Question about lighting a room for video photography (1 Viewer)

[Ronald Epstein]

I have been putting my high definition camcorder to good
use as of late.

Been doing several product reviews on this forum, and
more recently, been videotaping friends who play in a band.


The problem I have is lighting. I always seem to be shooting

in rooms that have very little light.


What I need is a large (hopefully) single lighting system on

a tripod with a filter so that the light looks natural without

hot spots.


I know nothing about lighting, and something tells me that

this could get very expensive.


I am going to include a video I shot this weekend at a party

to give you an idea of the room size and the lack of lighting.

Can anyone recommend something fairly inexpensive but

highly effective to light up the room?


Thanks in advance.

 

[Citizen87645]

On-camera video lights have made some nice advances with the advent of LED lamps. This one by LitePanels gets some use by a wedding photographer I follow.


For the particular situation in your sample, I would apply a similar approach as I would with still photographs - creating soft, even lighting through bounced light. In this case, one or two of those living room torchiere lamps bounced off the ceiling would probably make a big difference to the overall light levels, as well as provide some accents around the room.


Raising the overall light levels in the room would also reduce the harsh contrast of those accent lights over the fireplace.

 

[Ronald Epstein]

Cameron,


Wow. That is expensive.


So that looks like it fits on top of the camcorder.


Was kind of looking for fixed lighting on a tripod. But I don't

know if that works better or not.


If placed on a camcorder, and as I move around the room,

will the light stay steady? By that, I mean I don't want any

movement shown in the light as I walk around or tilt the camera.

 

[Citizen87645]

I added some additional info in my post about a less expensive way to go. The other advantage of using readily available living room fixtures is it would not stick out as a "lighting setup" and would allow you to move around rather freely.


The primary issue would then be the white balance, depending on the color temperature of the lamps in the fixtures. As long as they are the same color temperature, there should be minimal issues. If you wind up shooting more in the day time, you'll also want to minimize the amount of daylight coming in through the windows, as that will be putting out much brighter and bluer light. Most cameras will have a hard time reconciling the difference between the outdoor and indoor color temps.

 

[Sam Posten]

Yup, expensive quickly. You think that strobes are expensive? Try video lighting. You have two choices; Hot lights (think incandencents like a drop light from Home Depot) or LED. LEDs are cool to the touch but not nearly the light output you'd want to light a whole room plus a single one of em overpowering a room would be like a cone of light, talk about harsh shadows. If you go for on board lighting there's really no way around the deer in a headlight look. Edit; remember that the BIGGER your light is (in area, not power!) the softer your shadows will be. A 'point' light will cast the harshest shadows, a big ole soft box will, no joke, give you softer light. Also, the further away your light is the softer it will be BUT Light radiates out and you lose half your output every time you double your distance. This is called the inverse square law. It hurts videography a million times worse than it does photography because you can't store up power in a capacitor and unleash it at precisely the split second you need it, you have to be constantly throwing light. http://www.scantips.com/lights/flashbasics.html http://www.thisweekinphoto.com/2011/understanding-the-inverse-square-law/ http://www.geofflawrence.com/inverse_square_law.html http://www.adorama.com/alc/article/8217 http://www.videomaker.com/article/14280/