member
Hey guys,

First post here. I am currently developing a short project (approximately 2-3 minutes) and am curious if anyone can help with suggestions on how to tackle a particularly challenging scene in the film. Basically there is a night scene where a little girl runs into a colorful "magic forest" at night. The concept and look was inspired by this still photo, which was accomplished by using long exposure and painting various elements in the frame with a flashlight gelled with different colors. See here: http://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/05...ght-Painting-Painted-Forest_1024x1024.jpg?171

I realize that recreating this look in a film will require a different approach than the photographer used, and the final results may look fairly different. However, I want to at least give it a go and try and do this in camera using lights, rather than trying a CGI or After Effects approach.

So you guys know what I'm working with, I shoot with a 5d Mark II. My lenses are Canon 24-105 4L, Zeiss 50mm 1.4 ZE, and Zeiss 85mm 1.4 ZE. I'm looking to add a Canon 24mm 1.4L before we begin shooting (hopefully late September). I do own three 650 watt Tungsten Fresnels from Cool Lights, and have been fortunate enough to find someone with a generator who is willing to let me use it to power the lighting required. However, the three lights are not going to be enough to create the look I have in mind. I'm thinking at least 5-6, each with a different color gel (teal, blue, pink, purple, yellow, etc).

We don't really have much money to put toward this, so I was thinking maybe those ubiquitous work shop lights from Home Depot might be an option. I know they run super HOT, but they do put out a good amount of light and are relatively inexpensive. My concerns are 1) starting a forest fire, and 2) how to use a color gel with those. Could you create a frame that is 6" or so in front of the work light and get the color output without your gel melting?

Any other ideas and suggestions are most welcome. I've been doing film/video projects for the past 5 years so I'm not a total noob, but I have never taken on something this challenging before. I think if we somehow pull it off though, it could be a really good piece for the reel.

Thanks guys!
 
I agree with David. I think your better off doing this on green screen and compositing it since it's already a dreamy look scene. Because if you end up shooting it all together your going to get the spill of the colored lights on the talent and that may not be what you want. Or possibly shoot it normal and then color it later in post with masks.

If you do go buying Work lights i would get these Snap on 2000 Lumens LED Work Light as they are cool to the touch and you'll have not problem putting gels on them. I got them at Costco for about $30. I've tested them with 24fps (and i think 60fps) and didn't see any flickering. I've used them for a few shoots. Working on building barn doors for them, but using black wrap in the mean time. Or rent some high powered LEDs that use batteries.
 
Well, I get what you guys are saying about green screen and post being a more pragmatic approach. That may be what ends up happening. However, at this point I'm interested in seeing if anyone has any ideas/suggestions in regards to going about it "in camera", i.e. the pain in the ass way with actual gelled lights.

The snap on LED work light is a decent suggestion, but I don't think 2000 lumens has enough punch. Isn't that equivalent to like 25 watts? That's why I was thinking the home depot halogen work lights. They're inexpensive and put out 250-500 watts. Does anyone have an idea of how to safely gel a workshop light? I have a collection of LEE brand gels. Usually I just attach them to my 650 tungstens with a few C47s, but everything I've heard about halogen work lights has me thinking anything near them is melting or going up in flames.
 
3 questions.

1: What size generator package do you have available?

2: What size budget do you have available for your lighting & grip package?

3: Are you shooting any wide shots where the lights you use need to be out of the frame?
 
Deeply colored gels will by definition cut most of your lamps' output. You're going to need a LOT of light to do what you're proposing. I'm talking an order of magnitude or so. I would never attempt what you are trying just with some ordinary Home Depot shop lights. If I did, I think I'd set up a bunch together in a grid configuration like a 9-light and then mount the gel to a frame in front of the lights. You can make a frame out of some wood or PVC pipe and use a couple of C-stands to hold it in front of the lights.

But that reference still shows that different areas get different colors of light, and shop lights are just open face units. They spew light everywhere, which means you'll get overlap from one area onto all the others. You need lensed lights to control the direction of the lights. Something like a PAR light, which is like a car headlight. These cost money and eat power.

Also, where will the lights be relative to the camera? From the reference image, it appears that the light is quite frontal, so that means the lights are on either side of the camera pointing straight in. Your lights would splash colors all over your talent.

If I were going to attempt to light something to look this way and have actors walk through it, I would need powerful lights on tall platforms with lots of flagging in order to carefully control spill. The talent would have a set path they could move through frame so that they could be lit separately. This setup would require a couple of 5-ton trucks of gear and a truck generator at a minimum. Plus a lot of crew with considerable time.

I'm not trying to be a naysayer and applaud your desire to be creative. But I don't want to be unrealistic about what the requirements would be in order to achieve what you desire. This is very theatrical lighting, and would require theatrical lighting equipment.
 
The low budget view.. LEDs are king for this.. even $5 torches have decent power if you are at 1600iso at f2

This is not a job where colour rendition matters.

Last forest shoot I did have two LED bar lamps that run off 12v car batss.. very bright per $

S

also a huge amount of colour in post with davinci.

private version no post
https://vimeo.com/116374538 pwd shoot

published version.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fBY8nU33ckw
 
Last edited:
David,

In answer to your 3 questions.

1) I believe it is a 3000W generator, but we're probably going to rent another 3000W generator for $60. Noise is not an issues because only music track for audio
2) As far as budget, not a lot. It's really what I can beg, borrow, and steal, already own, plus maybe another $300 to put towards the project.
3) I don't plan on doing anything too wide. Just wide enough to get a sense of the forest. My thoughts are to do a shot of just the forest with a field of view similar to the photo I sent as a reference without the talent in frame. Use my three 650 tungsten fresnels to hit the front of the woods with three different colors, and maybe one 500 watt shop light gelled with a color. Then two more 500 watt shop lights further into the forest to give some depth, and also a couple 24" china balls with photo floods hidden back in the forest.

Mitch, I hear what you're saying. Yeah, I'd love to have the resources of 15K HMI's and a fully loaded grip truck. I would like to emphasize that the image I sent as a reference was what inspired the idea of the look, but I have no delusions that whatever we produce will not look as cool as that. Buying several shop lights and some grip gear is not going to be a tremendous investment, so if it is a total failure then I will have learned something in the process. I appreciate your straight shooting advice. I'm going to give it a go and see what we can do with our limited resources. The one good thing is my filmmaking partner who does most of the editing is an absolute After Effects wizard. So if it requires enhancing in post to make up for what we don't have in the way of a professional film crew, then we'll try that too. I'm very much from the mindset of Christopher Nolan; that you should capture as much as you possibly can in camera with practical techniques, and then CG and Visual Effects are a wonderful tool to enhance and supplement that material. Just my personal preference. Thanks for the input though guys. Hoping to shoot mid to late September, so we'll see what happens.
 
The wider the shot, the farther away the lights need to be. Which means higher wattage instruments, as Mitch touched on.

Not sure where you are located, but you might find an owner/op where you live willing to cut you a $300 package deal.
 
The other option would be a locked off wide shot. Then light each area as separate zones one at a time and stitch them together in After Effects. Then shooting your tight shots would only require you to light the background elements seen in the tight.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top