Let There Be Light!

I finally figured out what went wrong with the lighting we used in the car for our shoot last weekend. When I tested the light that we used, I tested it on myself in the house, with the light fairly close to my face. When we used it in the car for Kim, it was about 2 feet away instead of a few inches. Plus, it finally occured to me that I have very fair skin and blonde hair. Kim's skin is a much darker beige, plus she has dark hair. (I have discovered first hand why stand-ins need to have similar skin tones and hair colors!) Plus, as director, I also made the not-so-wise decision to allow her to wear a black shirt. Yeah. Note to self: Night shoots and black shirts DO NOT go together. Yeesh! Could I be any more blonde?

So tonight, I went out to my car wearing a black shirt, with a black scarf draped over my head to simulate Kim's hair--Yes, actors are completely nuts!--taped a piece of tin foil to the center of the steering wheel, and attempted to hold a flash light as if someone were in the back seat holding it while simultaneously filming myself to see what the lighting looked like. I was clever enough to get the tripod to stand in the passenger side of the car (don't know that I'd do that while the car was actually moving, however).

Turns out foil on the steering wheel looks like someone is holding a flashlight from the backseat shining it on the steering wheel. You couldn't actually see the foil with the camera angle I'll be using to film, but it did look like there was direct light on it. Plus the direct light was catching my shoulders, and I'm sure it would catch Kim's arm movements while she was driving.

So then I moved the foil to the front center of the dash board, over the radio. That worked better, although the flashlight will need to be held at just the right angle to keep light reflected on the face, but not completely light up the steering wheel in the lower corner of the frame.