Lighting Setups & Cinematography ideas

Here I was lighting a variety of environments: daytime exteriors, night time sequences by flashlight, special effect lighting, twilight, different interiors etc:

1. Interior night time sequence:

Here I did a single tracking shot starting outside the bedroom and eventually close up on Lyndsay’s face. I replaced her bedroom lamp with a 200W practical bulb, and softened it up with a umbrella – The trick here was to soften the light more for the closeups (no harsh shadows on her face). I also tucked a 45W blue effect bulb to cast an eerie laptop glow onto her face.

[TOP:Lyndsay getting board while I spend 2 hours taking pictures of her. BOTTOM: Frame from the finished scene]

2. Interior dinner scene

For the kitchen scenes in the film, I was able to put a single 300W bulb (purchased from Henry’s) in the existing fixture which allowed total camera freedom – The single bulb allowed me to light the entire scene. The smoke machine was used here to simulate dinner burning in the oven (I got trigger happy with it though). The scene was done in one long tracking shot back and fourth across the kitchen, this allowed me to follow Cam while he argued with his dad on the phone about bills.

[TOP: I'm convincing Cam that he should actually call his dad in the scene for added 'realism'. BOTTOM: a frame from the finished scene]

3. Alien light effect

This was an interior scene in which cam approached a strange light coming from the front door. When he opens the door he is blasted by light and high powered gusts of snowy wind (I bought the biggest leaf blower I could find from Tucky’s hardware and returned it the next week). the light beam was done with a 650W Fresnel focused on the door. I threw on some halogen lamps to boost the light level even more.

[TOP: Outside at 1am on a Monday, not sure what the neighbors thought when I turned the leaf blower on... BOTTOM: Finished scene]

4. The Abduction

This scene involved a simulated storm which called for an intense light blast from inside the house. I used a direct 2000W Fresnel through the window to achieve the intensity of light I needed – I had to install a 20 amp circuit in my house just so I could turn the thing on.

[TOP: Testing out different snow blower angels in the back yard.BOTTOM: Finished scene]

5. Bike ride through time

This scene follows Cam home from work on his bike, while he bikes home the seasons change from summer to winter. I filmed the scene in several sections over 4 months to get the gradual transition through fall. I mounted my camera directly to the frame of the bike with U brackets, socks and a tripod center piece. I tried to get Cam to always bike into the sun to keep his face nicely illuminated. I used Neutral Density filters on my camera to avoid the sky from overexposure, the result was a very pleasing image:

[Above: Cam biking around Wortly village - Frame from finished scene ]

6. Flashlight Scenes

In the spirit of the X-Files I wanted to pull of some flashlight work during scenes in the film where the power cuts out. In order to get a nice solid flashlight beam you need two things: 1. A focusable mag-lite flashlight 2. Atmosphere for the light to bounce off (I used a smoke machine!).

[TOP: Playing around with different smoke densities BOTTOM: Finished scene

I learned quite a bit during the process of lighting these scenes, made lots of mistakes and stumbled upon a few happy accidents. I’m looking forward to future lighting challenges.