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Indoor lighting with tungsten lights ?

Hi everyone,

I'm planning a shoot next week. The scene is happening in the morning, in a hallway with some sunlight getting in through a big big window on one end. But it just won't be enough for the entire hallway and the scene really needs th entire lengh of it.

I can get as much 1kW tungsten lights (at least, I think it's tungsten. It's hot, heavy, harsh and warm) as I want but i'm not sure they will give a sunlight balance.

Anyone got any advice ? Is a blue gel enough ? What kind of blue I need to buy exactly ?
 
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CTB (Color Temperature Blue)... but don't balance it fully... we want to see some blue in the sun and some orange (CTO for blue sources) in the indoor lighting. It hints at the world subconsciously. Revel in the color :)
 
You use gel in front of the lights, like Knightly said, use CTB.

CTB comes in fractions or Full CTB. You won't want to go all the way like he said, but use a sheet of 1/4 or 1/2.

After the lights are gelled you'll white balance to 5600k or so, orvuse an outdoor setting.
 
Sure. The brain auto corrects for mixed light. So much time is spent looking for eliminating the differences in color in the lighting to match what we perceive once the brain has corrected for the color differences. The problem comes with the audience, now not having to have their brains make those corrections, feel the artifice of the lighting.

If you balance your camera to an outdoor source, adding just a touch of blue to it will make it sell as outdoor light rather than sanitary light better as the audience gets to process it into white light.

Now that you've got just a hint of blue in that source (generally by either adjusting the white balance slightly lower on the Kelvin scale, or by adding CTB gel to an already blue source to push it farther blue), gelling your indoor sources just shy of white (still slightly orange) will give the brain something to do there as well. This slight effort on the audience's part will help them imagine the rest fo the world outside the frame in a way that a perfectly balanced lighting scheme won't do.

Keeping alot of different gel options in your kit will make it easier to make this happen. I've got 1/4, 1/2, full CTB and CTO; several sheets of each so I can tweak the lights slightly and make more fine tuned adjustments. I have 2 of the "Master Location Lighting Gel Kits" from Lee (bought at filmtools.com). It's $50 or so per kit, but gives you so many options on set!
 
Oh, and your starting point is either the indoor or outdoor preset for WB on your camera. Pick whichever one you have the least control over and correct the other (generally the sun/windows on a lower budget).
 
the amount of light in your hallway is also something you need to think about, because if you blue up your lights you lose 1-2 stops worth of light. you could also instead of blueing the actual lights just cheat the white balance, by which i mean white balance your camera, with white paper or whatever and in front of the lens put a 1/2 or full CTO (colour temp orange) and look which will force the camera to add more blue.
 
With CTB, your 1k's become more like 250w-ers. 1/2 CTB can look nice, and you also don't lose as much light. Have a play around with both and see what you like best. I also sometimes like using 442 1/2 CTS or 103 Straw for indoor lighting looks because it's not as typically orange.

But, it really depends on what look you want - do you want it to look sunnier? Do you want it to look overcast? Do you want it to look like all the light is streaming in from the window, or do you want it to look like there are also lights on in the house?
 
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