Nighttime HMI

mjmcneese

mjmcneese

Veteran
Got a nighttime scene shoot in a couple weeks. Gonna have a 5k HMI shining in through the window of a house. Problem is that the window we need to shine into is a 2nd story window. There are no structures nearby to get the light up high enough, so how do we safely but economically get it that high?
 
I had this very same problem lighting an exterior night scene a few weekends ago...In the end I had to settle with the high boy and have the light a bit lower than the second story window. I was tempted to add a gobo arm or two on top of the high boy since I was working with a lightweight Arrisun 5 575w HMI, but I decided against it.

If you're not going to see the exterior too much could you put the stand with the HMI on top of an SUV to get a little added height?
 
Home depot rents scaffolding. Just make sure its all stable and everything. That whole mess falling over would not be a good thing. Not sure how heavy a 5k HMI is.
 
condor, or scissor lift. If you've got the budget for a 5k HMI and a genie, then you've got the budget for a scissor lift.
 
If there's room, you could fake it. Cut a piece of foamcore into the shape of a window frame and hang it from a c-stand in front of the HMI (venetian blinds would also work). This might help sell the "moonlight through window" effect without needing to rent scaffolding.
 
You're putting a 5K to light a 10x14 room?

That seems to be a bit of an overkill. At 20 ft. an HMI 5K set at flood should give you enough light for shooting at f-8 (125 ASA)

May I ask what you trying to achieve?
 
Well, we also have a couple outdoors scenes that we will be using the HMI for as well. Need to kill two birds...

I also have a 1k fresnel in my kit. I've used it before on scenes like this, but the Iris was WIDE open and it still looked a bit grainy.

Horse, the only problem with putting a cookie'd light in the room is that the bed is about 20" away from the window source.

We're just doing the standard high-angle-over-the-bed shot. Thanks for the tips so far, guys!
 
Mike McNeese said:
Horse, the only problem with putting a cookie'd light in the room is that the bed is about 20" away from the window source.

We're just doing the standard high-angle-over-the-bed shot. Thanks for the tips so far, guys!
Click to expand...

Ah, I see. That does put a damper on my suggestion.
 
Don't worry about the light being overkill. Better too much than too little. You can always bring down your intensity. Also, as soon as you add a lens to the light, you are going to lose a little punch anyways.

Since you don't have the capability to raise the light, there is a simple solution. Rent a 4X4 mirror and a combo stand, and angle the mirror through the window, and shoot your 5K into the mirror. With this setup, you will only lose very a very small amount of punch, and having a mirror come down is certainly a lot cheaper than a 5K HMI.

The only downside here is controlling the source, you can't use barn doors or black wrap, you would have to fly up other stands with flags, or use an arm off the combo stand with long arms and gobo's to hold your controlling devices.
 
A 5k HMI sounds silly to me, unless your shot is of a blinding white UFO outside the window; if so, add smoke or maybe it'll do it for you.:violent5: but what do I know about the story?...zilch....

You might consider skipping the HMI & gennie, use a tungsten 2k on a high high and you'll be fine. That should take it up to around 18 ft.
 
a 2k is gonna be rough. I had a 2k, and 1k clamped to a telephone pole and I was barely getting enough of a stop to shoot wide open with a similar scene.
 
Your 2ks must have old bulbs because my Mole Richardson 2ks easily put a beam into tall evergreen trees an acre away at night. I've punched them through 2nd story windows and the problem I've had is they're too bright! They're also fun for throwing short beams into the sky... & looking for Nazi bombers...:)
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top