lighting a scene revised

[Dhow101]

How would you light a coffee shop scene?

The scene takes places a night. You would not see any windows. The scene focuses on five to six individuals having a discussion around a circular table. The mood of the scene is a mixture of humor/philosophy. You see others in the background but the main focus is on these five to six indviduals. The scene has a slight inclination of foreshadowing. The scene as I picture it is medium to low lit. The format that it is going to be shot in is 35mm digital/high def.You would probably cut back and forth between each character talking to the rest of the group. It could possible be shot in a studio, so we have more control.

 

[David Mullen ASC]

When you say "35mm digital/hi-def", what does that mean? 35mm or maybe hi-def? Or 35mm transferred to hi-def?

The main thing about lighting night interiors is to decide where the sources are and if you can add your own. Most diners at night are lit overhead, a few with wall sconces; a restaurant may have table lamps. I say all of this because it affects which direction the faces are being lit from.

You want to find a diner that allows you some depth behind as many of the characters' close-ups as you can rather than have a flat wall right behind them.

Otherwise, the most realistic thing that would cover a conversation in a circle is an overhead soft light. The easiest thing would be to use a Chinese Lantern. Just warn your sound man because naturally he's going to want to wave a mic boom over the center of the table.

You can go with a higher or small lantern for the wider shots and then a bigger, lower lantern for the close-ups to get a softer light that comes into their eye sockets more.

Or you may be able to rig something like a Kinoflo or softbox over the table.

Skirt the light to reduce the spill into the background, and then light the far background more spottily or just use practical illumination.

If there was a chance of a colorful neon sign on the wall providing some colored edge lighting or something, that would be nice.

Now, you could find a way to light people from a lower direction, either by creating a source (fluorescent tubes along the wall above the booths, etc.) Something that looks like it could be part of the architecture / design of the diner.

A more extreme look would be to light a light-toned or white table top with an intense hard spotlight hitting the center and let the people be lit with an underexposed bounce back up into their faces. Their hands would be very hot under the light. You'd probably want to use a Source-4 or a narrow-spot ParCan or something like that to create a narrow hot spotlight on the table. You'd have to have a way of rigging it over the center of the table -- it won't be as lightweight as a Chinese Lantern.