Elsa rides the bus back to her dorm after an argument with her roommate.

We shot this on a bus in Roanoke.  For lighting, we used an $8 battery powered flourescent light just out of frame.  We did not have any room or power sources for other lights.

One of the first scenes in the film – Zach at a toga party. We used a 150 with a red gel (actually a transparent red page cover) for the back light. We used two background lights, coming from the left was a scoop with an orange gel. A 150 Lowell Pro light with a purple light was our background light on the right.  We wanted to give the party a very cliche college-movie feel to reflect Zach’s expectations and impressions of the party.

The lights we used:

Scoop: http://cybercollege.com/pix/scoop27.jpg – Just a bright bulb in a metal housing.

150 fresnel: 150 is the wattage of the light (its a small light), fresnel is the type of light (it has a lens which helps focus or defocus the light). http://www.leoscamera.com/Lighting/arri/150w_fresnel/01_arri_150_sb_r.jpg

China ball: http://novemberfilm.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/_mg_8658.jpg. A 150 or 200 watt bulb on a stick, very portable and soft.

Moving Car Interior. We shot this in a garage. Scoop with 60 watt bulb on dimmer with frost diffusion gels for key on the two actors in the back. We chose green because all of the street lights in Zach’s scenes (which are in a completely different location) are orange. This green is Aislynn’s color (the girl on the right) because it is energetic, enthusiastic and a bit too vivid and pushy. Red bulb behind back headrest for brake light. The green light is a 150 fresnel with a green gel on a C-stand that we rotated in circles over the car to achieve a street light effect. We also used a 150 for headlights that we swept across occasionally. I’ll post a clip of this, but I want to matte the background into the window behind them first.

In this scene the girlfriend (Elsa) confronts her roommate Aislynn. China ball to the left of the screen for key and a 150 with an orange gel for back light.

"You sure you're going to be okay?"

A heavy fog rolled in right before we shot giving us a beautiful background to light. 150 with a red gel (actually a red transparent page cover) for back light. China ball for key.

"Where are you headed?"

China ball for key, red gel on a 150 for back light. We’ve really found the china ball invaluable because of its portability and soft light. Here’s a picture of it: http://novemberfilm.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/_mg_8658.jpg. The ball was about $9 at Pier One. We had a photoflood bulb until our producer dropped it so we ran out and bought a 200 watt reveal bulb which still works great. The light socket and cord were $9 as well and just took a bit of soldering to put together. The pvc boom was $2. I taped a clothes hanger hook to the end to hang the ball from. The next shot is what we got using this set up.

"What's the matter shy boy?"

China ball again for key, this time on a dimmer; blue gelled 150 for back light. I really would have liked to see the background more here and we probably should have put our 650 down on the ground, but we didn’t want to bother anyone by hitting their house with the light at 1 a.m.

The first image shows our setup. You can compare it to our original plan in the second diagram.

For this scene, we stuck fairly close to the original set up. Because we did not have a 300 watt light, we used softbox on a 650 with a dimmer and an orange gel. She turns this light on when she enters like it was a lamp. We used an existing lamp in the room that had a flourescent bulb with a greenish cast as the bathroom light that illuminates the closet, rather than a scoop or a 150.

The other setup that we planned was when Elsa comes back to her dorm after arguing with her roommate. This is the image we got.

This is the set up we used. Compare this to the original plan in the second image.

We ended up scrapping the planned set up because we did not want to break up the emotional flow of the scene. The scene is the emotional climax of the movie and so we wanted to free our actor to run through the entire scene and really invest herself in the moment. So we decided to light the entire scene and follow the actor with the camera handheld. We found that it did not make sense for the walls to be blue and so abandoned the 300 fresnel pointed to the ceiling. We kept the faint key, but used a softbox on a 650 with a dimmer rather than a 150 with a frost. To light the beds in the second part of the room, we used some of the spill from the and then had a 150 with a blue gel for moon from the window to become a key when she sits on the bed.

Read more to see our plans for lighting the scene complete with diagrams.
This is a lighting diagram from the first establishing shot.

She will walk from the door turning on the first 300 then to the bed where she will drop her backpack and swim gear. The 150 has a blue gel to simulate outside night light coming through the curtains across the bed and her stuff. She’ll go to the closet to take of her hoodie and will turn on the scoop light to silhouette her. She will walk back to her stuff on the bed to get her books and then to the desk behind the couch around the wall. At that point, the camera will change to a close-up on her.

This is the first time we really see her in the film. I wanted to introduce her, what she does, and her room all in one shot. So I have the camera placed by the bed, framing her in a long shot at the door and then as a medium close-up when she reaches the bed. I want to quietly observe her world and let the audience attach to her without being distracted by cuts or camera movement. The dim regions of light should help create a mood of contemplation and being alone.

This second diagram is from the last scene we will be shooting. This is near the end of the script when Elsa returns from partying defeated and sad after arguing with her roommate about her boyfriend. She sits at her desk and calls one of her friends.

We will be shooting directly into a white wall unless we can come up with a better angle. Maybe rotating her so that we shoot back across the TV towards the couch and door would give a better background. Either way, we have a 300 watt Arri with a blue gel pointed up at the ceiling to cast blue light into the background. We have a flag on a C-Stand over her, to keep the blue light from hitting her skin tones. We will use a 150 fresnel with a frost or a 650 on a dimmer with a softbox to get a soft key on her face that drops off into shadow. This will bring her skin tones out in contrast to the blue background.

We’ve already gone to the location twice to look at our options, so I’m interested to see how closely we end up sticking to these diagrams. They are really just a starting point for us.

- Paul Hinson Director

What have I learned from the project?

• Delegate the work. You can’t do it all by yourself and thats why you get other crew members. Tell them exactly what you want and tell them when you need it completed by. They’ve expressed a will to help, don’t worry too much about making other people work, you just can’t do it all on your own.
• Know your script. Day 1 was an example of a lack of vision in some respects. Yes, I had storyboarded the script out and I had a pretty specific idea for the film, but I hadn’t adapted the visual idea to the new location which was slightly different from how I imaged it originally. Stick to the script and not the storyboards. Think about compositional shape, color scheme, focal point, etc and get creative. Sometimes you can get so hung up on it not looking exactly the way you see it in your head that you lose opportunities for an even better angle.
• This is probably the main thing in fact, roll with the script and hold loosely to the storyboards. This frees your attention to watching the actors and making sure their performance is exactly what you need. The more you know the script, the more you understand what visual coverage you need and the more relaxed you can be about deviating from plans to get it. In addition, knowing the script inside and out is essential to directing the actors, if you don’t know how you want to see something its not going to help them one bit. If you can’t quite get it right, just ask them to try something different and see what happens. Getting two different versions of the lines can help you triangulate exactly what you are looking for.
• If you are using two cameras, make absolutely sure your second camera operator knows exactly what shots you need and how you want it to look. Take a few minutes to go over it and see what they want to do.
• Start with your establishing shots and move into shots from one side of the action, medium and close-ups then switch to the other side. Simple enough, but try not to move the camera around much, it wastes a lot of time.
• Write out a schedule for the day before hand. You need to write on the script or make some notes on how you want to shoot each scene. Figure out the schedule and keep it with you at all times. This way when the day goes completely crazy you can come back to what you wrote before in a moment of sanity.
• Consider dividing the job of continuity person and assistant director. Let some one else take care of the schedule and making sure people are in the right place at the right time. Make sure you let them know exactly what you need and work very closely with them. Let them take care of the loose ends so you can focus on directing the actors and if you are using the camera getting the shot you want.