How was Deep Focus achieved in film Noir and low light situations?

gibbo · Apr 23, 2012

Doesn anyone know how Deep Focus was achieved in the low light situations of a lot of the early film noir movies and other movies?

In particular, the high contrast low key lighting of film noir movies sometimes used only one key light but somehow managed to achieve deep focus (foreground midground and background in focus).

I'm struggling to understand how this was achieved, especially since technology then was not as advanced and not as good in low light. The only way I can think of with my limited knowledge is to open the aperture as wide as it will go and use an extremely wide angle lense and use the hyperfocal/infinity focus, but there is no distortion evident in the shots, I would think that they may use a more 'normal' focal length to minimise barrel distortion but that doesn't make sense because in some shots the foreground is very close, too close for infinity focus.

The the only other way I can think of would be to stop it right down to allow for deep DOF, but this isn't feesible as there isn't enough light to support that, and even if there were focusing on something that close might not have the deep focus effect.

A few reference shots:

Deep focus:
http://images.suite101.com/2791790_COM_kane_boy_window.jpg

Very low light but all in focus:
http://www.takegreatpictures.com/app/webroot/content/2010_images/2006/08/21/citizen_kane_5.jpg

Notice how close the glass is
http://www.takegreatpictures.com/app/webroot/content/2010_images/2006/08/21/citizen_kane_3.jpg

I would love to be able to use this technique at home and would make some shots so much easier!

So what am I missing? It's obviously something!

gibbo · May 9, 2012

Wow Scoopicman, thanks so much for your contribution!

Scoopicman said:
I'm also a fan of deep focus:

Living Room pic.

That's so cool! Can you tell what camera, lens and settings you used for the above shot? (ISO, Aperture, shutter etc) It looks pretty damn good.

We needed to transform my living room into a horror setting:

The girl in this video wanted to play an Elvira type of host, so in order to hide the normal surroundings I put a 1000 watt light on her from the front and then I hung a couple of scoop lights (Home Depot kind) right above her, to outline the couch. All that was left to do was to stop down the Iris, which made the background disappear. Here is the same room:

I can't believe that's the same room. Jeez lighting is so so so important, I always knew that lighting was important but I kind of had this idea that it was all about strictly lighting the subject and making them "pop" from the background with a back light.... but wow, you can seriously change the whole mood and feel of a scene.

I also liked what Chillpie was saying about night lighting. I've done the blue gel on a solitary 1000 watt light. (I say solitary, because I wanted light from just one direction - from the supposed moon.) The fog in this scene helps "carry" the light throughout.

Blue gel, without fog:

I'll tell you what, that above shots are lit, and are more believable, than 90% of the outdoor night time scenes in big budget movies I've seen... so many use a really strong light coming from just off screen and it looks fake and distracting. These are nice and believable. I guess big budget movies want everything to be exposed properly, are they too scared to have something over exposed and not in light properly? (Note: when I saw properly exposed I mean right in the middle, where 1 or 2 stops under would actually make it look better and more believable)

I also tried it without the blue gel. In this shot, I wanted the motivation to be the outside street lamp, coming into the window:

Night lighting is all about........shadows. Obscure your light with branches, barn doors, flags (could be a square piece of wood, clamped to a stand placed in front of the light), window blinds, etc. A light shining through a cracked open doorway, or closet door could be what you want. Shadows, shadows, shadows.

Awesome.... this is great. I can't wait to learn as much as I can about lighting and start playing with shadows and light, I would imagine this would separate my short films apart from the millions of others, even if it's just visually.

I just don't know where to start? Can you recommend a good place to start?

wheatgrinder · May 10, 2012

start with a camera, a light and a piece of blue gel.

Im not being flipant here.. Practice, practice, practice. Test your ideas. like I said, I have some outdoor shots coming up, do you know where Ill be Friday night? Not out to dinner, or a movie, but trying to light my driveway for a night time fight scene... when I was learning my musical instrument, we called this kinda practice.. "wood shedding"

Scoopicman · May 10, 2012

That's so cool! Can you tell what camera, lens and settings you used for the above shot? (ISO, Aperture, shutter etc) It looks pretty damn good.

I shot that 2 years ago, but the camera is a Panasonic HVX200 with the stock lens on Wide Angle. I usually use a slow shutter speed, like 1/24. The original HVX is a light hog, so the slow shutter will allow more light to come into the camera.

If I remember correctly, I used a soft box (diffusion) on a 1000 watt light, to fill the room. A softbox has white material for the light to shine through. This softens harsh light and spreads it out evenly. For "noir" type of shooting, I would recommend strong light and to use barn doors to help shape it.

I can't believe that's the same room. Jeez lighting is so so so important, I always knew that lighting was important but I kind of had this idea that it was all about strictly lighting the subject and making them "pop" from the background with a back light.... but wow, you can seriously change the whole mood and feel of a scene.

Yeah, that was a pretty dramatic change. With the girl on the couch, I used a 1000 watt light with barn door flaps. I didn't want to flood the couch or the background, so I closed used the barn doors and a "flag" to make sure the light was just on the girl.

I just don't know where to start? Can you recommend a good place to start?

Like wheatgrinder says, grab a camera and a light and start experimenting. Put a light outside a bedroom window. Gel sheets are available at Theatrical Lighting stores. You can use clothes pins to attach them to the flaps on the barn doors.

Most of those shots, above (the two blue exteriors and one interior night shot) were done using a single 1000 watt light, so practice should be fairly easy. There is also a book, Painting With Light, by John Alton that is an interesting read. It covers lighting for old films, but it's still very relevant.

Of course, you can add more lights (I ended up using 6 to light the dark house), but practice with the one first.

How was Deep Focus achieved in film Noir and low light situations?

gibbo

gibbo

wheatgrinder

Scoopicman