Another way to accentuate the sunset is by the use of graduated filters. Usually the neutral density graduates are used, but they come also in orange graduation for this purpose.
Richard Kline, ASC
I use graduated filters quite often in a sunset situation. More so than in a sunrise. It depends if there is a stratum of clouds. Then I have less need for any kind of filtration above. I also use color filters to enhance the sun. When you overexpose the sky to accommodate some objects in the foreground, you will lose all your color values, which I think you will want to retain. You can achieve it with graduated filters, neutral or color, to darken the sky.
Sunrise lasts only thirty seconds. There is the glow, then you start seeing it, and within thirty seconds the sun is up. And if there is no cloud formation, it is a blast of light. Sunsets last longer, although the last moment when it just goes behind the horizon is fast too. Sunsets seem to go slower. The latitude of the location has a big bearing on that. I was in Finland last year, doing a picture, and we had a long sunrise, I mean it lay there forever, and it was beautiful. In Africa and in California, it just comes and goes.
When shooting a sunrise or a sunset, it is all judgment of what you want to see. If it is only the sun and not the terrain, then expose just for the sun. But if you want to still see something in detail, then you have to expose for that and tone down the sun, if you can do it. For sunrise and sunset I like the soft blend in the middle of the graduated filter. Attenuators are better for some landscapes.
Unquestionably the most attractive light happens just after sunset, when the beautiful glow comes from an unrecognizable source. It is the so-called “magic hour,” which may last only fifteen minutes in California and a few hours in Sweden. Shooting at this time of day requires meticulous rehearsals and total concentration from everyone involved. As the light fades away, taking the 85 filter off extends the exposure for a short while. Finally, one may keep cutting down the frames per second. This gives more exposure but it also speeds up the movement in the frame. To counteract it, one has to instruct the actors to move slower and slower. Fading light will be changing its color characteristic, but these variations can be corrected by the timer in the lab or the colorist in the DI suite.
DAY-FOR-NIGHT
The technique of shooting night scenes during the day is one of the oldest tricks in Hollywood. There is no question that the most convincing night effects are shot at night proper. Yet there are some valid reasons to shoot day-for-night. The most obvious is the need to see deep into the background. In actual night shooting, it is usually too expensive and often not feasible to light too far back into the distance. Another good reason is to avoid the inconvenience of working at night. Both actors and crew get tired faster and the quality may suffer. And the producers do not like paying people at the higher rate.
There is general agreement among cinematographers that the most successful day-for-night effect is photographed during the magic hour of dusk. When lights are used, electricians should have a good assortment of scrims to cut down their intensity as the daylight fades away. Checking the brightness of the sky with a spot meter indicates the dusk changes and the necessary light adjustments to keep the relationship between the sky and the close-up illumination in constant balance.
On the other hand, if we need only one master shot of the scene and intend to do close-ups later in artificial light, then every subsequent take of this master shot does not have to match the previous one. Under these circumstances, as the sky light fades away we may want to add more fill light for the faces to keep the required exposure. Therefore, in such situations we may start with several scrims on the lamps, and then as the day gets darker we would take them off, to keep a constant light level on the faces.
James Wong Howe, ASC
When you are shooting in the city and do not want to lose the shape of the buildings, you can shoot dusk-for-night to obtain a more realistic night effect. You still have a dark sky, which you can darken even more with a neutral density graduated filter. Of course this filter will limit your camera movements a little. In color you can use a polarizing filter but it works only with certain angles to the sky and again, if you start panning, it will be visibly changing. Shots at dusk are limited to a very short period, so if it is possible, more than one camera should be used. This way you will get at the same time the long shot, the medium shot, and the close-up. Usually we start this type of shooting a little earlier than the “perfect” dusk and we shoot a few takes, first stopping the lens down a little more and perhaps putting an ND graduated filter over it. The next shot may be about perfect, so it should be the good one. But just to be on the safe side we will take another one, this time opening the lens a little more to compensate for the diminishing light. The close-range action will be a little “filled” with light, and the task is to capture the right relationship between the foreground and the background which is getting progressively darker as the dusk time continues.
Approaching the day-for-night situation, one should concentrate on the visual characteristics of moonlight. We observe that it is softer than sunlight and that objects do not seem as sharp as during the day. The main characteristic of night is the preponderance of dark areas. To obtain this effect during the day, we have to stage the scene in such a configuration that the sunlight comes as either a backlight or a cross light. For this we need the cooperation of the director and the production manager, so that proper scheduling can meet our requirements.
Silver reflectors can be very useful in day-for-night shooting to redirect the sunlight.
Richard Hart, gaffer
I worked with a cameraman a long time ago and I really liked his day-for-night stuff. He used mostly reflectors because there weren’t any lights bright enough to use in the daytime. He would use the lead side of the reflector and the effect was fabulous. You print it down and the light looks like night. He used a lot of neutrals on the lens, so you could open up and then just use tons of light from reflectors. At night you do not want depth of field; it is the biggest giveaway in the world.
The technique described here by Richard Hart characterizes day-for-night lighting well. The powerful amount of light on the foreground allows us to underexpose the background and still have the action area at a desirable level of illumination. At the same time we do not want to obtain the underexposure by stopping down the lens, as this would give us more depth of field, undesirable for the night effect. Instead, we use neutral density filters and keep the lens open. It all comes down to having the back- or cross-lit foreground against a dark background, and having a shallow depth of field. Together, all these elements give us the character of night.
After the light direction, next comes the problem of the sky. For all practical purposes it is much better when the sky is not visible. Therefore, elevating the camera or shooting against hills, mountains, or buildings whenever possible is the best way. But obviously there will be many scenes when the sky will occupy part of the frame. Polarizing filters will darken the sky, especially when the lighting comes from the side and when the sky is clear. Another filter for the job is the graduated one with neutral density in the upper part and clear glass below. The soft border dividing these two parts is matched with the horizon line. Finally, there is also an attenuator, a filter which changes neutral density very gradually from top to bottom. Unfortunately, all these filters limit camera movement. Polarization changes with the camera angle in relation to the sun, and graduated filters allow for a panoramic movement only if the horizon line is parallel to the frame line. As far as clouds are concerned, dark clouds will look darker when polarized, but white clouds will look whiter, so they should be avoided altogether.
Whether the sky is included in the frame or not, day-for-night effects require controlled underexposure. Cinematographers generally agree that the best results are achieved when underexposing two stops for the long shots and a stop and a quarter to a stop and a half for close-ups, so that we can see more details i
n the faces. Neutral density filter 0.6 cuts down the light by two stops, so it is convenient to use it without correcting an f/stop, to obtain the required underexposure.
One should generally pay more attention to the overall character of the night than to the clarity of the faces. Unless the facial details are very crucial, a more sketchy treatment better conveys the reality of the night.
On occasion a day-for-night situation will include a campfire. This is not an easy setup and it requires a well-shaded area.
Jordan Cronenweth, ASC
I am fond of shooting day-for-night in shadow. We once put the fire in among these trees where one could count on having shadow pretty much all day. We built the fire up so that it started to light the faces of the guys around the fire, and I shot it with an 81 EF filter so that it went a little bluer than normal. I underexposed it a stop and a half and I shot this whole sequence just like that. We had gas pipes underneath to make the fire brighter. You could see the fire on their faces, you could feel the fire, and the nice thing was that you could see all the trees in the background. But you don’t want to see the sky.
To control the day-for-night effect, it is important to be in charge of the timing. You will probably still want to print it down, so that the final print may be underexposed as much as three stops. Some cinematographers believe in starting with two and a half stops underexposure to have very little detail on the film to start with, and then printing it down another stop.
Cameramen differ in their perception of the bluishness of night. It is a theatrical convention that night is supposed to be bluish. In the day-for-night situation the easiest way to achieve blue light is to remove the 85 filter from the lens. The less blue-oriented cinematographers replace it with an 81 EF filter that can be considered only half as strong as 85 in its color correction. Of course any degree of bluishness can be introduced in the printing or in digital intermediate.
At the planning stage for the day-for-night scene, attention should be paid to the costumes the actors will be wearing. Bright colors tend to give away the illusion of night. As we all know, at night our color perception diminishes considerably. In day-for-night a blue shirt will remain blue, perhaps only darker due to underexposure.
NIGHT-FOR-NIGHT
In spite of the logistical and budgetary advantages of shooting night scenes during the day, day-for-night was never a very popular method among cinematographers. Today, when truly fast film emulsions and HD cameras are available, it is even more desirable to shoot night-for-night.
A brightly lit urban street constitutes a lighting situation well within the exposure range of present-day color negative stocks and HD cameras. With skillful lighting of the foreground scene, we are therefore able to utilize available light in the background and achieve a high degree of location realism. It is this character of night that makes night shooting so desirable if realism is what we are after.
The following remarks about street scenes at night were made by James Wong Howe many years ago, but in spite of the advances in lighting equipment and film emulsion since then, the basic principles are still the same.
James Wong Howe, ASC
In lighting streets I would have my lights coming from on high as if they were streetlamps. That at least would give me a kind of light source. I would use the three-fourths backlighting principle and fill in, with the soft front light, the people closer to the camera, leaving the more distant players in semisilhouette. This light direction is also good for buildings at night. In certain places I may hide a lamp behind a lamppost and use that pool of light. As for types of lights, the best are spotlights slightly flooded out and slightly diffused. They are better to control than big soft sources. Sometimes a bank of lights like a maxi brute can be used, but coming from an established direction of a streetlamp. If it is necessary, I add a little light in shop windows when I intend to shoot into them and there is not enough light. This can be done with photofloods.
When shooting night-for-night in the streets, some cameramen insist on wetting the pavement to gain light reflections from it. I would not do it unless the story calls for it. Of course sometimes you want rain for an effect to indicate, for instance, the comfortable feeling of a fireplace with burning wood while the rain is falling outside the window. It is similar to the situation when there is no wind outside, but the director insists that the tree branches move slightly to add a bit of movement in an otherwise static background.
Our main objectives in an exterior night scene are to preserve the night character of light and to create a feeling of depth. To achieve these objectives we need to scout locations at night and, if possible, do the prerigging preparation at night.
James Plannette, gaffer
The best time to scout is at night. Then you will see how it is and how much you have to enhance it. And with fast film now, it is just a case of picking up the foreground. The thing to watch out for now is not to overlight it, because when you overlight it, you lose all the “free stuff” that you have in the background. If you can make the farthest background that you see bright, then you get a lot of depth, and if somebody walks out of light, at least you see him in silhouette against the background.
Generally you would use three-fourths backlight and fill light ideally would come from a show card or Griffolyn. I would not underexpose the night. If you print down, your blacks are very rich. I don’t like lenses open more than f/2.3. Below that, focus is so shallow that it is distracting.
The lighting should follow the logical light sources, which in this case will be the streetlamps and the storefronts. You can adjust your lighting to the streetlights, you can overpower them, or you can cover them up.
Caleb Deschanel, ASC
Most of my ideas come from reality, from observing things. Using existing night streetlights, you end up with mostly low-pressure sodium vapor lamps. If they become pin sources and they burn out, it doesn’t make that much difference, but if they really become your sources of light, then you have to start adjusting everything around them. You can let them go and overpower them in the foreground. Sometimes you may go daylight instead of tungsten. If you want to, you can totally adjust to it, but unfortunately it is an incomplete spectrum, so you are really lacking in colors.
Richmond Aguilar, gaffer
The mercury vapor streetlights can be blacked out by simply covering them with a black cloth. They can be simulated by putting a Mighty-Mole on two risers behind the post, twenty-four feet up. You do not see them in the frame but it gives the effect of the lamp and the spread. On New York, New York we had a scene when a musician is playing a saxophone underneath a streetlamp. To help us out there with the effect on the sidewalk, we had the pool of light painted on the pavement.
You may also paint the street darker if the backlight is showing too much. As always, the more you can test in advance, the better.
Jordan Cronenweth, ASC
On the street I would test how the available light looks, and then I would attempt to light the scene with the available light sources appearing to do the lighting. And I would work with the director in staging, to maybe have some interesting neon sign in the background, so you have not only a light effect but one that has some of the environment in it in terms of color. And maybe establish some kind of overall ambient light, so that you see into some of the shadows. Ambient light comes from nowhere and everywhere. There is a reason for it. It not only looks good but you are letting the natural lighting do as much work as you can, so that hopefully you are buying the time to stay on schedule or to do something more unique somewhere else.
A street at night represents a rather high-contrast scene. To bring the brightness range closer to what the film emulsion can handle, we need to lower the excessive brightness of such elements as neons.
Haskell Wexler, ASC
On night exteriors in town one should be very careful not to overexpose the neons. If you do not wrap some net around it, it is likely to burn out to an extent that you cannot even read i
t. For night exterior shooting, one would often employ the fastest lenses on hand. The problem to watch out for, with the fast lenses, is the phenomenon of double headlights when the light kicks them from a certain angle. You can avoid it to a certain extent when shooting at night by not having any glass filters in front of the lens.
Another way to avoid double reflections in the lens is to use a special matte box that allows for the filters to be tilted.
Rodrigo Prieto, ASC
I did a lot of urban night exteriors on 8 Mile and recently on Biutiful. What I like is to incorporate street lighting, not only for the background but for the characters as well, so for example on 8 Mile, we actually had on the truck the (streetlight) cobra heads with sodium and with metal halide and some practicals with mercury vapor. On the actual streetlights we put no gels. I do a lot of testing always. A particular color that I don’t like very much on skin is sodium vapor color, so I try to come up with gels that simulate that color but won’t have the green-yellowish cast. I was using #013 straw tint combined with quarter plus green. I still feel it is a little too orange, so I still have to work on that. One gel that I use a lot to simulate metal halide is Lee Steel Green. That is my favorite gel. The gel itself looks pretty intense when you see it, but on a skin it is actually very subtle, it takes away magenta, the red of the skin, but it is not blue really and it doesn’t feel green either. It just feels desaturated. I like it very much so I used it a lot on 8 Mile for the foreground. I worked very closely with the art department on practical sodium metal halides. For smaller units in the background I used a lot of mercury vapor lights.
Film Lighting Page 29