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Revolutionising cinematic lighting
Aputure’s principal engineer Tim Kang explores the art and science of image-based lighting
L ighting effects based on where photos of a location could be used to match real-world lighting in a computer-generated scene. Doing that for live-action scenes became more common with the advent of virtual production (VP) – though even when there isn’t a giant video screen behind the action, image-based lighting can still find use where a scene might benefit from a complex, subtle play of light. Tim Kang is principal engineer for imaging applications at Aputure, and points out that VP represents a revolution in a field which goes back to the rear photographic images originally came from computer rendering, projection effects of films like Aliens – but the associated lighting techniques have wider application. “The thing to learn for the craft, in the normal ways that we work, is about using the world as a light source that’s not just a blank white
fixture. We’re recreating the dispersion patterns, the colour shifts, the differences real-world light has in our light source.” To date, image-based lighting has often involved a stack of technology that risked being a time sink, though advances in both technology and technique are starting to make things easier. Kang found an opportunity to put that into practice at a recent shoot for the University of Southern California. “The university had an Entertainment Technology Centre, shooting a short film every two years to demo technology. They sponsor a filmmaker with all the gear and support to do it. This year, they were in the Sony Studios lot, Stage 7, with their volume for all of February.” The set-up involved a sci-fi setting, which Kang calls ’an ice cave on Jupiter’s moon, Europa’. He elaborates: “They had a lighting environment simulating water: caustics and extending the effect of a
pool of water which did not exist on the set. Lights we used to simulate reflections of the actual environment, using the living environment that talked and was diegetically motivated for the story.” It was a spectacular testbed. “Steve Mangurten, chief lighting technician THE VIDEO LANGUAGE IS clearly defined WITH varying flavours ”
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