I never thought we’d end up doing what we did for the second experiment for Assignment 4 of Film Light, but I’m so glad we did.
Our mission statement / what we set out to test was:
“To experiment with controlling and utilizing only natural and available light between two different colour temperature locations”
To expand on that further, we wanted to challenge ourselves with only being able to manipulate and work with the natural light sources within two different spaces with two different natural colour temperatures, that ending up being the blue light from the sun outside on the street, and the tungsten glow of the overhead lamps and defused sunlight of a windowed room.
This idea was born from the pre-existing group from Exercise 1, that being Chloe, Tash and I (with Jonah unable to be physically present but very much involved) pondering how and what we wanted to explore and create for our coming test. We were super stressed and dwindling our hope of ever finding a controllable space in RMIT, both in the case of light and sound, and no one had a car big enough to lug anything around to a home without it ending as disastrous as our last failed attempt. We were stumped. But, like an angel descending down from heaven, Robin came and saved us, throwing the most helpful wrench into our brainstorming cogs.
Why do you have to use electric lamps?
And then it hit us. What if we didn’t. Whilst we then and still now very much acknowledge the importance of being confident and understanding how to use artificial film light sources to create media, an arguably more important and impressive skill is being able to control and manipulate available light, because as we have first handedly discovered, there is not always going to be a convenient powerpoint available to you. You’ve got to work with what you have, and you’ll always have bounce boards, cutters and c-stands!
From there, as spoken about in a previous reflection, we thought of a location within minutes, felt a burst of creativity and played around with controlling the light, as seen below.
We felt more confident than ever!
We decided we wanted to shoot as soon as possible, get it out of the way so we weren’t stressed about getting it done as the date grew closer, and gave us time to reshoot if things didn’t work. We chose Tuesday the 8th to film, after class and before various other classes people had to attend, giving us around two and a half hours to do it.
We improvised a short script up just before shooting, and I donned the role as director, sorting everything out. Tash and Chloe graciously chose to act, and Jonah was on camera, but everyone helped out in any role they could, it was a really nice collaborative set!
Our shooting schedule was determined by location, with all shots in the inside of RMIT being shot first, and the street shots second. Setting up the first shot of Chloe against the blue couch was probably one of the most tricky shots of the whole shoot, just because we really didn’t know what was going to work, as everything was so over-exposed outside. We liked how the hair matched the furniture, and subtle production design choices like that are scattered throughout, which is something I’m really proud of. From there, we heavily diffused the overhead light above Chloe, used a cutter to block out the outside sunshine behind her, and used a bounce board and two c-stands to bounce light onto her face, to achieve full and comprehensive coverage. It looked professional!
After shooting all scenes there, we moved onto Tash entering the building, and talking to Chloe. For that, we again, deeply defused the overhead lights above her, but this time, used the fill of the outside light to bounce and light here, creating a nice fusion between the tungsten and blue colour temperatures. This shot required a few takes, as it proved difficult to keep her in the frame, and continually key and fill her from the bounce board. But again, we looked professional!
We then proceeded to shoot outside, which looked way less professional. Swanston street was manic! Luckily we found a nice corner away from the main sidewalk in which Tash could run through her first shot, and featured a similar colour and art theme as her raincoat. Aesthetically pleasing! We mainly experimented with exposure, as well as using a bounce board to fill, as there isn’t much a small amateur crew can do to control the sun.
We then moved to the sidewalk, which while crazy busy, had respect for the fact we were filming, and stayed out of direct frame. Similarly to our last shot, we mainly used the reflective surfaces of the buildings to light this one.
However, over both the inside and outside shots, the dialogue was unusable, due to uncontrollable city sounds and band practice, so I quickly went and rented a 360-degree mic and recorded both atmos and wild lines once we wrapped up filming. This was actually the first time I had ever done wild lines properly before, and was a really informative experience.
I volunteered to edit our Experiment 2 for Assignment 4, and it proved to be way more involved process than I initially thought. The main fear we had was the sequence of events not making sense, but after a rough cut, we were able to arrange the scenes in a way that felt like was clear continuity wise to us (and to the few external audience members I tested it on).
The main issue was the sound, and HOW unusable all the audio was, and how it meant I was going to have to fully create a soundscape. I actually really enjoyed this process, making a realistic atmos track through personally sourced audio and RMIT’s library of sound effects. The most tedious aspects of this were matching footsteps and some dialogue exchanges, in which the wild lines just wouldn’t naturally match. A very beneficial experience nevertheless!
Fortunately, the visuals aspect of the experiment didn’t need that much work done to it. Some minor colour grades here and there, but as we have discussed in class, the more effort and attention you put into lighting how you want it on set, the less you have to do in post!
See for yourself!
I’m really proud of how the final edit turned out overall. The story isn’t the most unique or engaging thing that’s ever existed, but it works well for what we intended. The shots match up relatively nicely, and besides some dead air in-between interactions, it’s all paced nicely. Personally, I am really proud of the soundscape. Besides some small inconsistencies with some footsteps that is really only noticeable if you look SUPER closely, it all seems authentic, and doesn’t detract from the visual components.
I like how different the colour temperatures are, and how they both evoke different moods. Now I know they’re both warm and cool lighting, but the blue of Tash’s scenes genuinely looks cold, and makes her urgency for the hangout’s shelter that much more believable. In contrast, the tungsten of the indoor shots feels much warmer and inviting than that of the outside.
I do think the outside light can sometimes be a tad bit over-exposed in some scenes. Subjects in the background can be a little overblown, and I wish we had been able to naturally get the inside to be a little warmer, so to really contrast between the two temperatures.
If I was to change anything about how we did Exercise 2 overall, I would have had us more prepared on a pre-production side. Whilst nothing went wrong because of not having it, a pre-prepared shotlist and shooting schedule would have definitely de-stressed and smoothened out the shoot overall, and probably made the shots turn out better. Furthermore, I would have more realistically suggested and incorporated actors into the scene, allowing all four of us to really focus on controlling the light whilst the scene played out.
Nevertheless, I’m exceptionally proud of the whole outcome of Exercise 2 of Assignment 4 of Film Light, and ever fortunate that I got to work with such lovely and talented people!