Lighting Workshop Two

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What We Did:

 During our second lighting workshop we looked at the different types of lighting and when we could use them:
-Naturalism- in a gritty drama.
-Pictorialism- this is similar to a painting style.
-High key and Low key.
-Subtractive- when light is taken away: for example using a canopy on a bright day.
-Additive- Adding light
-A direct source- when wanting to create hard lighting.
-Indirect source- when wanting to create soft lighting.
-Chiascurro- emphasises sharp light and shadows- Film Noir.

 During the workshop we created different lighting set ups in a team with a director telling us where they would like the lighting and what effects they want it to give off.  As the gaffer I was in charge of making sure the lighting was just as the director wanted it. The first thing that I did was collect any lighting that I thought we would need, as well as gels, diffusers and reflectors. Then I waited for the director to block the actors through what they would be doing because if they were moving about I needed to make sure that they were always lit. I had not considered this before however it saves lots of time and energy on set and was a tip from Ferg. Then once I knew the actors movement I started to move the lighting around the set to get the cold blue night sky effect the director was looking for. I used a blue gel which worked well as it gave the set a gloomy appearance and I bounced an LED light off a reflector behind the actors to make it look like the light from the moon. However something that I struggled with was dimming the light. The set was very bright and in the camera it appeared very bright, Therefore I moved the Tungsten back slightly and added a scrim which helped to dim it and the director was very happy with the final result. I then drew a small diagram of the setup of lighting so that if we needed to recreate it or take anymore shots we could easily create it again.

What Was Successful?

 The thing that was most successful was the lighting that i managed to create; I definitely surprised myself. I have always found lighting a little overwhelming as it's so new to me but I spoke to the director at the start and they briefed me on the effects they wanted. Then I looked at the different gels and started to slowly piece together how I was going to create this moonlight evening effect. I was really happy with how it came out and was very proud of myself when looking back at the shots that were taken. There were some hurdles to over come but I got there in the end.

 What Went Wrong?

 The first part that went a bit wrong was when I was first setting up the lighting. As I had only done it once before it took me a bit longer to remember how to get it all up but eventually I did get there. Then I struggled with getting the right intensity because the tungsten does not have a brightness control just a flood and spotlight option therefore to start with it was really bright which is not what I wanted so I used some scrims to help to tone it down a little. Then I used gels to add some colour. I had three lights set up and to begin with I added gels to all of them, this created a very colourful set which again is not what I wanted to I only ended up using a blue gel on the one tungsten light. As I said these were small hurdles but created a good learning curve because now I know what to do again in the future.

 Conclusion:

 In conclusion I learned a lot from this workshop as lighting is very knew to me and is always something that intimidated me a little, therefore being a gaffer and having to do it all on my own was such a great experience and learning curve and now I know that I can do it successfully on my own I look forward to doing it again in the future and even experimenting with it a little more. I have also said to the members of my group that I am happy to be the gaffer for our directions project if anyone needed help as I did really enjoy it. (update 20/2/2020- I ended up being the gaffer on two different productions which went really well and I really enjoyed it).




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