Lighting an Apartment Interior Naturally

M

mikeshu

Well-known member
Hi Guys,

I'll be filming a concept film for a wedding couple in their apartments in a month or so. We all know how nasty an apartment's lighting can be, and I never really ventured into shooting in one, knowing how it can quickly look muddy.

I was wondering if anybody has tips to get the most natural and color balanced lighting that they are willing to share on the forum? This is assuming that no decent natural light shines in and we are trying to simulate

Tungsten? Kino flo? Bounce off the ceiling? Any help is greatly appreciated!
 
What's the subject matter? If there aren't lots of windows or the scene doesn't justify bright ambient light, lean more heavily on practicals and light based on that.
 
I shoot in apartments regularly. And I re-bulb every practical that will be turned on. If you want "natural" it doesn't get much easier than that.
 
mikeshu said:
Tungsten? Kino flo? Bounce off the ceiling?
Click to expand...

D) All of the above

It really depends on what area of the apartment you are in. Let your practicals be your motivation.

For example: If you are in a kitchen, the light will come mainly from the ceiling. If you are in an office, light may come from a desk lamp. Let those motivate how you light and then add from there. You may need some fill light or rim lighting in addition to the motivated key light.
 
Color balance will be your biggest problem if it's daytime and there are windows. If the apt. truly has no natural lighting coming in, you must be shooting at night. Chances are you will get some of that gray-blue shade daylight. Take some full & 1./2 CTB with you.

If it's 1st floor, you can put an open faced 750 or 1k outside the window through a sheer curtain (basically overriding the daylight), and then bounce lights as needed inside. Every room is pretty unique.

The big key for me is generally soft as you can get. Hang a 8x8 fabric over a c-stand and light through it, bounce from ceilings, etc. If you can get a small fresnel or two in there, you can often shoot them at lampshades or walls behind lamps to boost the practicals. And getting some rim light/kickers in - even if there's no practical motivation - can make things prettier if you go easy on 'em. Look at hollywood film interiors - often when they move to mid & closeups, there's all kinds of hard-lit back or side modeling going on; not blasting, but subtle. We're used to it as viewers and it adds depth and beauty.
 
One of the most common problems with apartment interiors is boring white walls. Not only do they blow out easily, but by contrast it is more difficult to light a human subject because the skin tone is darker than the background. So, the trick is how to keep light off your white walls. Also, the white walls that aren't on screen act as giant bounce cards, which can also contribute to a flat look. Solutions are to use flags, black fabric, etc. as negative fill and to block spill light. If you don't want a "sunlight from windows" look, you could try a soft toplight with a black skirt to keep spill off the walls. Then, like PerroneFord suggested, re-bulb the practical lamps as necessary.
 
Michael Carter is right about shooting through some translucent white fabric to create soft light coming from the windows. But I don't think a 750W or 1k tungsten light is going to provide much light. Especially if you have to put CTB infront of it to color correct to daylight. That will lose up to 2 stops of light output. Maybe if your subjects are very close to the window that would work, but if they walk even two feet away from that spot, they are WAY underexposed. Can you rent an HMI light? A 575W fresnel or Par, or even a 1.2k HMI par can plug into a household outlet and puts out a ton of daylight balanced light. Shoot that through a white sheet draped over the window, or lose the sheet and shine it direct...strategically so that you don't overexpose your subject's skin. HMI's might be overkill. I don't know your budget or what your client is expecting, but that's what I would use.
 
umuima said:
What do you rebulb with?
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Usually CFLs. I keep a supply in 3 color temperatures (2700, 3500, 5500) and different wattages. This gives me quite a lot of flexibility, and is perfect if you need to do 360s or you intend to have practicals in the shot.

I don't understand when I see people new to this who want to light the entire set with movie lights, and absolutely ignore the practicals in the room. That's the first thing I look at when preparing to light a location set. Where are the windows, and where are the lamps. Second question, is what is Time of Day for the scene.
 
PerroneFord said:
Usually CFLs. I keep a supply in 3 color temperatures (2700, 3500, 5500) and different wattages. This gives me quite a lot of flexibility, and is perfect if you need to do 360s or you intend to have practicals in the shot.

I don't understand when I see people new to this who want to light the entire set with movie lights, and absolutely ignore the practicals in the room. That's the first thing I look at when preparing to light a location set. Where are the windows, and where are the lamps. Second question, is what is Time of Day for the scene.
Click to expand...

That is one of the best posts I have seen on this forum in a while. I love the CFLs. Re-bulbing the practicals, and having a handy portable soft light to bring in as a fill/portraiture light is a very good guerrilla lighting approach. Sh*t, it is a very good professional lighting approach also.
Most practical lights can usually take up to a 100 watt bulb (check to make sure). In CFL world a 100 watt light has the equivalent light output as about a 400 watt incandescent bulb. Replacing the available practicals with 100 watt CFLs and you will have a natural looking light, at a level that is high enough to properly expose for. What I do then is to use a CFl, of the proper color temp, as note in PerroneFord's post, in a Home Depot clamp work light, heavily diffused, that I bring in close to the talent to use as a fill light or for proper portraiture light.
Now the secret to this lighting approach, is WHICH practicals to re-lamp and leave on and which ones not to. Get to the location and play with the lights that are there, find which ones look the best to you, then use them. Remember, that you can move and rearrange these lights to meet your needs.

BTW, I used the 100 watt replacement bulb as a usual maximum for standard practical lights, lower wattages can give you good results also. Experiment with what you have available.
 
Ive shot apartments frequently. I look at it like this, almost every apartment has at least one standard lamp with shade. I usually source my lighting from those, I swap out the bulbs of all lamp practicals and put them all on dimmers. Then I hang Chinese lanterns over the top of the lamp itself. It creates a beautifully sourced light for most of the room, plus its cheap and will look great on skin tones. If its night time, Ill usually punch an hmi, or a blued up tungsten through windows , and soften it up so it has some shape, and creates a nice pretty moon light coming though blinds and such.
 
Wow, I go to out of town shoots for a few days and sit back down at my desk with a plethora of advice. I love you guys!

Well, this is sort of an "engagement story" shoot for a wedding couple so it's a low budget piece I want to keep looking good. I haven't had the chance to go to their apartments and take a look, and I'm not sure if I will have the chance, since it's one of those things where the couple barely have any time as well.

The use of CFLs to replace existing bulbs is very.... enlightening, for a lack of a better word. Can a 100 watt really be powerful enough for the purpose?

I'm thinking we're shooting the apartment during the daytime but there are scenes in which the TV is involved and that I want to give a night time feel. The groom wants to show his overzealous cheering of sports in front of his TV, for example.

So you thinking that using studio lights such as kinos and soft boxes, etc, may be much harder to produce natural looking lighting?

Thanks again for the advice!
 
These are good suggestions on the CFLs. I also carry Reveals because they dim with the Ikea DIMR inline dimmers. I use consumer (GE) CFLs in daylight and tungsten and never have a CRI issue.

I also carry a kit of paper china balls - 18" and 24" - that also are wired with Ikea switched bases and run those with the biggest CFLs I can find. These are great because you can literally rig these over the set with good quality gaffer's tape or scissor clamps if you have a drop ceiling. A little Duvetyne or Blackwrap will help control most unwanted spill. I like that they quickly give me a softer, cooler source than I can achieve with conventional fixtures that have to ride on bulky stands, baby nail plates, comets or wall-buster supported methods.
 
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