[nathanielregier]

Hi Stephano, I’m happy to chime in here, since I recently went through a very similar shoot to what it seems like you are about to do. I recently just shot a film with a complex sequence that takes place at a track event over 1500m of running distance. Of course my first question was, how am I going to light this? With a very limited budget I decided to rely on a stadium’s existing lighting during running sequences, seeing that augmenting any amount of light over a large distance like that would create an enormous amount of work and equipment, the kind of work definitely not in our budget.

Instead I asked production to find a location where I would have some control over the stadium lights, at least the ability to shut off one side or the other. They found a track with LEDs that could actually dim on either side of the stadium and with a low, medium and high setting. Great!

I did augment some static scenes before and after the race with small units. At one point on the starting line I started bringing in 12×12’s and extra lights to help shape things but quickly realized that keeping continuity across the film was going to be very hard if I continued with this method. Instead, after one take, I decided to strip everything back and keep things much more honest to what the location was giving. I only added one Vortex for backlight to give a bit more edge (see above).

When it came to the shooting the running sequences, we were so strapped with time coordinating the action of the running, dramatic beats, and timing the camera car that lighting became the last thing I wanted to think about. As a result we ended up leaving the lights as they were, at full blast for most action sequences. I think it was a good lesson in learning to not have to make everything “pretty”, and just embracing what the location was giving us. It felt more true to the story and in the end it shouldn’t distract from anything on screen.

Hopefully this long anecdote can give you some more context on shaping your decisions for your film!

[Author]

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