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- #21
Drew Mylrea
Well-known member
I had to learn lighting before I could shoot without lights. Once you've had experience playing with light and knowing what effects it will have on your image, shooting with natural light is like working with a very large immobile source - you adjust actors and camera around the sun / refracted sunlight instead of the other way around (I almost exclusively use it as a backlight).
However - if you've never had experience developing your eye (via playing with artificial light), chances are you'll just point and shoot with complete disregard as to how the light will effect your image and end up with half-baked jello. In my opinion it takes a very skilled cinematographer to achieve the diversity of light that a film demands in natural light.
Not that I am very skilled, as Johan said; these are just some home movies. Emmanuel Lubezki does it brilliantly in The New World (I heard Children of Men was mostly natural but it could be wishful thinking).
However - if you've never had experience developing your eye (via playing with artificial light), chances are you'll just point and shoot with complete disregard as to how the light will effect your image and end up with half-baked jello. In my opinion it takes a very skilled cinematographer to achieve the diversity of light that a film demands in natural light.
Not that I am very skilled, as Johan said; these are just some home movies. Emmanuel Lubezki does it brilliantly in The New World (I heard Children of Men was mostly natural but it could be wishful thinking).
