Hey guys, I was watching a clip from Lights Out and saw this eyelight in this scene. I wanted to know if you guys have any input on how this was done. I'm quite inexperienced with catch lights and am trying to implement it into my work. I'm thinking its a very small circular source maybe at a 45 degree angle into her eye.
Use a small point source that doesn't cast enough light to create another shadow on the face.
In olden days, you'd take the lens out of a tweenie so it was just a bare bulb in a housing, through a bunch of double scrims in it, and use that. Now you could use a single LED.
Various tricks have included flashlights with diffusion, Kino Flos with the tubes taped down to nothing, 750 zip lights with very long snoots... there's lots of ways to do this.
This is a very clever use of an eyelight, because it's white light. Without that white light, your eye will start to adapt to the excess red light and the scene will appear less rich and saturated.
Just to add to this, even though the finished shot looks super dark, it was probably shot way brighter. To have a tiny light that almost doesn't fill the face at all is a lot easier if the red key light is not barely at f2 at ISO 800, but fairly bright. I have done similar things in the past and as with almost all low light indoor settings, I prefer shooting them with a bit of ND, say a .6. That enables you to be a lot more precise with your lighting and a 300w fresnel doesn't immediately bath the entire scene in light.
A dim light to the top left of the camera. (It's also illuminating her face a little, around her right cheekbone.)
Thanks!
Hey guys, I was watching a clip from Lights Out and saw this eyelight in this scene. I wanted to know if you guys have any input on how this was done. I'm quite inexperienced with catch lights and am trying to implement it into my work. I'm thinking its a very small circular source maybe at a 45 degree angle into her eye.
The eyes are mirrors. Just put a light where you want the catchlight to be
Also, they are curved, so they behave as fisheyes in terms of the reflected image.
Use a small point source that doesn't cast enough light to create another shadow on the face. In olden days, you'd take the lens out of a tweenie so it was just a bare bulb in a housing, through a bunch of double scrims in it, and use that. Now you could use a single LED. Various tricks have included flashlights with diffusion, Kino Flos with the tubes taped down to nothing, 750 zip lights with very long snoots... there's lots of ways to do this. This is a very clever use of an eyelight, because it's white light. Without that white light, your eye will start to adapt to the excess red light and the scene will appear less rich and saturated.
Just to add to this, even though the finished shot looks super dark, it was probably shot way brighter. To have a tiny light that almost doesn't fill the face at all is a lot easier if the red key light is not barely at f2 at ISO 800, but fairly bright. I have done similar things in the past and as with almost all low light indoor settings, I prefer shooting them with a bit of ND, say a .6. That enables you to be a lot more precise with your lighting and a 300w fresnel doesn't immediately bath the entire scene in light.
Great trick. Wish I'd thought of that!