Creating same lighting on set to match for the back ground plates

[Vasu]

Hi Master Roger & David,

I’m currently in the prep stage for a commercial that I’ll be shooting in about 15 days. There’s a specific task I’d like your advice on.

We’ll be shooting plates of crowded, iconic streets that strongly represent a certain city — locations where filming with the artist is not feasible. The artist will instead be shot on a partially built exterior set, with green screens used for the areas to be extended in CGI.

Since this is my first time working with this kind of setup, I’d really appreciate any tips or advice on shooting the plates and recreating the lighting on set to ensure that the final composition feels seamless and realistic — not like it was shot against green screen.

What should I be most careful or considerate about in terms of lighting, lensing, or camera movement?

Thank you so much in advance for your guidance.

Topic

[Gregg]

You’re in luck.  Get a copy of the current (August 2025) edition of The ASC Magazine.  Jay Holben has written a “shot craft” article on exactly this. “The basics of plate capture for VFX, virtual production and beyond”.  I haven’t read it yet…

[Vasu]

Thanks mate. Will do

[LucaM]

Since i suppose you’ll have little control on the exterior lights, you could create a similar artificial lighting in the studio for Key light (intensity, temperature, diffusion,  direction, etc). Consider that you’ll need separate light on the green screen to make  the Chroma Key step easier. Study how light behaves in real scene to mimick It in studio (what types of shadows, reflexes, etc).

EDIT: I am not an expert and i apologize if i am saying something not correct,  but i suppose that for camera movement in theory you have two options: shooting in the studio and match the movement in the exterior or, even  more simply, shooting in exterior and match it in the studio. Perhaps you’ll need some camera tracking in both cases, so in studio remember the tracking points!

I used green screen for my short movie and, if it may reassure you a little, even if the lights were completely off (in my defence, it was a shot made for another scene but i had to use in emergency in a different one by altering the lighting in post production) by grading it in post production i managed to match the shots in an acceptable way, so i’d say it’s not impossible with modern softwares

 

[Author]

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