Mixed Lighting

[jd07]

I am shooting on 16mm a scene in a diner. I just got back from checking out the location and its set up with hanging lights that seem to be around 3200 mixed with the daylight that comes in through the window.

This is a student project so there is no budget really to correct for one or the other. I was thinking of just lighting with tug and letting the outside go cool. My concern is if I light with 3200k sources will the light from outside cause a blueish tint on my image? I don't mind if there is a very small hint that the average audience member wouldn't see but I am concerned if the daylight from outside will cause the inside look on the film to go blue.

 

[David Mullen ASC]

Yes, in 3200K, 5600K daylight looks blue, so anything lit by daylight will have a blue cast. Now often it's rather bright, so it's sort of a washed-out blue, but it's still blue.

Color temp mismatch is color temp mismatch, either you use it creatively for an effect or you minimize the problem by getting the lights closer to the same color temp.

You could always split the difference, balance halfway so your tungsten is a bit warm and your daylight is a bit cool, but they will still look like two different light sources.

Or you could try using daylight compact flos instead of tungsten bulbs in the fixtures.

 

[jd07]

Do the compact flo's have any green to them? Also if you do mix the color temps a bit and try to time the blue out, will that work? Or do you get into a situation where as you time the blue out you start changing the tungsten temp.

Thanks

 

[David Mullen ASC]

You time the blue out by shifting the image towards orange-yellow, so that doesn't get rid of the color temp difference, it just makes your tungsten lights look more orange.

The better daylight compact flos made for Lowell Rifa lights, etc. and whatnot only have a bit of green in them, not bad. But your general daylight compact flos from hardware stores are really more like Cool White in color, so are blue + green. Basically you want to find a daylight compact flo with a high CRI rating, above 90 hopefully.