Posted by Spex on 06/20/06 09:29

Reza wrote:
> I have selected a lake side location for a shooting a music video
> during the day time with my Canon XL2. I am having trouble getting
> good lighting condition and contrast because of bright sun and moving
> water. I would greatly appreciate advice from a professional dv
> cameraman. First of all I need to know what time of the day will be the
> ideal time to shoot the video. Does the sun need to be exactly behind
> me when I shoot? When I record my subject in front of the lake water,
> my subject appears to be dark (low contrast) while her background water
> and trees come very bright in the shot. I need to know how I can make
> my subject brighter along with the background. I also need to have
> footage around the trees at the lake. When I have my subject under the
> trees with a bright lake background, I again have the same problem, I
> am using built in ND filter and also tried reflector to have some
> shades on the subject. What are the golden rules of getting good
> contrast under bright sun?
>
With digital cinematography the golden rule is to reduce the dynamic
range of the scene as much as possible. Lighten the dark areas (shade)
or darken the lights.

Think of the sun as your keylight and your reflectors etc as the fill.
Sun behind you at an angle to the scene.

If your subject is under exposed in front of a bright background then
you have to think about lighting the subject either with reflectors or
electric lighting with appropriate daylight correction gels.

Plan for early to mid morning or mid afternoon to early evening as the
light will be less intense and will cast nice shadows. Avoid the middle
of the day if at all possible otherwise your scene will be rendered flat
and lifeless.

The light can change very quickly early morning and late afternoon so
you really only have a small window of opportunity of getting your shots
so planning ahead is the key.

Go here,

http://dvestore.com/theatre/index.html

and watch the "XL2 feature tour video" as it has some excellent
information on XL2 set up info. Lots of good info on lighting.

I found this while looking for info on the XL-H1 camera which sports a
similar setup.

[Back to original message]