Lighting Space.....Knights

December 11th, 2008

It's 7am and we're off to Ottawa this morning to shoot the last section of "Kardinal Sinners" wrestling show. I was at the office until 1am last night finishing things for other clients before we head out on the road. Not quite sure why im up writing a blog, but im having a little trouble sleeping.

I wanted to talk about lighting in this post. Recently Mark Hemmings and I went to FatKat Animation in Mirimachi, NB to shoot a series of 30 second commercials for their show "Space Knights".


From what I understand the show cartoon is about 4 'power ranger' type super heroes who are trying to save the world. But they aren't exactly politically correct superheroes....and one of them is gay and in a wheelchair...not that there is anything wrong with that! I just think its funny for a superhero. I guess that's why the show is a comedy.

So they wanted to shoot 4 public service announcements to help promote the show and had FatKat employee's dress up in the Space Knight costumes and act out the parts in live action.

It's so much fun to go up to FatKat. They have such a cool spot and always treat us so well. We seem to really connect well with them when we are there and the owner Gene Fowler always has time to welcome us and crack us up a thousand times over. Im glad we have formed such a good relationship, which such a talented and creative company.

It's always such a pleasure to shoot anything with Mark as well. I respect his abilities so much, especially when it comes to lighting. He just knows how to paint a scene so meticulously. Lighting is such a crucial part of shooting anything...whether is be photos, video or film, so setting up any shot with Mark is fascinating!

It took us about an hour and a half to set up this first scene. Below you will see how we did it.

They really wanted a nice warm feel to these first 2 scenes. So we brought a giant white bed sheet and suspended it from the roof to create the same effects of a giant soft box.




We then shinned 2, 300 watt and 2 500 watt lights directly down through the sheet. The result is a nice soft light that falls on the subject (as you can see in the picture at the top)

We then filled behind him with a 500 watt softbox with a blue gel. The blue gel is used to create the illusion that light is coming from the window. It gave us some really nice defined edges around the shoulders and top of the head.

We then used 2, 1000 watt lights you would buy at any hardware store and bounced them off the reflector to create a soft key light on the subject's face.

I then set up our Sony ex1 with the Letus extreme 35mm adapter. Used a 50mm f 1.4 nikon lens, which is near perfect! It gives such a perfect depth of feild...especially for this camera. I used 8 feet of track and set the camera up on our dolly. Our final image was lit perfectly. The Space Knight in the chair was clearly and softly defined. Because the chair was a darker red than his suit, the foreground was slightly darker than the subject. It made the image stand out even more and almost looked like there was a soft vingette in the bottom third of the picture. (that's me with the space helmet on!)






We headed down to the bar next and shot the final 2 commercials. One was of the space knight getting wasted in the bar talking about how to treat your woman.


Then we shot the green knight in the wheelchair in a janitors closet. Talking about how disappointed he is that he is always left behind. Mark again lit this beautifully. To top it all off he swung one our our lights from the ceiling to really give that storage closet effect. It turned out amazing!


Everyone was really pleased with the final images! We shot everything at 24p and FatKat is editing the footage and adding all the sound and voice overs in post.

It was actually really nice to only have to shoot something for a change and not have to edit it at all. It was a 17 hour day by the end of it for Mark and I....seems pretty good for 4 commercials, considering all the tear down and setup required. Hopefully I will be able to post some of the shots once FatKat is finished!

Cheers.