Outdoor Scene at Playground

[KnoxHotch]

We'll be shooting a few scenes outside in the coming weeks and I'm pre-planning the lighting for them. Been trying to find good websites for info, but haven't turned up much.

The first scene will take place on a playground/ball field in midafternoon where the protagonist will confront a bully. So far I'm thinking of shooting everything besides a wide master under a 12' silk and using a 1.2k HMI Par as necessary for fill. I'm concerned about the light loss from the silk, as well as the best time of day for the mid-afternoon look. Also, if we have to rent a generator, a little 2k unit should be sufficient for that single light, right?

The other scene will be possibly day for night or at least evening for a midnight look. It will involve one character in the bushes/lawn talking to someone in an upstairs window and then a brief walk/crawl through the bushes. Would the HMI Par shot through silk be a good option for nighttime lighting or should I look at something else?

All of this obviously depends on our locations and shooting schedules, which are still being scouted right now. Any thoughts or links to similar lighting setups for comparison? I'm not used to having a budget for decent lighting and grip, so it's like a whole world has opened up creatively.

Thanks in Advance!

 

[RyanT]

I never liked the look of just throwing a silk over the sun. Maybe instead try staging your scenes with the sun as your backlight and then use your 1.2 or shiney boards through frames of diffusion.

If you want to silk the sun maybe try something light. A 1/4 silk, china silk, or even 1/2 soft frost will help to take the edge off.

A 2k watt generator should be fine but you should start your 1.2 with nothing else on to be safe. What other power might you need? I might get a 3000 watt genny instead to leave you a little extra room for crafty, wardrobe and all that stuff.

 

[KnoxHotch]

I'm also not a fan of the "shooting under a tent" look, so 1/4 stop or less sounds ideal, just anything to soften the sun a little. How does 1/4 silk compare with what matthews calls "silent frost"? I'm also concerned about how to support an overhead frame that large. Will two bagged c-stands with someone on guard with them be enough, or is there another way i'm not thinking of?

In addition, the gennie won't be used by anyone else on such a small production, the 1.2k would be its only purpose. Will look into renting a 3k generator if we decide to add any additional load.

 

[Eileen Ryan]

I'm also not a fan of the "shooting under a tent" look, so 1/4 stop or less sounds ideal, just anything to soften the sun a little. ....

The purpose to using a silk and lights outside on sunny days has as much to do with maintaining continuity between shots in a scene as it does with taming the sun. The problem with shooting an extended scene outdoors is that the sun moves. For shots that are filmed hours apart to cut together you have to take the direction out of the sunlight. For that you need a full silk and nothing lighter. The set up pictured below is a good example of this approach.

I find it works best to shoot the establishing master shot when the sun is in a position that offers the best modeling or effect without a silk. For a scene that takes place at mid-day, that would be when the sun is in a backlight position. Shooting the coverage under a full silk then offers a number of advantages. When the sun has moved and it is in the wrong position for continuity, the silk knocks down its’ level by two and half stops and takes the directionality out of it. Now you can use an HMI Par light to model your talent to mimic the establishing shot and maintain continuity. Staging your action so that the sun is in a back light position also means that you will be shooting into the shadowed side of the talent – which means that you will be able to model your talent with a smaller HMI. Shooting into talents' down side under a full silk, I find that you still need at least a 4k – especially if you want to put it through a diffusion frame.

Another advantage to shooting with the sun in a back light position is that your background is also back-lit so the discrepancy in exposure between levels under the silk and what you see outside the silk is not so great that a 4k can’t bring it up so that the background does not over expose. Also, your background looks better because it is not flatly lit, but has some contrast. Finally, with the sun in a backlight position, the shadows of the silk frame and stands are thrown forward, which enables you to frame wider before picking up the shadow of the hardware. You will need a larger generator than a 3000W to power a 4k. But, if you use one of the modified 7500W Honda EU6500is generators with a Transformer/Distro, you could do this set up without a tow generator.

Rather than using C-stands to rig the silk, I would suggest you use High Walker stands like the ones in the picture above. I would also suggest you use a dual wattage 2.5/4k Par (there is a good deal on one on ebay right now.) The Par configuration will give you the additional output you will need for the day exterior, but also the versatility to use the same head for the night exterior. When you need a lot of light for day exteriors you would lamp it with a 4k globe. For the night exterior, when you don’t need the punch of a 4k Par, you can swap the 4kw globe for a 2.5kw which will give you more power to run additional lights on the generator. When you consider that a Kino Flo Parabeam 400 uses only 2 Amps , the 15 Amps we saved by burning the smaller 2500W globe will enable you to power quite a few more Parabeam lights on the small generator for the night exterior scenes.

Eileen Ryan, Gaffer

 

[DDirector]

Just a question to the above post with the picture.

What size silk and the thickness is that?
- Its a little larger than what I was looking for, but I will be able to tell which size is too big.

Is it better to use the diffusion on a stand in front of a light or get a softbox? - oth indoor/outdoor use

 

[Eileen Ryan]

Just a question to the above post with the picture.

What size silk and the thickness is that?
- Its a little larger than what I was looking for, but I will be able to tell which size is too big.

Is it better to use the diffusion on a stand in front of a light or get a softbox? - oth indoor/outdoor use

Hey DDirector,

Here are answers to your questions
1) That is a 20x20 Full Silk
2) That is Half White Diffusion on the frames. You will get more output using a softbox on the lights because the silvered walls of the softbox will redirect the light bouncing back from the diffusion.

Hope this helps.

Eileen Ryan, Gaffer, Boston

 

[KnoxHotch]

Hey Eileen, thanks so much for your help, I've actually been studying that image in other threads.

We've got location scouts out today, I couldn't make it but my co-DP on the project is out with the team. If I had it my way we'd be able to do what you suggested, but with such a small crew and budget to work with I don't think we'll be able to swing that large of a package. At most, we're looking at 2-3 of the 1.2k pars and I'm not sure about the gennie situation yet. If that's not going to be enough light to work with, we may have to look into using large sources of bounced light for fill. Not sure how long the scene will take, but like you said we'll have to be mindful of the sun's position for continutity's sake.

As far as night shooting, we are limited to a stock Sony NX5u to shoot on (not by choice), which is supposed to be rated near 400iso or a little slower (though, being video those figures aren't as useful). Shooting at 180* with a 2.8, what kind of lux/footcandles are we looking at needing for exposure?

 

[nejuicer]

http://www.dvxuser.com/V6/showthread.php?240592-Strobe-vs-Continuous-Light-Output

As far as night shooting, we are limited to a stock Sony NX5u to shoot on (not by choice), which is supposed to be rated near 400iso or a little slower (though, being video those figures aren't as useful). Shooting at 180* with a 2.8, what kind of lux/footcandles are we looking at needing for exposure?

To figure out how many Footcandles you need, all you need to know is that it takes 100FC to get an exposure of 2.8 with an ISO 100 film with a 180 degree shutter at 24FPS (1/50th of a second shutter speed.) If your camera is 2 stops faster than an ISO100 film, you will need 25FC to get a stop of 2.8. An Arri 4k HMI Par with super wide lens puts out 3577 FC at 10’. An Arri 1k Fresnel at full flood puts out 183 FC at 10’ (55 FC after correction with full CTB to 5000K.) A Diva 200 puts out 14 FC at 10’. A Parabeam 400 puts out 63 FC at 10’.

I don't think we'll be able to swing that large of a package. At most, we're looking at 2-3 of the 1.2k pars and I'm not sure about the gennie situation yet.

Since you plan to use HMIs, it matters not only what type of generator you use but also what type of HMI ballasts you use. The harmonic noise that magnetic and non-PFC electronic ballasts (both HMI, Kino, & LED) kick back into the power stream can have a severe adverse effect on the power waveform of conventional AVR generators like those that are available from Home Depot and Tool Rental Companies. The harmonic noise these light sources generate will not nearly have as bad an effect on the power supplied by an inverter generator like the Honda EU6500is. The Honda EU6500is will also generate less than half the noise of Home Depot type generators – making it easier to record clean audio tracks.

For more detailed information on the use of HMIs on portable generators, I would suggest you read the article I wrote for our company newsletter on the use of portable generators in motion picture lighting.

This article is cited in the just released 4th Edition of Harry Box's "Set Lighting Technician's Handbook" and featured on the companion website "Box Book Extras." Of the article Harry Box exclaims:

"Great work!... this is the kind of thing I think very few technician's ever get to see, and as a result many people have absolutely no idea why things stop working."

"Following the prescriptions contained in this article enables the operation of bigger lights, or more smaller lights, on portable generators than has ever been possible before."​

The article is available online at http://www.screenlightandgrip.com/html/emailnewsletter_generators.html.

Guy Holt, Gaffer, ScreenLight & Grip, Lightng & Grip Rental in Boston