Ok for my final major i want part of the film to be set in zurich switzerland, now i cant transport actors there so have to get the shots myself, such as establishing shots snd shots that can be green screened, can anyone give me advice on getting green screen shots and also about travelling to a foreign country to get these shots.
Travelling to locations
- Thread starter Motorstorm
- Start date
Ya, look into stock footage. That might be an option.
If you ARE going out there yourself...you can grab some footage, why not. The question is, what are you going to do about lighting? Are you going to use all natural lighting? Will it need to match the lighting design of the rest of the film?
If the rest of your film uses natural lighting...you might be golden. If you are stylizing your light concepts...I hope you're bringing a friend along to help out.
One can light might not do it.
About the green screen...you can find many tutorials online about that. Good luck.
If you ARE going out there yourself...you can grab some footage, why not. The question is, what are you going to do about lighting? Are you going to use all natural lighting? Will it need to match the lighting design of the rest of the film?
If the rest of your film uses natural lighting...you might be golden. If you are stylizing your light concepts...I hope you're bringing a friend along to help out.
One can light might not do it.About the green screen...you can find many tutorials online about that. Good luck.
lighting is the main issue I've ever had with green screen. You can use all the fancy keying software you want (Keylight, Ultra, etc), but I learned the hardway you have to light evenly. As people stated above, you can use stock footage, but then you're not in control of lighting, which if you know how to color correction a little bit, you can actually bring down the lighting effect in your actors if you greenscreen. You can almost get it to look right, to the average viewer, they may not notice.
Of course none of our answers actually answer your question about filming in foreign countries. I'm sure someone here has filmed in other countries and had to get permits and stuff, but you might be able to pull off just being a "tourist" and get your shots, who knows? I've lived in Germany for 4 years and have traveled about Europe (never to Switzerland though) but for the most part, people are pretty indifferent to whatever you do so long as you don't cause a disturbance. I'd seriously look into stock footage and save yourself a lot of money- unless you're going to Switzerland for vacation anyway and filiming was a secondary purpose.
Of course none of our answers actually answer your question about filming in foreign countries. I'm sure someone here has filmed in other countries and had to get permits and stuff, but you might be able to pull off just being a "tourist" and get your shots, who knows? I've lived in Germany for 4 years and have traveled about Europe (never to Switzerland though) but for the most part, people are pretty indifferent to whatever you do so long as you don't cause a disturbance. I'd seriously look into stock footage and save yourself a lot of money- unless you're going to Switzerland for vacation anyway and filiming was a secondary purpose.
It's doable. There are a couple of films where we made sets in my backyard and passed them off as being on an alien planet. Green/blue screen stuff is okay, but consider doing composites. For instance, you might have a small setpiece that you can have actors in front of. Then you composite the background behind them. Much cleaner than keying. Here is an example:
Backyard set in Las Vegas
Same shot with composited background and set extension:
Backyard set in Las Vegas
Same shot with composited background and set extension:
Most of my film will use natural lighting anyway, not because im being lazy with lights, i can book out arris whenever but i want a more on location feel to it, and as for going to switzerland, getting stock footage is ok but at the end of the day on these websites anyone can download and put it in there film and also i need specific shots etc of a certain type of apartment block, and then i'll film the exerior in england, i may also be going to new york as part of a college trip soon anyway, and easyjet makes going to european countries much cheaper, but anyway i also want the experience of going there
Story bard so you know what you will need.
bring 2 stands with 2 markers each on them on location so you can match move to the camera (better resolution that way).
Then setup the green side to match the footage you've captured... bring another human on loction to see how the lighting should look on set (or stand in front of the camera yourself for reference and turn to see the light play off you.
bring 2 stands with 2 markers each on them on location so you can match move to the camera (better resolution that way).
Then setup the green side to match the footage you've captured... bring another human on loction to see how the lighting should look on set (or stand in front of the camera yourself for reference and turn to see the light play off you.
