Color Contrast Lighting | Advanced Cinematography Techniques

Hello, it's V from the A-Team, and today we're talking about color contrast. What is it? How do we use it? What is it used for? Let's find out. Hello, welcome to 4-Minute Film School. My name is Valentina V, I'm your new host, and I'm so excited because today, for my first episode, I have Brett Barbeno, who is a cinematographer and co-founder of ShareGrid. And for this first episode, we are talking about color contrast. Now, what is color contrast? So, color contrast is actually pretty simple. It's when you take two opposing colors on the color spectrum wheel, let's say yellow and blue, throw into a scene and create a more dynamic look with emotion and enhance your overall story. So, Brent, what are some reasons why we may want to use color contrast in our scenes? Most importantly, the first thing I always focus on or ask myself as a cinematographer, does it enhance my story? Does it lend itself to the script? The second thing is it really creates a dynamic look to your scene. And last, but certainly not least, sometimes it's a practical limitation. Sometimes you're on set and you've got a lot of daylight, and you've got tungsten lights at the same time. When I went to film school, we learned on film, and I remember learning that you had to stick to one color temp, which is not a rule at all. I think it's perfectly okay, and in fact, I embrace it now, to bring in different color temperatures. And so sometimes practical limitations isn't that bad of a thing. I feel like you have to know the rules to break them. Yes. And now that we know the rules, let's go break them. That's right. So here we are, first setup, this scary looking elevator that already has some lighting going on just in the studio. So we have a lot of daylight actually coming in from different areas that we couldn't control and we wanted to embrace. So we let that come in and kind of fill in the ambient of the room. But there's also a really kind of ugly, but cool looking tungsten bulb in the middle of the elevator. So this was a perfect scene to show a tungsten versus daylight color contrast scene. We put a Aputure 120D II with a Leco modifier, kind of up in the next level, shooting through. And we added full CTO on it and actually half plus green. There's a little bit of green paint somewhere in the elevator, and I kind of like that. It kind of gives it a grittier, real look. So we wanted to kind of give the light in there a little bit more of a green tint. Yeah, and the 120D, D stands for daylight. So of course you had to add the color temperature orange to make it warm. And then you added even more blue to the outside. So we actually had daylight balanced lights already, but they weren't really registering to blue on camera. And I really wanted to go opposite sides of the color spectrum for the scene. So we actually added full CTB to already daylight balanced lights. So we had a 120D II with a light dome. It's kind of like our overall key slash fill, kind of like an overall wash of daylight ambient. And then we also had a 300D bouncing into a V-flat, which kind of gave an overall ambient light to the scene. It was subtle, nothing too crazy. And we also put in a 300D, which we shaped. We kind of slashed it and gave it a cut kind of at the waist. We purposely didn't want it to hit our subject, and it really shaped the light and kind of gave it some dimension. And last but not least, we also used a hazer, which quickly escaped the open door in the scene. We wanted to kind of show the outside coming in. But when we did have the room filled with haze, it just gave it a little more atmosphere, which is always nice. It softens and lightens the contrast a little bit. So let's take a look at how you built that. All right, so now we're at our second setup. And what's the sort of vibe we're trying to evoke here? Yeah, this is kind of like a jazzy, smoky, classy, cloud kind of vibe. And I noticed that the red ones we didn't bring, they were actually here. So what are those red lights? Those are those happy little accidents that we get sometimes when you book stages. They have built-in RGB LEDs over the stage on the brick wall. So we kept them red to kind of just enhance that red brick look. So the opposite on the color wheel would be green, but you're not exactly using green. What's up with that? We tried. We tried green, but as I suspected, it kind of looked like we were doing a Christmas commercial. A strong green on skin tone isn't always the most appealing. So we took some liberties, and that's OK. You don't always have to go exact opposites on the color spectrum wheel. So we gave it a little bit of a teal look. Our key actually is a little bit more on the blue side, which is a little more appealing for skin tones, with just a hint of green, because then we wanted to match that to the back edge over here, which is a very strong green with just a hint of blue. So the key light has a very strong circle around it because that's kind of a spotlight look. And that's why you put the Leeko attachment on that 120D. Yes. To create that nice circular shadow and actually see it in the shot. So we actually have three Mini 20s. Two are on the wall with the same exact green teal light that we used on the backlight. It's just to kind of break up the wall so it's not too red overall, which gives the background a really nice dynamic contrast. We also used a Mini 20 as a back edge, but we actually kept it tungsten. We actually dimmed it down and made it like a warm tungsten light, which was kind of refreshing. Sometimes in a scene, if you stick to two colors, your palette can almost get a little too boring, a little too strong. So when you add another light, another color in there, you can kind of freshen it up. So we had little hints of tungsten throughout the scene. That rim light also pops the lead character out of the background a little bit nicer. And creates a little rim. And my favorite part about this was our foreground elements. We had martini glass and two candles that were lit, and they were backlit by Leeko, which was really nice. Gave it a nice little tungsten wash and actually flared the lens a little bit. So you got a little veiling flare as we dollied past it. And also the flame from the candles gave a nice warm glow, which is really beautiful. And I also liked how that tungsten light complemented the rim light on the subject. I thought that really tied it really nicely together. Thank you. I noticed that you were hazing the set. What does that do to the lighting? In this set in particular, we're on a stage as a jazz singer. It's very common to have a haze for a live performance. You get that kind of nice cone shape out of your key light or backlight, which we love to have. So we did it for that reason, but also it kind of softens the contrast sometimes in the image, which can create a more timeless look. So let's check out how you built that. So that was your episode on color contrast. Thanks for sticking with us. Once again, if you want to do color contrast, make sure that it fits the vibe of your entire production. That everywhere from the production design to the costuming to the makeup, it all sort of fits in the same palette. And make sure the colors complement each other. Make sure they're opposite of the color spectrum wheel. And for your next project, just think, why am I using this color? Why is it red? Why is it blue? Why does it make sense for my story and how I want to tell it? Speaking of your next project. How would you use color contrast on your next project? We want to know. Put your answer in the comments. And the best response gets an Aputure MW, which stands for waterproof, which is our new underwater LED light. I want one of those. So do I. Yeah. Big thanks to On The Mark Rentals. We actually rented our camera gear through them, through ShareGrid. Well, thank you, Brent. My name is Valentina V. Thank you for watching. Till next time.