DARK BY DESIGN Stills from True Detective: Night Country highlight the power of carefully balanced light and shadow; Julian White on- set (below)
EVERYBODY INITIALLY THINKS day- for-night SHOOTING IS A GOOD IDEA, BUT IT’S actually risky ”
That’s difficult in places like England, but better in locations such as California or Spain, where there’s less likelihood of rain or clouds. “You always shoot into the sun, so it’s always a backlight. Everything in front of it becomes backlit and thus goes into shadow. Your first challenge is to control both the backlight and the front light, continually balancing them.” Controlling the lighting may require employing neutral density (ND) filters to reduce the amount of light entering the camera, adding artificial light to mimic the look of nighttime, or both.
“Traditional black & white films would put a heavy ND on the lenses and then shoot,” explains White. “The problem is that, by reducing the overall stop so much, your actors will end up overexposed. And if you blast lights into their faces, it makes things difficult for them because they’ll be blinking.” Day-for-night shoots often have a cooler colour temperature, so adjusting the white-balance of the camera could help simulate nighttime. Since moonlight is often thought to have a blue hue, setting the temperature to 3200K can help sell the illusion. The look can also be
enhanced in post by adding elements such as stars. A common giveaway of ineffective day-for-night footage is the look of the shadows cast by performers and objects. Daytime and nighttime shadows look markedly different, and it can be quite difficult to replicate nighttime shadows during the day. “Back or side-lighting actors with the sun and closing down to prevent their hair from having that glamorous glow is a good place to start,” adds White. “Of course, you want to see the actors’ faces, so you’ll need to fill them. But this
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