I would shoot a day for night scene, but if the moon is bright enough for the camera to pick up light I would shoot at night.

H.A.

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Originally posted by Henry701

I would shoot a day for night scene, but if the moon is bright enough for the camera to pick up light I would shoot at night.

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Thanks. And yesterday as I was watching and episode of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and eating lunch, I thought they must be the master of "night shots" and I wonder if they shoot day for night or use lots of lights out at a dark/night location or what.

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If the sky is brighter than the ground, it's day for night :). That's by far the most obvious giveaway.

Of course if the sky isn't brighter that doesn't mean they shot at night, since they might just have replaced the sky.

Is your night time scene Int or Ext? In theproduction that I am preparingnow, theres an Ext night scene shot on a dark open park. So I'm sort of in the same position as you. I am thinking about shooting it in night vision. Its not really fitting with the rest of my film, how ever my audience will understand whats happening as most people understand the concept of night vision (If only from big Brother, Which is a bag S**T of by the way). Cleary.

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I would imagine a show like Buffy would shoot during the day (either day for night or inside a studio) simple because of the scheduling issues involved in cast and crew on a tight television schedule.

RJSchwarz
San Diego, CA

If you shoot day for night, be careful of shadows that scream 'this was shot under a bright sun'. Many old movies overlooked the obvious and you can see nice, crips shadows on a moonless night!

A

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Originally posted by alex whitmer

If you shoot day for night, be careful of shadows that scream 'this was shot under a bright sun'. Many old movies overlooked the obvious and you can see nice, crips shadows on a moonless night!

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Yup I read that in some book, warned of shooting day for night only when there is overcast cloudy weather (plenty of that where I live), the need to avoid shadows.

Independent Filmmaking.
Seeking to tell Hero's Journeys
http://borealpictures.com

Buffy used a real cemetary the first season or so, and used exterior lighting, which is why you can tell the lighting is pretty dark in the earlier episodes.

But every episode onward they shot in a studio with lights for the cemetary scenes. They shot them amazingly too, every shot looked as if the moon was just very bright that night.

By the way, if you need a real real cheap way to do day for night, sometimes I get pretty good effects packing on a few sunglasses over my camera lense.

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Originally posted by darkwolf416

Buffy used a real cemetary the first season or so, and used exterior lighting, which is why you can tell the lighting is pretty dark in the earlier episodes.

But every episode onward they shot in a studio with lights for the cemetary scenes. They shot them amazingly too, every shot looked as if the moon was just very bright that night.
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If I can carry over the technqiue from my 35mm fine art photography then the lighting method makes sense. I used to shoot a lot of 35mm nudes with a dark black background--well you can even make a white backdrop go black if you hit the model (actor in this case) with enough light, because then you need to stop down the exposure so much to compensate for the intense light on the model. Voila--the background goes black, *if* there was at least a 2 f-stops exposure difference (3 f-stops guaranteed) between the subject and the background. Perhaps less of an exposure difference is needed in film since we do not want the bg to go black, just appear darker, esp the sky, and post filtering with day for night will enhance the effect.

Independent Filmmaking.
Seeking to tell Hero's Journeys
http://borealpictures.com

nude? :p

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of course you can shoot at night!!!!!!!!!!!