TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome to the Lights Film School video tutorial on lighting on the “upstage” side of the camera. As filmmakers you’ll often be looking for ways to add depth and dimension to your images. One way to do this is to “light on the upstage side of the camera” – meaning the side away from the camera. This will mean that your shadows will fall towards the camera rather than away from the camera.

Before we begin let’s take a look at how this concept is used in cinema. Here we have a subject that is looking camera left with the majority of the shadow falling “towards the camera”.

Generally actors won’t break the “4th wall” and look directly at the camera. This means that one side of their face will be closer to the camera than the other side. The angles will often be very subtle, but you’ll soon find that one side of their face will be closer than the other, with only a few exceptions. For the purpose of demonstration we’re exaggerating the contrast ratio on our subject’s face but If we wanted to avoid such dramatic lighting we could always bounce some of the light back on our subject by using a bounce board or even just throw a rim light on him like “this” to give a better exposure to the downstage side of his face.

There are multiple ways you can keep your shadows towards the camera. You can achieve this look by working with flags, subject placement or light placement. But let’s start with the easiest setup. Let’s imagine we have one primary light source: A window. Because your can’t move the sun or the position of the window, this means you need to think of ways to position your subject and your camera in a way that will keep your shadows “towards the camera”. In our case, because we’re shooting in a black box studio and don’t have access to the sun, we’re using a couple of 650 watt lights from our “Arri baby blue kit” to throw some light through our curtains.

As usual, before we begin we’d like to show you our lighting setup for this shot. So let’s take you behind the scenes to show you how we setup and lit this scene.

It’s a really simple setup. We’re just using 3 lights. 2 behind the curtain acting as our subject’s main key light and 1 practical lamp hanging from the ceiling to give light to our background and seating area. So before we bring out our subject let’s light this scene.

Here is a wide shot of the studio before it’s been lit. Now let’s go to black and start to build our lighting from the ground up.

At this point you can see we’ve turned the lights on behind the curtains. We’re going to be sitting our subject on the bed so this light acts as our “key light”. The fabric the light is passing through acts as a sort of diffusion which softens the light.

Now let’s turn on our practical lamp. Notice it’s not positioned properly. We’d like the light to catch some of the flower and vase in an upcoming scene so let’s quickly reposition it so it highlights a more specific part of the frame… There. That’s great.

So that’s our scene lit. As you can see it didn’t take much!

Now let’s sit our subject in the scene. Remember that his key light is coming from behind the curtain. Just so you can see how we’ve done that we’ll zoom out so you can see behind the back wall.

Okay, let’s get back on topic. Now that we have the subject in the scene we need to find a way to position him. Since we want him to have nice side lighting on his face let’s position him so one half of his face is positioned towards the key light and one half of his face is positioned away.

Now let’s give him some action. Okay, now he’s reading a book. So we have our light positioned, our subject positioned and now we need to position our camera. Let’s give this shot a try.

This is really not a bad shot. We have a nice contrast ratio on his face, we have a strong sense of depth and a simplified colour palette. It’s not bad and it’s a perfectly usable shot. But let’s change our position so that the shadows on the left side of his face are directed towards the camera rather than away from the camera.

I like this shot much more. We still have our simplified colour palette, a strong sense of depth and nice contrast ratio, but now we have shadows that are positioned towards the camera rather than away from the camera.

Here is a similar shot with a slight variation in framing.

And here you can see all of our shots compared side by side.

Again, there are many exceptions to this rule, but you’ll often find that keeping your shadows towards the camera will give your shot more depth and a more interesting sense of dimension.

TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome to the Lights Film School video tutorial on using flags. A cinematographer once said that “Great cinematography is not about knowing how to turn a light on, it’s about knowing how to shape and mould that light”. The intention of his video tutorial is to help you understand that shadow is light’s creative equivalent.

Let’s begin by talking about what flags are:

Flags are pieces of black duvetyne held together by metal frames. Flags are generally held up by c-stands in an effort to cut or shape light and provide “negative fill”.

It’s important to mention that when using c-stands you should first position your flag exactly as you want it with the c-stand joints loose. Then when your flag is ready, tighten the c-stand joints in order to secure the precise position of the flag. This will not only help you precisely establish where your shadows will fall, but it will also save you a lot of time during your setup.

Many independent filmmakers rather than using black fabric flags and c-stands, will instead use tripods, clamps and black foam core. A large piece of black foam core can be purchased from an art supply store for around $10-$15 and it will have essentially the same impact. In fact, virtually any opaque object can be used to flag light.

Where to position your flag?

Knowing how and where to position your flag is important. A flag that is positioned close to the surface the light is being project onto will appear dark with clearly defined shadows and edges. However, as the flag starts to move towards the light source the shadow will become slightly more diffused with softer edges.

Moving your flag.

Once you have your flag in position you can start controlling where your light falls by re-positioning your flag. Here we wanted our flag close to our light to give a soft shadow with gentle edges that “feather out”.

There are many applications for using flags but let’s discuss how we can use flags to control the spill of light while filmming a subject.

Notice how we have a subject in frame and we are moving the flag back and forth. You can see the impact this has on the image. However, it should be noted that it’s easier to control flagging different layers if there is a noticeable separation of depth. So let’s pull our subject off the wall a little bit… Much better. Here you can see how the flag impacts the image as we move it back and forth. The flag’s purpose is to help filmmakers highlight the parts of the frame that are most important to them while muting the areas that are less important or distracting. Picasso even said it himself when he stated that “Art is the elimination of the unnecessary.”

But now let’s start from scratch building a shot from the ground up.

We’ll begin by turning our overhead lights on so you can see the room before we start to design our light. Now let’s walk around the set so you can see how the flags are blocking the light. This flag, directly in front of us, is stopping the 1K zip light from hitting the back wall. And this other flag is going to be stopping the light from hitting our subject. Notice there is only the smallest sliver of light shining through as we move in front of the flags. Most of the light is being completely blocked. We can now manoeuvre these flags to shape the light to our liking.

let’s go to black.

Notice how these two flags stop all of the light being projected from the 1K zip light from hitting the background. Now let’s introduce our subject to the shot. As predicted, only a sliver of light is making it’s way though the flags.

Now let’s look at what happens when we open up the background flag. Notice it has no impact on the subject who is still only being lit by a small sliver of light.

If we open up the flag on the subject the following will result.

But now let’s block the light on our subject and our background again. At this point we’ll turn on a small practical background light. We’ll also open up the flag hitting the subject so a sliver of light comes through.

Because we’re getting closer to our final composition lets now also turn the rim light on.

Let’s walk around the studio again. Here is the flag flagging our actor. Watch what happens when we move it right to left. Notice it has no impact on the background.

Now let’s look at the other flag that’s stopping spill from hitting the background. Watch what happens when we open and close that flag. Again, notice this has no impact on our subject. Having this flag stop the spill of light from hitting the background allows us to keep our background darker giving us more contrast and a dramatic and moody look. When we open the flag up the composition becomes flatter.

So now let’s punch into our final framing. Let’s look one last time at the impact that the flags have now that our rim light, background light and our key light are all turned on. Here we move the flag controlling light on the subject back and forth. Again, notice this has no impact on our beautifully lit background. Now we can experiment by opening up the background flag a little bit… But it was nicer with a darker, richer background, so let’s put that back. And here you have it… your final shot!

The idea here is to think about lighting in terms of layers and depth. Light your background, middle-ground and foreground separately by using flags to help you control the spill of light.

TRANSCRIPT:

Welcome to the Lights Film School video tutorial on framing heights. In this video we’ll discuss the importance of properly cropping your subject within a frame. Three common mistakes filmmakers often make when framing a subject are:

1. They leave too much ‘room” above the subject’s head which creates “dead space”
2. They fail to leave enough room above the subject’s head “clipping” the top of their head with the top wall of the frame. While this may be advisable for some close-up shots, this is not advisable for medium or full shots.
3. They “cut off” or “amputate” their subject at the joints of their limbs.

Let’s start by looking at a full shot.

Notice how your entire subject fits nicely within the frame. A full shot is great for providing context as well as orienting your audience geographically within your world. The full shot allows more than one character to be in the frame at the same time and it’s wide enough to allow your characters to use body language to express themselves. Notice how a bit of room is left both below our subject’s feet and above his head.

Next we’ll look at the medium full shot.

This shot is similar to the full shot but instead of cropping below the feet we are making our first cut just above the subject’s knees. Notice there is still room above the subject’s head at the top of the frame.

Next we’ll look at the cowboy shot

Enough space is left below the waist of the subject so if they dropped their hands their wrists would not be cut off with the bottom wall of the shot. This is of course helpful for cowboys who need quick access to the guns in their holsters. In non-western films this shot is equally important for subjects who simply wish to put their arms down to their sides.

Next, we’ll look at a medium close shot

The medium close shot is a great shot when you want to include even less environment and gain more insight into the emotional state of your character. Small emotional nuances may start to register with this image size. That being said, this shot is still wide enough to fit multiple elements within the frame. This shot choice allows you to multitask the character’s emotional state with their body language while at the same time giving you the opportunity to include other characters, props or surroundings.

Next we have a close shot.

This is really one of the first shots when we’ve made the commitment to focus primarily on the emotional world of our character. Notice how in this shot we’re slightly clipping the top of his head with the top wall of the composition? Let us take a moment to fix that by ensuring that the top wall rides just a sliver above our subject’s head… Much better! The actor’s face is the main tool used to convey information when you’re in this close. As we continue to move closer to our actor his body can still communicate expressiveness, but it’s the actors face, and specifically his eyes, which start to become the centrepiece for these shots.

Punching in even closer we have the wide close up

Close up shots are used to gain access into the inner world of your characters. The top part of the frame usually rides just above the top of your character’s head while the bottom of the frame includes just a sliver of the arm as it starts falling off from the shoulder.

Let’s give our character a little bit of lead room which will give him some breathing room and help ensure that our frame has a more dramatic sense of balance… There we go.

Now let’s talk about the full close up.

This shot can be tricky since the framing can quickly become awkward if we loose the subject’s eyes or chin. As a general rule of thumb you want to keep the subject’s eyes in the top 2/3rds of the frame and you don’t want to clip the subject’s chin with the bottom frame of the composition. In this shot we’ve included a little bit of the subject’s shoulders and now we’re allowed to cut the top of his head with the top wall of the composition.

A medium close up.

A medium close up will punch in a little bit closer. Notice we start to loose more of the top of the subject’s head. His chin is also getting dangerously close to the bottom wall of the frame. The benefit to this shot is that it allows you to dig even deeper under the character’s skin to see what is beneath the words they are saying.

It should also be mentioned that budget minded Independent filmmakers often like tighter shots like this because they are cheaper and quicker to light.

Now let’s move into an extreme close up.

An extreme close up goes a step further and we allow the chin to dip below the bottom wall of the composition. In this shot we frame the bottom wall just below the subject’s lips This is as close as we can get into the inner world of a character before moving into macro close ups.

Macro close ups.

Macro close ups allow us to feature a particular part of the body. For example a wrist watch, as we can see in this case. This shot is common when a filmmaker is trying to punctuate a narrative point. For instance a character walking along the side of a desolate highway at night by the themselves might hear something moving in the bushes to the side of the road. The filmmaker in this case may decide to shoot a macro close up of the character’s ear to help “punctuate” the sound.

There are no absolute rules for framing heights. Many filmmakers will simplify framing height terminology by using only three loose terms: Full shot, medium shot and close up. The definition of some of these framing heights vary from set to set. So make sure you talk with your crew members beforehand to make sure you’re all on the same page.

Another type of voice over, employed by protagonists rather than omniscient narrators, is the type used commonly in hard-boiled film noir films. Here, the narrator, who is also the main character, punctuates the overall narrative by providing voiceover narration where he or she speaks directly to the audience.

As filmmaking and storytelling has evolved, both of these forms of voiceover narration have begun to feel antiquated. With writing instruction putting an emphasis on “showing not telling”, the idea of revealing important information through voiceover is at times now thought of as a cop out.

However, as we can see if we take a closer look, there are many exciting ways to use voiceover beyond providing plot points and story details to an audience.

What are some of the ways voiceover is employed that defy the traditional uses?

- Voiceover may be used as a way to detach dialogue from a particular image. This technique is used especially well in Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind.

In this technique, the writer uses voiceover to place lines that would have chronologically been spoken at a different place or time over an image in a separate one. In Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, this is used to create a tapestry of time and space. It’s used very subtly in the following clip after he says “I did”.

- Voiceover may be used to clue the viewer into the inner-monologue of a character whose thoughts we would otherwise not know. This is similar but more in-depth than the traditional form of VO used in film noir and is used a lot in the Showtime series Dexter. Here, the protagonist clues the viewer into his thoughts and intentions. This is a major contributing factor in making Dexter a relatable character, and giving the audiences the creepy sensation of being on the side of a serial killer.

Writers don’t need to shy away from voiceover even in its most traditional sense. As long as the voiceover benefits your story, it has the potential to be a compelling tool within a script.

By Lauren S. McGrail

Lights Film School has recently finished shooting an assortment of  incredible new video tutorials covering the topics of Cinematography and Design. We will be publishing these videos over the next few months on our blog and YouTube channel. Stay tuned!

Topics covered include:

1. Tonal range / shooting black and white video
2. Contrast ratios
3. Molding & shaping light / using flags and diffusion
4. Lighting for independent film
5. 1 point lighting / 2 point lighting / 3 point lighting / 4 point lighting
6. 180 degree rule / 30 degree rule
7. Framing heights
8. Types of light
9. Color temperature
10. Light direction
11. ISO & noise
12. Lenses & impact on the image
13. Color psychology & simplicity / color wheel
14. Camera movement
15. Wardrobe & styling for film
16. Depth / lighting the foreground, middle-ground and background
17. Designing & lighting a frame from the ground up (tying it all together!)

Lights Film School was recently fortunate enough to interview Thomas Wightman, the Director of the ambitious and breathtakingly beautiful 13 minute short film entitled “Outside”. The film was shot for a modest 2500 Pounds (roughly $4000 USD). Thomas was generous enough to share his creative and technical vision for this film with our blog readers. Below you’ll find his short film and our interview.

Tell us about where this story evolved from. How long were you working on this story before you decided to shoot it?

I spend a lot of time assembling different images from newspapers, magazines or off the Internet. Often I might find one image or read something that triggers a story. In this instance one series of photographs by Michael Wolf called the ‘Architecture of Density’ was the trigger.

Prior to making Outside I had made a series of films based around the creation of cities. I made them using animated stills that I had taken from different cities around the UK. In these films I was able to create different environments that would immerse the audience. Most of all I really wanted to do this on a larger scale.

Alongside this was my interest in technology and the increasing role it plays in our everyday lives. I was interested in looking at a future where technology has almost embedded itself into the environment and whose society has an over reliance on technology as an intermediary in human interaction.

Also unlike some sci fi films I didn’t want to create an unbelievable reality. I wanted something that was very tangible to the audience.

Overall we spent several months working on the story before we were ready to shoot. This coincided with location scouting and preparing for post-production.

Your opening shot is epic (above)! How much of that shot is real vs. digitally altered (is the building / structure real? is the flare real?)

The ground plate and the sky are real. These were filmed on Southport beach near Liverpool.

The structure itself exists, but not on the same scale. The building is the Park Hill Estate in Sheffield. We used still images, which were manipulated to create a cityscape on a larger scale.

The flare is not real sadly.

How did you accomplish the “fly by” movement at :44 seconds in? Is that a real location? What support system did you use for your camera here? What city was this filmed in?

I can’t draw so photography helps me realise every shot I want to achieve. We took hundreds of stills of the location prior to filming. Again using Compositing we were able to create an atrium on a denser scale. The camera movement is achieved using 3D Projection Mapping.

The shot at 1:03 (above) is beautiful. How are you lighting this shot? What types of lights are you using? How much of this is natural light?

We used natural light through the window and kino flos for a subtle fill in the room and a slight relighting of the woman was applied in the grade.

Your sound design is excellent. What microphones / mixers are you using?

We just used a standard shotgun mic (Sennheiser 416). The final sound mix done was done using protools.

Is that shot at :1:58 (above) using Foley sound or is that environmental sound? Also can you explain your lighting setup for that scene?

It’s all environmental sound.

For the lighting we diffused all the windows and used kino flo’s behind and above the actor to add highlights.

Referencing shot at 3:09 (above) – Many of your shots use symmetry, pattern or line as a primary design element. Can you explain your location scouting strategy and how you went about selecting the locations for your film.

When you have very little money and a high concept idea it forces you to be creative. This meant that location was going to be key in every scene. We spent possibly 2 or 3 days a month over a 5 month period driving around looking for the right locations.

We selected locations not only based on aesthetics but also practicality.

What lenses did you use to optimize for performance in low light environments?

We used a set of Zeiss Super Speeds Prime T1.3 Lenses. The set included 18, 25, 35, 50 and 85mm lenses.

What camera did you shoot on?

Red one camera

What did you use to edit the film?

I used Final Cut Pro on my iMac.

What did your lighting kit consist of?

Lighting

2k tungsten fresnel
1k tungsten fresnel
650 tungsten fresnel
22″ Springball 1 Kw
2 Kw In Line Dimmer
Boom Arm Stand with weights

2x Kino Flo 4′ 4 Bank System
2x Kino Flo 4′ Tube Tungsten 3200k
2x Kino Flo 4′ Tube Daylight 5500k

Mini flo Kit (Tungsten & Daylight)

19″ LED Ring Light Kit
or Gecko LED Ring Light Kit

100w Dedo light Kit

12v Dedo 4 Bank Ballast
Dedo 100w 12V Heads

Black Flag set
Net and double net set
5x C Stand Flagstands
5x Flag Arm
5x Flag Stand Knuckle 16mm
3x Trace Frames with diffusion
2x K Clamp
2x Cardellinni / Mathellini Clamps
2x Magic Arm (With K Clamp)
Pole cat long
Pole cat med
Pole cat short

Full CTB
Half CTB
1/4 CTB
Full CTO
Half CTO
1/4 CTO
0.3 ND
0.6 ND
0.9 ND
214 Full Tough Spun
215 1/2 Tough Spun

How much of your film was designed. How much cgi was used? Did you leave room for improvisation?

I designed and planned out every shot in the film. There are only 9 cgi shots in the film but all of these come from or include existing natural environments. I wanted all of these to fit within the environment we were creating.

How did you find the cast for the film?

Most of the cast was found through castingcallpro, apart from Maeve Rendle (The Apprentice) who we approached and asked to audition.

What were some of the bigger expenditures for this film? You’ve done a really great job of shooting a breathtaking short film on a small budget. But what ate up your budget the quickest?

Overall the equipment cost £1200, the petrol cost £700 and the rest was spent on feeding the cast and crew with a very small amount made available to the Art Department.

There is a very cool (i.e. blue), dark look to your film. Who did you keep that consistent throughout?

Most of the outside shots were done shooting day for night so they weren’t noisy and were graded down to match. We found that Red raw footage was great for manipulating in Post as long as you have a good exposure to start with.

For the grade we used Apple colour on a home built PC.

At 5:26 (above) what camera rig are you using to stabilize your shot?

This shot is actually handheld.

Referencing the shot at 8:44 (above) – Wow! That’s another incredibly epic shot. You’re very brave with the amount of space you bite off for your wide angle shots. Can you explain the details behind the shot for us? How did you edit it so you pulled out the highlights in the foreground a little more? How much of this was done “in camera” vs. how much of this was done in post?

The bottom half of the shot, including the character walking, was filmed as day for night on Southport beach using natural light.

The top half is a different sky plate, which we shot later but was graded to match.

The cityscape was created again using still images.

Thank you for taking the time to answer our questions Thomas. Please let us know about any future projects you’re working on. I’m sure our blog readers would love to continue to learn from you!

With the advent of a DSLR technology never before has stabilization been so important. Dollies, tripods, jibs, shoulder mounts and now the Z-Cage by Zacuto are necessary to help support a strong image.

Besides being able to support numerous ad-ons, this product also helps ensure that the camera operator and the Z-Cage itself absorb the shock of movement. This of course helps ensure that the movement in your final product will be as smooth and professional as possible.

The cost of the Z-Cage is just under $1000. We’ve seen it available for sale at the low end of the spectrum for the price of $870.