you have one of those giant soft boxes but you need to shoot in a small space
how do you make that work in this video i'm going to show you how
i'm rafael and welcome to the channel where our goal is to always fix it in camera
and then finesse it in post and i always appreciate the early thumbs up because
large soft key lights are great for capturing beautiful images the goal with any shot in any
space is to lock in the best camera angle first typically the widest shot that you want to get and
then light it to make it look great and to adjust the shot only as a last resort if it's not working
but those situations are really rare in small rooms this can be tricky because some lighting
equipment is really big and can be hard to keep out of sight of the camera case in point
these soft boxes and light modifiers are essential gaffer gear and are great for shaping light and
creating large light sources or softer light and bigger reflections or catch lights in the eyes
which makes for beautiful pleasant images and when working in large open spaces or in studios there
are no issues set up the shots for the best angle and place the lights right where they need to be
though i found myself in many situations where i need to film in very small tight spaces and
still want to have depth in the shot and use large soft light sources for example interviews in small
offices or bedrooms no bigger than you see here many people don't actually know that these types
of light modifiers the soft boxes umbrella lights or other are relatively new in the video space
they were borrowed from the strobe photography space when continuous leds lights were introduced
they are fantastic they are light can compact pretty small to be easily portable and really
work well to shape light prior to this the heat from non-led video lights would set these types
of modifiers up in flames in a hot minute and for many people these are the first lights and
modifiers that they have owned and they're using them just have they've seen others use
them without really knowing the fundamentals of how the light is being shaped and why it's being
used the way it is sometimes the biggest light and the fanciest modifier is not the best solution for
your setup sometimes you have to think outside the light to achieve the best result i've been on
many sets where the cinematographer has ordered all these fancy lights but only ends up using
a handful that works in the situation typically these types of modifiers require lots of space to
set up and in small spaces we potentially have to make sacrifices in the shot either depth or
the lens choice so how do you achieve the look and feel of these large modifiers in a small space for
example if i was to set up that modifier in this room i could go with a wider angle to compensate
but not all people or shots work with wide angles so i've locked in the shot with a 24 millimeter
and i want to get the background to be a little bit out of focus to show off the set so i need as
much distance from the camera to the background if i was to set up the modifier as is it would force
me to move the camera forward or change the focal length of the lens ultimately changing the feeling
of the shot so those options are out but before we adjust the modifier let's see what the modifier is
actually doing to understand better what we need to recreate the light is being funneled through
the dome to the diffusion material this is where it's spread evenly and disperses in all directions
reducing the direct light rays coming from the light source without the diffusion we get very
hard light hard shadows and this is not very pleasant so just taking off the soft box and
pointing it at the subject is not an option either but it does reduce the space needed the key is to
make the light much softer remember the softer the light is the more pleasant it's going to be
so the next step to recreating that soft look and feel is to remove the modifier and point
the light at the wall especially if it's white or add a white bounce material and at this point it
can be anything as long as it's white like a bed sheet a shower curtain or one of those big fold
out reflectors or if you want to get fancy like me use a white sound blanket to serve two functions
to bounce the light and as a sound dampener for the room and if you see my auto pull video you'll
know how much i love them the sound blanket has grommets and i used bongo ties to mount it to the
autopole which is spread across the room a shower curtain has these exact same grommets so you can
mount it the same way or with the bed sheet or shower curtain you can use gaff tape to tape it
up to the wall temporarily this essentially puts the light source at the wall think of it like
mounting the light behind the wall expanding your space allowing you to use more of the room
for your shot some large soft boxes also use two diffusers one smaller one closer to the source and
one large one at the end of the softbox this is actually easy to recreate with a small piece of
the fusion that you can mount right to the light or in my case i use the aperture light dome mini 2
to soften light before it hits the bounce and this type of double diffusion really softens the
light and makes it even more pleasant as a light wrap and if you feel that there is too much light
spill in the room you can always shape the light by adding some black foam core to cut the light
from bouncing up onto the ceiling or around into the room this is the shape and funnel the light
where you need it to go i know it's not pretty off camera but we're working with small spaces here
as long as it looks great on camera then we're golden this also opens up to be able to do roger
deakins cove lighting that is used on some pretty huge movies where you can get some pretty soft big
light sources with a single light i love utilizing this when i can the beauty of this setup is you
can achieve this with pretty much any light that you have aperture nand light or any other this is
a technique that i've used over and over in many small spaces and it makes even small lights feel
large i've done this so many times for interviews where i've cross shot the light to the bounce
to make the light source much larger softening the light and creating a nice catch light
in the eyes and after this point you can add a hair light or fill light and craft the look
that you want but in small spaces you actually have many options to use big lights if you want
more lighting or camera related videos make sure you check out this playlist as always thanks for
watching give this video a big thumbs up subscribe i'm rafael i'll talk to you soon bye for now