BLOG QUESTION ADV: SETTING UP A LIGHT

1. What are three key important details when setting up a light properly?

2. What are the proper terms when instructing someone to change where the light is pointing?

Always use gloves to protect your hands from heat. Lock the knobs hand tight for easy striking, and add a sandbag to weigh the stand down. Make sure your cables are tidy, either taped down, close to the wall, or covered by a mat. Before you turn on the light, make sure you yell striking so people know to look away from the light. Some terms you should know when lighting are names of equipment. C47's = Clothespins used to pin gels to lights. When moving the light, there are 3 ways to direct someone into directing it: Tilt, pan, and stick, Tilt is tilting the head up and down, panning is moving the head left to right, and stick is lengthening or shortening the height of the head. When lengthening, always start with the top riser first. When sticking down, always have a hand on the riser before loosening and do it in reverse order. When turning off a light, call out saving so people know why a light source is being turned off.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: THE DIRECTION OF LIGHTING

1. What do you notice about front lighting? Top lighting? Side lighting?
2. What does the angle of your light have to do with your character and story?
3. How can you incorporate this in your film noir?

Front lighting is light that comes in front of the subject, relative to the camera. It can give your subject a flat appearance, since it eliminates any shadows on their face. The angle of your light brings depth to your image. Having light slightly above your subject's face, aka "beauty lighting", highlights the bone structure of their face and the shadows define their jawlines, cheeks, and hide their chin. Having light directly above them shining down, emphasizes these shadows quite a bit, giving them an intimidating or brooding look since their eyes are casted in the shadow, and since it is hiding some of their features. Under lighting your subject can also give it the same intimidating feel, for a similar reason, this time casting the shadows up their face. Having light 45 degrees relative to your camera will create shadows on the opposite side of your subject's face, defining their features but still keeping them relatively lit. Moving the light completely to the side gives a dramatic, mysterious look to your subject as one half of their faces is completely in the shadow. A back light is used to separate your subject from the background by highlighting the back of their heads. We can use all of these tactics in our film noir depending on the context of our scene. I think the most useful one we'll use is the side light and beauty light, since our noir is very focused on our main character who is going through a moral dilemma.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: LIGHTING THE HUMAN FACE

1. What do you notice about how the angle of lighting affects the human face?

2. Take a moment and pause the video in the article in different parts. What does the lighting do the ladies face at those angles?
3. How could you start using lighting angles intentionally in your future productions?

The angle of lighting plays a huge role in the emotion of their faces, despite them having the same expression. The lighting coming form the top of their faces, with the dark backgrounds gives them an intimidating, almost uncanny look, because of the harsh shadows. The daylight photos with the lighting filling in all parts of their faces gives them a softer, neutral and more welcoming look.  The lighting makes the lady's face appear darker, almost scarier. We can use lighting to show the true intentions of characters and establish their personality.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: USING FLAGS TO CONTROL SHADOW AND LIGHT

1. What are flags used for on set?

2. What are three key things you learned in the video that you can put to use when lighting?

Flags are used to direct or block lights on a set. Some things I learned are the different ways you can utilize flags to direct lights (blocking the top, bottom, or sides of them). Blocking the top of a light will keep the light on your subject but eliminate the light spilling onto the background. Blocking the bottom will remove light casting onto your subject and light their background, creating a harsh shadow on their face and giving the space above them light. Having flags on the side will allow you to remove spill from your light. There are also different sizes and types of flags that can be used for different scenarios. A floppy can be used for lighting and blocking light from a monitor, and there are different ways to hinge them. A cutter is useful for blocking out light in a shot that requires a longer cut. It also helps with light spill.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: REMBRANDT LIGHTING

1. What is Rembrandt lighting?

2. What is Chiaroscuro?
3. What is important to consider when you are trying to achieve low-key lighting?

Rembrandt lighting is a term used for low-key lighting. It's a lighting technique that produces a triangle underneath one of your subject's eyes. Chiaroscuro is the shadows in an image that fall onto your subject's face . It's important to consider these concepts when you are trying to achieve low-key lighting because they give your image depth and can enhance the features of your subject. It also makes your image more engaging and compelling to the audience. You want to consider the intensity you're trying to achieve, and you should utilize tools such as diffusion gels or flags to get the desired look you want. 

BLOG QUESTION ADV: CHIAROSCURO

In a detailed paragraph, explain what chiaroscuro is. How can it be used to create depth in the images you record? How can you put this into action going forward with your projects?

Chiaroscuro is a lighting technique that gives your images the illusion of depth. It can be used to give your subjects more dimension by separating them from the background and bringing attention to details of the subject, and it can also emphasize separation between objects in frame. I can put this into action in my projects, specifically our film noir, or even when I'm trying to use three point lighting to light a subject.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: FOOT CANDLES, LUX AND LUMENS

1. What is a lumen? What is a footcandle? What is Lux?

2. How do you think this could affect your understanding of lighting in the future?

Foot-candles are the unit of measurement for light intensity. A lumen is the standard unit of measuring visible light from a light source (e.g. a candle or lamp) . Lux is the unit of illuminance equal to 1 lumen per square meter. Understanding these concepts, especially as a DP can be helpful when figuring out how to light your scene, by telling you what distance to have your lights at to give the look you're striving for. By being able to use these concepts to help you measure and calculate how to set up your lights, you can save a lot of set up and configuration time.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: LIGHTING RATIO'S

In a detailed paragraph, please answer the following questions:
1. In your own words, explain what lighting ratios are.
2. What is high key lighting used for? What is low-key lighting used for?
3. How can you put this principle into effect with your film noir shoot?

Lighting ratio refers to the difference in the amount of light coming from your key light to your fill light. The higher the ratio (high key lighting), the higher the difference from the key and fill, the more dramatic and noir-like the image looks.  Low-key lighting is used to create flatter images, good for sitcoms. I can put this principle into effect for our film noir shoot, depending on the gravity and emotion of the scene that I want to convey. For more dramatic scenes, I'd use high-key lighting to enhance the contrast of the image. For scenes that have softer characters and that are more light-hearted, I can use low-key lighting.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: FILM NOIR SCENE LIGHTING

1. What are some issues you notice that the presenter runs into when lighting his scene?
2. What are three techniques he uses to make the image look more cinematic? How do they affect the shot?

Some issues that the presenter runs into while lighting his scene were too much brightness on the desk, reflection of light in his background, and the overall scene looking fake or like a film set. Some techniques he used to make his image look more cinematic includes dimming the main key light and widening his aperture to bring more attention to the desk lamp (motivated light),  shifting the main light to be more directed towards his subject, and physically blocking the reflection from the window. They affect the shot by creating a more immersive and cinematic look.

BLOG QUESTION ADV: FILM NOIR LIGHTING

In a detailed paragraph, explain three of the key concepts that the presenter says are important for film noir lighting. How does film noir lighting differ from lighting in other kinds of productions?

"Chiaroscuro" is another term for harsh lighting, an integral part of Film Noir and a technique used in paintings. Noirs use the "three point" lighting technique (even if they utilize more lights), the key light being the brightest, the fill light which is placed opposite of the fill light to fill in the shadows caused by the key light, and the back light which separates the subject from the background. The key and back light are the most prominent lights in film noir. Hard lights are used in film noir to give the harsh, contrasty look. Harsh lights can also be used in noirs, mostly for female characters. Other objects such as cookies or flags can be used to shape the shadows of lights (e.g. diecting lighting or giving the appearance of window shades).

BLOG QUESTION ADV: WHAT DEFINES A FILM NOIR P. 2

How did societal fears play into the storylines of film noir?

Since early Noirs took place in the 40's, WW2 was also happening at the same time. Many of these films involved the fear of war, a powerful unknown enemy, and spies. This added a lot of tension to the films. Noirs could also be very political and have themes revolving around corruption and authority. Noirs reflected the rational fears of the people at the time they came out.