I am asking advise and bitching.
My goal is to have the full body talent in front of the green screen (actually a green wall and green floor). So I have been fooling around with this for the last few nights...placement of camera to avoid showing anything outside the green...while still trying to get the full body. Not an easy task I must say.
I finally found one place I can place the tripod where the full body can walk across the screen...now its the lights...I see shadows.
I have one 300 watt hd light on each side (These are the ones that don't get too hot which is why I like them though wattage is a lot lower).
I have another 300 watt facing the green wall ... on the floor that is out of view of the camera.
I have yet to place another 300watt lamp and a 700watt lamp someplace.
When I walk across the green with the three lights - the shawdow appears. The two sides are at 90degree angles but far apart (to allow room for the person to walk across the room). This is probably the problem.
Yikes.
This is going to take a while to get together.
Yes, you can't really light this kind of shot correctly with the equipment you have.
The key to a successful greenscreen shot is LARGE SOFT sources. It is very important that your green is lit evenly with units that aren't necessarily also lighting the talent. Talent lighting should be with additional soft sources.
The small sources you have are simply not giving you a large enough spread (not diffused enough either) so you will have shadows that you really want to avoid.
Truly for a head-to-toe shot, your green should be AT LEAST 15 feet wide and ten feet high with a cyc (curved wall) that extends the green onto the floor at least fifteen feet deep. That will help keep your talent far enough away from the wall to avoid having green spill back onto him. This means that your lighting for the green wall should either be from above (on a truss or grid) several feet back with additional soft lights overhead to light the floor.
If you have to light from the floor, then your units have to be at least ten to fifteen feet back from the wall and off to the sides, which means using larger units with large soft boxes (Chimeras) to diffuse the light. Something in the neighborhood of 2Ks minimum will help give you the spread you need, but know that the smaller the unit, the harder it will be to A) get enough light for a proper exposure and B) get the green lit evenly. Think bigger, softer.
Typically, KINOFLOs are used by the big shows to accomplish this and/or "coops" hung overhead (which are basically large softboxes with several 1K lamps inside).
This obviously will take quite a bit of power as well, which generally means running it all off a generator.
Now, assuming that you don't have access to any of that, the next best thing to do is shoot the green outside on an overcast day. The sun will light your green very evenly and the cloud cover will keep the lighting on your subject soft and diminish shadows falling on the green. Of course, this means finding a place suitable for shooting and paying attention to where the sun is and will be throughout your shoot. The last thing you want is shadows falling on the green. If you find a wall to paint or hang a large enough green onto, you'll of course have to put in some kind of hard surface for a green under the talent to walk on.
This isn't impossible, but it does take a fair amount of work and planning to do it right.
Good luck!
Brian Dzyak
Cameraman/Author
IATSE Local 600, SOC
http://www.whatireallywanttodo.com
http://www.realfilmcareer.com
Brian Dzyak
Cameraman/Author
IATSE Local 600, SOC
http://www.whatireallywanttodo.com
http://www.realfilmcareer.com
Yeah. I tested it out and the two lights I have facing the green wall left a great big 'hole' when I tried to key it out. You could see where the light was hitting.
..and the need to shoot a head to toe is now out..if I shoot indoors. I cann't do it without sacrifing the illusion. So as far as indoors is, I can shoot from the calf up and that works fine.
The worse part of the lighting were the two lights that I had hitting the wall and yes the spread wasn't enough which is why I could see two big circles when I tried to key it out.
I like the outdoor idea...but I would need to purchase equiptment for that...so I am going to try to figure out how to do it indoors.
I will try fooling around with the lights again.
It does take a lot of planning.
Out of curiosity I checked out green screen kits online. I cannot find any that have a 15ft width. They all seem to be 10ft by - whatever...but none with 15ft across..which is what I would want if I ever did it outdoors - for a person to walk across the entire screen.
Does anyone know where I can check for that size? Just out of curiosity if nothing else.
thanks.
You might consider just painting a wall or something, and then painting it back afterwards.
RJSchwarz
RJSchwarz
quote:
Originally posted by ccw
Out of curiosity I checked out green screen kits online. I cannot find any that have a 15ft width. They all seem to be 10ft by - whatever...but none with 15ft across..which is what I would want if I ever did it outdoors - for a person to walk across the entire screen.
Does anyone know where I can check for that size? Just out of curiosity if nothing else.
thanks.
Perhaps hanging a couple of these? http://www.filmtools.com/chkeygrsc10x.html
http://www.studiodepot.com/store/index.cgi?cmd=view_category&parent=1353&id=1366
Brian Dzyak
Cameraman/Author
IATSE Local 600, SOC
http://www.whatireallywanttodo.com
http://www.realfilmcareer.com
Brian Dzyak
Cameraman/Author
IATSE Local 600, SOC
http://www.whatireallywanttodo.com
http://www.realfilmcareer.com
