Lighting a cr@ppy, white studio

gorillaonabike · Oct 25, 2012

So I'm shooting a music vid - my first ever. The singer liked the test, learned a lot (and so did I...) and now we have a shoot. She is spending money hiring a small, cr@ppy studio with a few lights and I am bringing down my little redcaps.

The studio lights are photographic meaning they're probably 100w and consist of a softbox, something else a bit more powerful and something else (I don't exactly know but there are two lights). I have a couple of redcaps which are dimmable with have barn doors and a reflector / diffusor depending on how I set it up.

The studio is whitewashed and small. The group is a trio - guitar, bass and singer sitting on stools.

My gut reaction is to turn the room lights out, back light the trio diagonally from one side only and use the softbox and a second light to take the shadows out of the faces. I'd probably keep the lights as low as possible and shoot them looking 'cool.' I'd get them to wear simple clothes.

What I'm looking for is just a few ideas to light this and I'm open to all suggestions. Any ideas?

Lucky Hardwood · Oct 26, 2012

Key light the performers as you normally would. Set your exposure to their faces and over expose the hell out of the background. Keep the performers separated from the background and you will have people floating in an endless sea of white in the style of videos from the 60s and early 70s. You can use the clean back drop to add whatever you want behind them.

knightly · Oct 26, 2012

You can also use gels to light the background different colors as you see fit... gobos to break up the light patterns... lots of options here.

Adding some haze/fog to the room could lend some character to the light itself as well.

wheatgrinder · Oct 26, 2012

project some topical imagery on the walls.. phantasmagoria, old home movies, ASCII art ??

For tweakage, project or light a mirror in a shallow bath of water.. reflect onto wallls

gorillaonabike · Oct 26, 2012

Lucky Hardwood said:
Key light the performers as you normally would. Set your exposure to their faces and over expose the hell out of the background. Keep the performers separated from the background and you will have people floating in an endless sea of white in the style of videos from the 60s and early 70s. You can use the clean back drop to add whatever you want behind them.

I like! Thanks for the suggestions. Keep 'em coming. I really like them.

Lucky Hardwood · Oct 28, 2012

Alternately, you could light the crap out of the performers, using modifiers to light only the performers, and leave the background unlit. You then have the performers looking Robert Palmeresque over an endless black void. For this effect, you will want your performers to be as far away from the background as you can get them to maximize light falloff.

gorillaonabike · Oct 29, 2012

Lucky Hardwood said:
Alternately, you could light the crap out of the performers, using modifiers to light only the performers, and leave the background unlit. You then have the performers looking Robert Palmeresque over an endless black void. For this effect, you will want your performers to be as far away from the background as you can get them to maximize light falloff.

Light the talent, leave the walls unlit and shallow DoF to enhance the effect.

I like it!

Lucky Hardwood · Oct 31, 2012

You can also use cheap party lighting to create patterns on the walls of the studio. If you shoot cowboy or tighter, the lighting units can be placed between the performers which will keep the effects off of the performers and keep the units out of the shot. You can use various lighting types to give each of them a different background. You can use flags to give the lighting more separation.

Lucky Hardwood · Oct 31, 2012

You can also use a video projector to screen one of your own films behind the performers. Who knows, if the music video gets popular, you could generate interest in your movie, like how Matthew Sweet's video for "Girlfriend" boosted awareness of the anime "Cobra".