hi i'm working on a new video where i want to create the effect that a man is standing in a room and working on a wall of pictures but you cannot see how large the room is. Im fliming this in a garage and i'm wondering if there is some sort of lighting technique that would allow the whole room to be dark enough that you can't see anything but the man and the wall, but i need to do this with a limited fund of cash also. thanks!
Maybe try focusing all the light on the one man and whatever picture he is doing...You could try creating a spotlight out of some 500 watt work lamps...Dunno if it'll work, but that's what I would try for a cheap fix.
alrighty thanks, i pretty much clueless when it comes to lighting so anything helps.
Try using close/tight shots. Ever see Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid? In the beginning when Butch is getting out of jail, you can't really tell how big his cell/the res of the jail is.
Let me know if that helps.
I am new to the film area, but a major player when it comes to watching movies. I have made a couple independent movies and ran into this problem before. Size and lighting can make or break each other. Have you seen Citizen Kane. Welles played tricks on the audience with making objects look big or even huge.
One trick is film objects like the wall and the man, separately and up close. Use a three point lighting scale on the man and the wall, direct it towards the center of your action. Then film the environment, your garage in the dark with the same lighting, but farther away from the man. (I hope this makes sense.) In post editing, you can combine the images and hopefully your size will transfer properly. Watch Lord of the Rings. Gimli is a dwarf, but Jon Rys davies is like 6 foot tall. so, they filmed him separately. This is just an idea.
One technique you might keep in mind is using a post-production Levels filter. Most video editing packages have an Adjust > Levels (FCP, Premiere, After Effects, etc.). The Levels allows you to set the lowest, middle, and highest light levels of your scene.
For your needs, you might shoot your scene with a spotlight on the actor However, when you examine the footage, the dim edges of the wall are visible -- ruining the illusion of a vast wall. If you could make everything from a certain level of gray and darker appearred black, that would solve the problem. This technique is known as crushing the blacks.
The Levels filter allows you to set the Input Black and the Output Black. So if you set the Input Black level at 50 (normally 0) and leave the Output Black at 0, everything in the image with a light level of 50 or under gets set to 0. The poorly lit background will disappear into the blackness!
Be aware that this filter will affect the whole image, so your footage will appear more contrasty (often desirable in art films). You?ll have to do some tests and see if the footage will appear as you want.
Dan Rahmel
Author: "Nuts and Bolts Filmmaking"
http://www.cvisual.com
