Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Ask David Mullen ANYTHING

John Wee said:
David,

Thanks for the response, I am thinking about contrast control filters and maybe ambient filter? Also do you find the need of using 2 or 3 different types of diffusion filters in the same movie?
Click to expand...

Depends on why I am using diffusion and what affect I am trying to achieve. Some projects can call for a more varied style of diffusion, others you can keep it simple.

I don't really find much need for low-contrast filters beyond the contrast-lowering of the diffusion filter, but sometimes it is useful to have something that helps you match shots made on a hazy, smokey set, for example. For example, I usually carry a Smoque filter for shots where I can feel that the smoke is missing, like in a tight insert where you can't look through as much smoke as you did in the normal coverage.

Otherwise, I don't feel that with digital color-correction, you need to use things like low-con filters just to deal with contrasty day scenes, for example, because they don't add much extra detail in the shadows -- if you are shooting with a camera with a decent dynamic range, just playing with gamma in the color-correction is often enough to match shots better.
 
M.Halsell said:
With film, we had little choice about the visual presence or ascetics of silver salts, but do you think with digital we are moving toward a perceptually grain less viewing experience? What is your preference about the presence of or lack of noise?
Click to expand...


I think younger audiences used to digital photography don't mind that clean look -- basically we are all getting more and more used to seeing less grain. But that's a different issue from whether one can use grain or noise for artistic effect. For me, the choice is story and style based -- lacking a reason for an image with some noise/grain to it, I probably would tend to keep it minimal just as I did when shooting film, but if I can think of a reason to have some texture to the image, then I'm all for it.
 
Hi David, I have a shoot coming up that requires a shot of someone watching a b&w film, where the image is shown reflecting on their face. Other than projecting it directly or through some diffusion, do you have any experience in solving this in camera? Any pitfalls I should be aware of?
thanks in advance
 
A face wouldn't reflect an image sine it is not that reflective -- the eyes would, a pair of eyeglasses would, but you couldn't see an image as a reflection on human skin so I'm not sure what you mean. If you want to project an image over someone, yes, you can point a projector at them but it will naturally be a specular source. You could make a large frame of something thin like Opal or even thinner like Hampshire and get a mix of soft light and sharp light but if you need to read image details in the projected footage then it can't be too diffused.
 
I think you're asking about whether there is enough light to shoot a face by what bounces off of a theater screen -- it's borderline depending on the distance to the screen, the sensitivity of the camera, the speed of the lens, etc. If using a camera with an insane ISO rating, I'm sure it could be done, but for most cameras you'd have better luck if the movie being projected was a bright day scene and the person watching the movie was close to the screen, and you had a fast lens.
 
It's for a high class jewellery video, so pushing the ISO is out of the question. And it's a home sceen, so it might be no more reflective than a white wall. :-) While I do have f1.4 lenses it's not my favourite aperture for portraits.

The diffused projection route is the best one, IMHO.
 
Should a good DOP know how to light for Black and White?? Are photographing for 'black and white' vs 'colour' the same or different?

Thanks David!
 
Yes, it's a good skill to have in your pocket, who knows when you'll be asked to draw on it.

With b&w, you don't have colors to create separation, that's the main issue. So you have to use bright and dark tones to create separation, or bright edges against dark backgrounds or dark edges against bright backgrounds, etc. Second one is that generally people like b&w photography to have more contrast than color photography, though there are plenty of exceptions. Third is that with everything monochrome, the image is a bit more 2D so you need to increase a sense of depth -- mainly to make the subject stand out -- through light and shadow and/or depth of field.

A separate issue is whether a DP should know how to light in an old-fashioned hard-light Hollywood studio style, 30's-50's era, color or b&w. Again, I think it's a useful skill to draw on now and then.
 
Hi David,

I watched a tutorial video on getting rich cinematic blacks in your footage. The instructor said as a general rule best practice for rich blacks was to shoot low ISO in low light and higher ISO in brighter light. Does that sound right? It wasn't a great tutorial, and was kind of confusing. I can understand you'd want to shoot at low ISO in low light to keep the noise/grain under control. But what's the deal with shooting higher ISO in bright light? How does that help? What does that do?

Thanks!
 
Black level really is just where you set blacks in color-correction -- if your blacks are sitting at 0%, then they can't get any blacker, after that you are just crushing shadow detail by pushing some of it below 0%.

The trick is to get rich blacks without having shadows look artificially crushed, and that tends to involve lighting and exposing for good shadow detail, which gives you the flexibility to lower the black level in color-correction while retaining detail and low noise. So shooting at a lower ISO makes that a little easier by giving more signal to the shadows. But in bright daylight, you run the risk of clipped highlights, hence why you may want to use a higher ISO to protect them (plus a day exterior is more likely to be full of highlights rather than shadows). But there is no reason why using the higher ISO outdoors would help with your black level, just with your highlight retention.
 
Hello again David,

When you use smoke on interior location scenes, how do you prevent the smoke detectors from going off?

In the past I have simply covered the smoke detectors with a plastic bag used for covering hair,
but I am wondering how you prevent smoke detectors from going off.

Also, which smoke machine, or type of smoke, do you use, or prefer?
 
Yes, you cover them or unplug them.

I prefer the oil-based juice inside a haze maker (because it hangs a long time) rather than water-based juice inside a party smoke machine, but most locations today won't allow the oil-based stuff because it leaves a residue on things. So that leaves water-based fog juice in a haze maker as my favorite option.

No matter what, it's mostly about sealing the room from any drafts and then filling it evenly.
 
Thanks David,

What would you do if a director wanted to shoot a lot of interior residential locations scenes that are supposed to take place
at night, and need to look like they are shot at night, but this director does not want to shoot at night? And, this director also wants
beams of hard blue moonlight coming in through the windows.

I know this would be a lot easier to shot at night, but since it needs to be shot during the day, is there any affordable way to do it?

I keep thinking the only reasonable way is to basically black/opaque tent the outside of the house, or window areas, so that
the house in effect becomes like an interior studio shoot.

Have you ever had to do anything like this before?
 
Yes, tell the director that this requires a location that can have large black tents outside every window with moonlight coming into the room. If it's just a weak moonlight rake on some curtain sheers, etc. it can be a smaller tent with smaller lights, but if it is a moonlit room with the light sweeping across the whole room, then the lights have to be big and backed away from the window to get the fall-off to be correct, just like when lighting a day interior.
 
Thanks David,

Do you have any photos, or links to photos, that show this sort of exterior black tent setup and rigging?

Also, have you found any water based smoke etc. that does not set off smoke detectors?
 
You don't want to risk being shut down on the hope that whatever smoke you use won't set off a smoke detector. My feeling is that if you can see it in the air, it will probably set off the detector eventually. There are only two types of smoke -- oil-based or water-based -- and both have set off detectors in the past. I'm sure if you put more water/steam into the mixture, it will take longer to set off the detector but it will also not hang around for the length of a shot.

I can't think of any photos I've taken of a black tent around a house, I'm sure some grips have.

Keep in mind that a black tented house in daytime in the summer is an oven, you'll need an AC unit pumping cold air between takes into the room.
 
Thanks David. Your insight is very much appreciated.
 
Hi David, Bit of a technical question here.

Have you used the HIVE lights? I'm curious as to what your thoughts are on their output, and any problems you see with them? The only thing I really saw is that they can't spin 360 in the yoke. I'm also wondering if they would be an ok replacement for something like a 400 joleiko. I love using joleikos but i'm tired of how finicky they can be, and I find my gaffer always having to troubleshoot them, plus I love the idea of the variable color temperature as I find adding that hard sun spot on someone always is a challenge to find the correct color balance to make it feel REAL.

Anyway, have you used them or do you have any thoughts? Especially in terms of replacing joleikos.


Thanks so much.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top