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Hi All,
There’s one scene at the start of Phantom Thread where Reynolds (Daniel Day-Lewis) meets Alma (Vicki Kriep) at a cafe in a village, in this particular shot we see both characters framed in the wide shot inside the cafe, whilst able to see the landscape through a window.
Does anyone know how Paul Thomas Anderson and his team were able to create such a shot? Did they overlight the cafe and bring it down in post to match the outside, or did they wait for the weather outside to be dim enough to see it? It’s not only contained to this specific shot as well, but rather a sequence where we see Reynolds walk into the cafe, we pan with him, and see the landscape through all the windows.
I’ve attached the particular shot in this message, and this is the link for the full scene in YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ-OfdVU1CM&t=16s
Thank you all for your time!
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“Overlight the cafe and bring it down in post” is not how that works, what you are asking is if they lit the interior brightly enough to get closer to the exterior level so there was less of an exposure difference. At that point, they’d stop down the lens and/or use ND filters to expose the shot for the brightness they wanted, they wouldn’t need to bring it down in post. The truth is that if the background is very bright, you’d want to expose to retain some detail — leaving it very bright for post to then darken it back to normal risks having clipping (though this movie was shot in film, which has more latitude for overexposure.)
It’s an age-old question, how to retain details in a bright background through a window. Do you do it by bringing up the interior? Do you do it by adding ND gel to the windows? (You’d still need to add some interior light because if the room is mainly lit by window light and you darken all of them with ND gel, then the interior gets darker too, it’s just that because it’s darkened with ND gel, it takes less light level to bring up the interior, i.e. small LEDs rather than bigger HMIs.) Do you wait for a less bright time of day or weather condition rather than use ND gels?
Now if the actor is very close to the windows and thus receiving a lot of light from them, then the difference in brightness from exterior to interior might not be as bad you think, some white cards reflecting some of the sunlight back at the actor or minimal LED lighting might be enough to add some detail to the shadows.
Thank you Mike and David for your times and replies!
Those behind the scenes pictures are awesome Mike, thanks for sharing them. I foolishly left out the particular shot I mentioned, I won’t forget to share it this time.
Thanks for correcting me and explaining the different scenarios David, it truly was a poor choice of wording from me. I really liked what you explained in your last paragraph, it sounds so simple yet effective, and also a great answer for the way they lit the scene. Also, your explanation of the pros and cons of using ND gels on windows was more intriguing, and complex, than what I originally understood of such an idea.
I thank you both for your time!
He looks lit by a softened HMI coming from the right through another window, but whether the window in the middle of the frame needed ND gel is hard to tell – it looks sort of misty/foggy and overcast out there so maybe no ND gel would be needed. In a location like this, you might have hard acrylic ND gel panels made for each window that can be quickly slapped up — or removed as it gets darker outside.
Looking at a still like this makes it seem unrealistic as the artificial light effecting the characters is so much brighter than the sky. Nor is the same light present on the fence or building in the mid distance. However, in the run of the scene this is not something that draws the attention.
attached photos may help you.
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