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Can a scene shot in the day be edited to look like night?

Digital Root Films

Digital Root Films

I know, I worded the subject title beautifully didn't I ;)

Is there a way to edit a video, that was shot in broad daylight, to look like a night scene?

I have After Effects if I need that but I don't know how. Any help will be appreciated.

I may sound lazy, but the reason I would like to do this is because I don't have the lighting equipment to light a whole alleyway for a 1 minute scene.

Thanks! :D
 
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This is called "day for night" It usually looks pretty bad.
But you should give it a test. Shoot some footage in that
ally, download it into AE and play with the gamma levels
and color balance.
 
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Day for night tends to look pretty goofy, but it's been used a lot. Lots of lower budget kids' programming from many years back used it (like The Hardy Boys & Nancy Drew, who tended to do their investigations at "night".)

If you do it well, it's still noticeable... but passable.

I've read that the Ferris Wheel scene in Monster, towards the end of the flick, was done day for night - if that's true, then there are some wizards out there, 'cos that sure fooled me.

Try and avoid huge contrast levels when you shoot, such as having a dark alley & an expanse of white cloudy sky in the same shot. (If you do end up with this case, then you'll be wanting to learn how to use masks in After FX, to apply effects to only portions of your footage)

There was someone here (maybe two years ago?) who posted some sample footage of his street, and several people took a crack at turning it into day for night in post, and then posting their results. Forgot who that was, but that would be a good thread to find - if all the images & videos are still online, anyway.
 
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I would do the tutorial, but you can also try the AE ‘Moon Shadows’ preset
(Animation > Browse Presets > Image- Creative > “Colorize Moon Shadows”)
for something to play around with.

-Thanks-
 
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Either, I can't post edit a video, or AE is horrible at compositing a day for night clip.

It turned out HORRIBLE! I kept messing with it, but I either got a black screen, a (what looks like a) not very lit scene, or some kind of green/red/blue monster walking. (I used some on hand stock footage of my dad).

I understand what you guys are saying. I tried and tried but nothing. I will look into the AE tutorial tomorrow.

THanks!
 
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:D

Thank you, thank you :) I can say I have learned a lot from those guys at Film Riot. Ive been watching as much stuff as I can from them just to see if it sparks an idea I could try and use in my own film...Whenever I start it that is. :yes:
 
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if i remember correctly, Evil Dead had scenes like those. remember the car and the bridge at the end? im not sure if im remembering this right since i havent seen those movies in a while but i think that was a day for night shot.

just so u know what it looks like.
 
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