Fixture to set distance purely from a falloff consideration

[Wekblad]

Hi!
Thank you for a fantastic forum.

I wonder if I could pick the brains of this experienced crowd.

Obviously, there is a lot of factors that plays in here. But if we were to take the intensity calculations away, and purely look at it from the the falloff characteristics, is there an average distance you would place a hard source from the set to recreate direct sunlight?

Or is there maybe a minimum distance to which you would try and not go below?

Currently in a soundstage with low ceilings, scratching my head as I am playing around with mirrors, and would appreciate your insights on this.

Thank you very much!
Will

 

Topic

[dmullenasc]

I think the question is too abstract — I mean, I’d place the hard light a city block away to get a sharp pattern like sunlight from it, with the correct fall-off, but that’s hardly practical and the intensity would be useless.

You basically will try and get the hard light as far back as is practical or possible while still maintaining the intensity you want. You also have to factor in whether you are using multiple hard lights for a row of windows and if you need to separate the beams.

[Wekblad]

Thank you for your answer!

Ok, well let’s say you are going on stage, and they ask you to give some input on set construction. When would you say the distance is too short, and what would you feel is a comfortable distance you would be happy to agree on? For the sake of argument take a living room set with four windows and four 12K fresnels.

Yes there are many factors playing in, budgets, the angel of the lights the scene itself… just wondered if there were any sort of range you would rather keep those fixtures within. Although as you say, it will probably always be as far away as possible.

[dmullenasc]

A lot of that depends on the art department plans for the stage space, it’s often restricted. If they aren’t giving you enough space for the backing and lights, you can see about pushing the set back but often there’s a reason they’ve squeezed you, like another set is in the way, the fire lanes, etc. But I would hope that I’d have at least fifteen feet back for the backing and pipe for the 12Ks. Twenty feet would be even better but the further you push everything back, the higher the lights have to go, the larger the backing has to be, etc. You often run into the limitation of the height of the stage ceiling and greenbeds.

[Roger Deakins]

I have often used mirrors to lengthen the distance between a light and a set but, as David says, there are always practical limitations. In one example, the distance between the set windows and the stage wall was around 10′. That was all the production designer could give me based on the director’s desire for the size of the set and the stage space available. The mirrors I used were 6′ x 4′. The lights (20K Fresnel lamps) sat on turtles on the studio floor and the mirrors were hung high against the backing above the windows. This all allowed for a semi-sharp pattern of light to reach the interior of the set but as the windows were quite wide and tall, the effect was not ideal. But when could we call anything we do ideal?

[Wekblad]

Thank you so much for taking the time to comment, really appreciate that.

[Author]

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