DFN Beach

19th April 2006

Hi all...

I'm considering the possibility of shooting some day-for-night on a beach. I'm wondering if there are any obvious reasons I'm not realizing that this won't work. Any thoughts.

Roderick E. Stevens II
Az. D.P. (no beaches in Az.)
www.restevens.com
www.restevensart.com
www.12on12off.com

If it's a sunny beach then shadows will cause you a serious problem.

If it's not a sunny beach, why are you there?

Dominic Case
Atlab Australia

>I'm considering the possibility of shooting some day-for-night on a >beach.

I remember some good looking stuff in The Beach. That film also had some really bad looking day-for-night as well, so it's worth checking out for both.

Other than ND’s, no sky in the shots, shooting indoor stock outside without a filter, can't really think of anything specific.

I've heard by one professional to shoot mid-day, another to shoot at dusk. In any case, it tends to have a somewhat dreamlike look to it, so hopefully that works for the story.

Jim Eagan
NY editor/cameraman

>I'm considering the possibility of shooting some day-for-night on a >beach. I'm wondering if there are any obvious reasons I'm not realizing >that this won't work. Any thoughts.

Why would it not work??? Might be missing the obvious too but...1,5 to 2 stops under (more in post or in camera if you're feeling daring). I prefer to backlit as much as possible to build up edge and contrast and the reflections on the water pass off as moon. ND grads for good measure to kill the hot sky.

A few stills from a show I did 3-4 years ago shot around 1-2 PM. Not final but the Photoshop stills I used for discussions in colour timing. Windows do wonders for the sky. How else do you light up miles and miles of water/beach or whatever BG...plus accommodate a twisted schedule and, oh yes, with almost no money of course.

Cheers

Daniel Villeneuve, c.s.c.
Directeur-Photo/Director of Photography
Montréal, Canada
demo à / at : http://dvdp.ca

>. . .ND grads for good measure to kill the hot sky . . .

Don't forget to also use ND's (over all) to keep your stop as wide as it would be if you were shooting there at night.

David Perrault, CSC

>If it's a sunny beach then shadows will cause you a serious problem.

Hi David,

I don't get this at all, from my experience. Please clue me in to something I may have missed. Moonlight = hard hard light, just like the Sun. And unless you want to use some amazingly huge huge light(s) hanging from cranes ala 'Sleepy Hollow', the Sun is a pretty realistic option.

Do you mean that there will be too much reflection and you will see more than you would in moonlight? Surely a combination of increased contrast (via push-processing or through a DI/TK) and underexposure will help with this... Or do you mean the way that Sunlight reflects much more of the chroma in an image than moonlight? (Again there are methods to reduce saturation)

I live right next to the beach and with the full moon we have just had over the past couple of days, you can see an amazing amount of detail everywhere, and the shadows are very noticeable on the sand just as they would be in Sunlight. The main thing that would mislead is that you will have too much reflection on the sea and it will be too bright and the sky will be too bright also, and of course too much saturation compared with moonlight.

P.S. Moonlight isn't heavy blue, at best it is a little cool. Uncorrected tungsten film will look ugly and wrong, to my eye at least.

Benjamin Gregory Rood
DP/Dir
NZ

Firstly don't be embarrassed it's a good question. It's a matter of taste, some might think day for night stuff looks fake. The contrast in the sky is wrong, it's far too bright, the shadows are too hard. Sometimes it's not as simple as putting a ND grad on, for moving shots and portraits of people that wont work.

Having said that most of the night scenes on the boat in Jaws were DFN, and they're pretty good. There are several of day for night filters available, some blue, some more monochrome for a more silvery texture. If you were to go with vision 2 stock I would underexpose by at least 2 stops.

Your other option would be to shoot at dusk, you get a nice low contrast sky, but you only have 20 minutes to get the shots!

Daniel Bronks
DP
UK

Check out "Point Break"

The football on the beach scene and most of the night time surfing were
DFN...

Richard W. Gretzinger
Director of Photography
www.richgretz.com
USA

Have you considered trying a Variable Day for Night?

Best regards,

Will Harrison
Harrison & Harrison