Search Results for 'no'

[Roger Deakins]

I can’t imagine a 2K being effective. It also seems you might need to control the natural light so that it does not overwhelm any source you use. I would expect to use an Arri Max for this kind of effect or, at least a powerful HMI Par.

[GianniRanzuglia]

Hi All,

I’m gaffing a short film and I’m trying to create light rays coming in from a window through shutters. We’re trying to replicate an early morning sunrise, but the window we’re shooting towards isn’t facing in the right direction for sunrise or sunset.

I’ve attached images below for the type of rays and intensity we’re trying to achieve. Our strongest light is a 2k fresnel and I’m wondering if that’s strong enough to create such an effect? We also have a 6foot frame of full diffusion to spread out the source if need be.  If I had to resort to renting out lights, what lights would I need to consider and/or other lighting equipment.

Thank you all for your time!

[Edwardbravoharvey]

What techniques do you use to flag off larger source for interiors? I like using the largest diffusion source (6’x6′ +) I can fit inside but sometimes get into trouble with light hitting the rear walls or the ambiance coming up in directions I did not intend even if I put a control grid over the frame. Of course camera angle and light position can make a big difference but this doesn’t always solve it for me.

 

thank you

[Max A.]

Hello Simon!

If I can join in this topic and give you some of my impression, I recently ended my first feature with less budget (almost 1/3 I guess) but the first for me with a crew (4 guys per department).
I’m self-taught too if this can make you more chill, and the first “tip” that I want to give you is: enjoy your role.
Probably you love what you do and what you study so this is the moment where you can express yourself and learn a lot.
For me, it was so stressful and so inspiring with a lot of challenges and “issues” but sometimes I really enjoyed those moments.

The way you prepare the movie is basically subjective. Of course, If I can give you some “tips” based on my point of view (but here there are a lot of DP much more experienced than me and of course, there is Mr. Deakins that is a legend):

Talk a lot with the director, and try to understand what he/she means when talking about dark scenes/bright scenes, cold/warm, etc.
Share a lot of visual references with he/she and ask he/she to send you others so you can understand (and of course “trigger” he /she) the visual language that he/she imagines for the story.
Of course, you are a lot of responsibility for the final “image” so try to tell the director “why” you thought about that look for the scene, etc. so he/she could understand your vision.

Go and see each location to shoot, if some location is far away from the language you discuss with the director be sincere immediately, otherwise, you have big problems during the shooting day. Another important aspect (in my opinion) about the locations is to understand what kind of “issues” there are, in order to understand how “fight” those issues to achieve the result you want. For issues, I also mean technical issues.

If your crew is your first crew (like me) go to meet them, talk about the project, about you, and about your vision. Believe me, they are really the extension of your arms and they can help you so much during stressful moments of the set.
If they know what you want to achieve, they can help you with proper tips during shooting, otherwise, you could receive a lot of “incorrect” pieces of information that can distract you (and in some cases make you insecure).
On set often there is no time to overthink, so be prepared at better you can and sometimes listen to your instinct. The set (seemed to me) has its own life and things can also happen during the day of the shoot.

It will be a great opportunity for you, so work hard and enjoy!

This is my cent for this topic.
Have a nice day.
Max.

[Matt Stahley]

I agree with Al. Zooms all the way for doc work unless you are just shooting talking head interviews and some b roll you could get away with primes but if you are running and gunning nothing more convenient than a nice zoom that’s wide to medium tele.

[simoncarlkoeber]

Hello everyone, and thanks to Roger and James and the team for this great opportunity for aspiring cinematographers here.

I have a question for you all.
Next summer, I will get to shoot my first full length feature film with a budget of 1.5mil€. It’s here in Germany. For me, having shot 2 music videos, 2 documentaries and 1 short feature film before and being 23 years old, this is huge and it feels like a dream coming true. But at the same time, I am incredibly nervous. And there is a lot of first times on this:
– first time on a big set with a department I have to lead
– first time with a big budget (for me it’s big)
– first time full length feature
– first time with a full size cinema camera
etc.

Now my question:
What tips do you have for a first time as DoP on a big set?
And, imagining being in my place, how would you use the next 6 months to prepare? What would you read, what would you do?

I never went to film school and everything I do is self taught (e.g. through the great great resources Roger provides here and in Rogers and James’ podcast). I know I can do this, I think I have a pretty good impression on how I wanna light and shoot. But the imagination of putting it into practice on a big set is a bit daunting!

So thank you all a lot, hope you having a great day,
Simon

(P.S. probably this will not be my last topic here with questions I have during my very own prep the next months)

[Al Duffield]

Zooms buy you speed (shooting not aperture) at the expense of size, weight and image “quality”.

I don’t have any experience shooting weddings, but in documentary I have rarely has time to change lenses while the action is happening.

in narrative work, assuming you have assistants then changing lenses is less burdensome and there are regular and predictable breaks when lenses can be changed without holding anything up.

so I’m my mind it’s impractical to shoot weddings and documentary on primes, given that’s 2/3 of your listed work I see no logical choose other than to get both 😂.

[Max A.]

Hello Mr. Deakins, I saw that the links that I posted don’t work very well and last few days it was added a new function for posting images.
Unfortunately, I can’t edit the original post (and also my reply with links) and I just post now the two frame references that I was referring to.

Question 1:

Question 2:

I wish you a peaceful day.
Max.

[Roger Deakins]

I think there is some confusion between fall-off and the size of a light source. They are not connected. The fall-off of light from a source follows the inverse square law. How soft that light is on the subject is governed by the size of the source relative to that subject. That is simple geometry.

• This reply was modified 3 years ago by Roger Deakins.

[Roger Deakins]

There was a bounce source in front of the car to add a little more contrast to the natural light. Yes, the scene changes from rain to snow and this was achieved by our effects team, in camera, using cranes, rain bars and ‘snow’ blowers.  We wanted some flexibility in scheduling these shooting days because we needed, at the very least, cloud cover. The problem was the road closure, which allowed us only two specific weekends to work over. We got lucky in that it rained on our first day and remained cloudy through the next morning.

[StuGilmartin]

I think it was in the script that the rain turned to sleet/snow but I don’t know if I have the original (it’s a bit different to the actual scene) or an adapted version but I would be interested to hear more on the process here as well. Especially for the mix of rain to snow.

[Stip]

And follow up questions: the whole scene turns from heavy rain to snowfall. Was this planned? Was it natural rain/snow mixed with rain/snow machines?

In general, do you try to schedule rainy EXT scenes to potentially rainy days and then support with rain machines (something I would need to do on low budget projects)?

[Davinki]

Either opengate video on these current 8k stills cameras like the Canon r5c or Sony a1 or even better the Fujifilm gfx, or an opengate mode on the Panasonic s1h I can use as an a cam, meaning 10 bit 422 or higher to an external recorder, as it would allow me to use it on more productions.

[StuGilmartin]

Hello, Sorry if this has been asked but I love the film Prisoners and I have recently been tasked with shooting a film where there is a car scene. I hail from Rainy Scotland which is always fun for an EXT shoot.  My question is, does anyone know how the Scene where Detective Loki Questions Keller (the scene where he sees him then grabs a bottle of liquor to hide the fact he was going to the house where Paul Dano was held)

It looks very natural so I wondered if it was done with just natural light?

Was the back window blacked out? was there a source coming in the front window through diffusion?

I would love to hear any insight into scene.

[Davinki]

Hello, I had some some questions about your thoughts within anamorphic questions. 1, have you tried the Arri/Zeiss master anamorphic lenses and if so, what are your thoughts on them? Given they seem to solve a lot of your gripes on anamorphic lenses like breathing, illumination across the field causing vignetting, and flare from what I’ve seen from them, I figured they’d be your first choice if you had to shoot anamorphic but hey, I don’t know.