Question about lighting with direct sunlight, over powering outdoor light.

[Sergio Silva]

Around what wattage would I need in a light/lights to compete with sunlight? I wanted to shoot around ISO 200, with a high aperture (f/9-16), and a shutter speed that doesn't show light flicker, I also wanted to diffuse the light source as a key light. I have been looking at a lot of different available lights, but wasn't sure in continuous lighting what would work well with sunlight.

I searched around the forums but couldn't find any information that would help me make a final decision on which lights to try out.

Budget isn't an issue, portability would be nice.

 

[NateWeaver]

It all depends on what distance the light is from the subject, and what ratio you want to the sun, and how much you're diffusing it. That said, there is kinda a minimum practical size...which is probably a 1200 HMI PAR.

Joker 400 direct=probably 3-4 ft direct
1200PAR=6-10ft direct, somewhat spotted
2.4K PAR=10-12ft direct
etc etc

Remember that doubling the wattage can only give you another 50% in distance, not double the distance. Inverse square law.

If you're trying to overpower the sun by a stop or two, you need some big HMIs indeed, and would need to halve the distances I gave above.

 

[Nick Gardner]

To do what you are describing you are in 12-18k range. If you want to go harder and not diffuse it you could get away with a 6k fresnel, even through hampshire frost or opal. but not at asa 200 and a t 8.

Nick

 

[Chris Newman]

According to Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot-candle) "Full, unobstructed sunlight has an intensity of approximately 10,000 fc."

According to Mole-Richardson's spec sheet for their 4k HMI par (http://extranet.mole.com/store/images/backpage/6641-L.gif), it will provide 10,906 foot-candles with a spread width of 3.24 feet.

So, a 4k HMI par with no diffusion can match sunlight for a closeup shot. With diffusion and wider shots, you will need a lot more than that.

 

[Florian Stadler]

If you really want to overpower direct sunlight you will not find a portable solution, especially when diffused. 6k Par diffused will give you some shape in backlight but you'll have to go to something like a 100k or even 500k lumysys softsun to truly overpower direct sunlight with a soft source. Let me guess: you're used to flash photography?
On the portable side, small, hard beam a 800w Joe Leko is unbeatable.

 

[Sergio Silva]

Let me guess: you're used to flash photography?

Caught me, haha. I have been a photographer for a couple years, and have been shooting film for less than a year now.

All of my knowledge in lighting is in strobes not continuous light, so crossing over has its reeducation involved definitely.

 

[Tyler Black]

I just shot this scenario this weekend:

The camera is inside a screened-in porch on the back of a house. The shot starts looking out over the back yard at the fountain in the pond. We pick up female talent walking up the steps in the middle-ground (outside of the porch) and she climbs the steps, walks around the deck and opens the screened door to begin dialog with male lead who is sitting in a chair inside the porch.

The sky was patchy blue with mixed clouds about 3 hours before sunset. We were shooting directly toward the sun which had just ducked behind the chimney of the house for a few minutes. I metered the shot, but can't recall the reading. I do remember that with a .6 ND on the lens, my t-stop was 22 and the sky was JUST blowing the hottest parts of the clouds out. My talent inside the porch looked natural for being inside the porch... he might have been 2 stops under exposed.

The talent was lit with a 1200 HMI sitting about 8ft away. No diffusion and it was a freznel. And I was by no means trying to overpoer the sun... just trying to make it look as natural as possible with the instrument I had available.

Hopefully that will help estimate your situation, but the answers above are much more technically accurate. But I thought if you needed a real-world example this might help. Good luck.

 

[Joe G.]

Since no one mentioned reflectors, I will. That's my budget level at the present.

 

[Charles Angus]

On a sunny day, a mirror board will kick out a helluva lot of light, but it is fiddly (needs adjusting constantly to maintain the same effect as the sun moves.

 

[Tyler Black]

Yeah. I don't know what the percentage of light reflectance for a shiny board is, but it's a lot higher than a 1200 HMI on a sunny day. Anybody have any figures for this?

 

[Eileen Ryan]

Around what wattage would I need in a light/lights to compete with sunlight? ... I also wanted to diffuse the light source as a key light.....Budget isn't an issue, portability would be nice.

To do what you are describing you are in 12-18k range. If you want to go harder and not diffuse it you could get away with a 6k fresnel, even through hampshire frost or opal. but not at asa 200 and a t 8.

If, you pre-plan your shots you can get away with nothing more than a 12x12 overhead silk, and a 4k Par which you can run on one of the new modified Honda EU6500is gen-sets that provides a single 60Amps/120V circuit.

The trick is to shoot the establishing master shot when the sun in a position that offers the best modeling or effect. Then shoot the coverage under a full silk and/or when the sun has moved into a backlight position. Shooting under a silk offers a number of advantages. It takes the directionality out of the sun and knocks down the ambient level by two and half stops, which enables you use a smaller light to model your talent to mimic the direction of the sun in the establishing shot. The ideal situation is to wait to shoot the coverage until the sun has moved around to a back light position. When in this position, you are shooting into the shadowed side of the talent so a small light will have even more of a modeling effect. Shooting into talents down side under a silk, I find that a 4k Par through a diffusion frame is a sufficient key source for a two shot. And, if the sun does goes behind a cloud for a time, a 1.2 kw is usually sufficient to bring back the edge that was lost.

In this position, your background is also back-lit so it does not over expose because of the discrepancy in levels under the silk and outside the silk. Also, your background looks better because it is not flatly lit, but has some contrast. Finally, with the sun in a backlight position all the shadows of the silk frame and stands are thrown forward, which enables you to frame wider before picking up the shadow of the hardware.

An example of this approach is a scene I lit for a low budget feature that took place around a grill in a backyard surrounded by woods. We knew the scene was going to take all day to shoot because of its’ extensive dialogue, so we figured out where the sun was going to be throughout the day and where it would look best for our establishing wide shot. Where it was a two shot, mostly over the shoulder of one character talking to the second character who was standing with his back to the grill with the woods behind him, we decided to wait until the sun had moved into a near back light position. Surrounded on three sides by woods, we knew that we would lose the sun altogether at some point and would need lights. So we shot our close coverage first with nothing more than a 4k Par and 1.2k Par under a 20x silk. The 4k was heavily diffused and positioned so that it gave the talent the most attractive modeling. The 1.2kw was positioned where the sun would be when we would shoot the wide so that there was always an edge.

When the time came to shoot the establishing shot, the shadow of the overhead silk frame and stands were thrown forward and did not interfere with the wider framing. Since we were still shooting under the silk, we were wider open on the iris and so our exposure dug into the dark woods and brought out more detail. As an added bonus the smoke from the grill drifted into the woods, creating shafts of light where the sun broke through the tree canopy. What could easily have been a plainly lit scene, turned into a beautifully lit scene, and was accomplished without a lot of amps. The whole scene was lit with nothing more than a 4k and 1.2k Par and powered by nothing more than a 60A/120 circuit from a modified Honda EU6500is. If you can’t wait for the optimum sun position, the same modified generator will run a 6kw par that you can use to fill direct sun.

In fact, we shot a whole film on the Red with nothing more than a modified Honda EU6500is. A dual wattage 2.5/4k Par was our one big light. Not only did the Par configuration give us more output but it was also more versatile. When we needed a lot of light for day exteriors we lamped it with a 4k globe. When we didn’t need the punch of a 4k Par, like on a night exteriors, we swapped the 4kw globe for a 2.5kw globe giving us more power to run additional lights on the generator. When you consider that a Kino Flo Parabeam 400 uses only 2 Amps , the 15 Amps we saved by burning the smaller 2500W globe enabled us to power quite a few more Parabeam lights on the small generator.

For example, on night exteriors we ran a package consisting of a lighting package that consisted of a 2.5kw HMI Par, 1200, & 800 HMI Pars, a couple of Kino Flo ParaBeam 400s, a couple of ParaBeam 200s, and a Flat Head 80. Given the light sensitivity of the Red Camera, this was all the light we needed to light even large night exteriors. Use this link - www.screenlightandgrip.com/html/hdfilmstrip4lg.html - to see the final results, and get more detailed information on the lighting package we used along with more production stills from the movie.

Eileen Ryan, Boston Gaffer