Lighting is one of the most critical links in cinematography creation. From the formation of portrait and scene lighting practices in early black and white silent films to the colorful light effects used extensively after the appearance of color films, movies of different periods have light and shadow effects that belong to the characteristics of their era.
This article will focus on the changes brought to the lightning of the movie due to the use of digital cameras, and experience the innovation from the lightning of the portrait and scenes in the movie.
Natural skin color
In portrait lighting, most digital movies inherit the lighting methods and concepts commonly used in film, based on the three-point lighting method, and determine the characteristics of the characters' lighting effects based on the overall style of the film.
The impact of using digital cameras on portrait lighting is still related to the performance of skin color. If the film already has the ability to show the skin color of a normal character, then by using the digital sensor to capture light and perceive colors, the skin color of a character can be presented more naturally.


The sensor of the digital camera can capture infrared light that cannot be perceived by the human eye. Some photographers deliberately use infrared light to light the characters to explore the influence on the face of the character under a new light source. " Cherry " (2021) is a film about suffering from post-war traumatic stress disorder. After Xie Ri returned to his girlfriend from the battlefield, his mental trauma made him begin to numb himself through drugs, and eventually destroyed his life.
In the video, Sheri and her girlfriend Emily Changes in the state and relationship between the two are the main line of the story. When the two just fell in love when they were young, the photographer tried to explore the subtle changes in the characters' facial features to express Emily's real emotional state.
used infrared light that can only be recognized by the camera to light her. Since human eyes could not recognize infrared at the shooting site, this effect can only be seen through the monitor to see Emily's face slightly red, so as to express her inner excitement at this time.


This infrared light brings unique expression to the face of a person's face, inseparable from the unique way of obtaining images in digital photography itself.
When talking about the expressiveness of digital cameras for skin tone, photographer Stephen Feberg once said: "The RED camera will capture many facial flaws when shooting faces, so when shooting, it is accustomed to using rebounding soft light or grille to soften the light source."
Although overall, there are not many essential differences between digital movies and film movies when lighting portraits, digital cameras have more advantages in expressing the subtle light and color changes of the character's face, providing convenience for the camera to capture the emotional changes of the characters.
From simulated night to real night
The development and changes related to scene lighting only involve the transformation between studio and real scene shooting, and how to light up the real scene at night has always been an important issue in cinematography lighting.

Night scene is an indispensable scene in many movie narratives, but because the illumination at night is usually very low, how to light up the actual night scene for a period of time has been a difficult problem. In the process of film development, creators are always trying various technical means to show the night scene, striving to find a balance between the limitations of technology and artistic creativity.
From film photography to digital photography, the lighting methods and effects of night scenes have also undergone tremendous changes.
1, simulate night color
Before the emergence of digital cameras, people usually used various photography techniques to simulate the impression of night scene effects.
In the early days of the birth of movies, colors are usually used to symbolize the night. Early black and white films had very low sensitivity, and night scenes were usually taken in full sunlight. When washing and printing films later, coloring was used to distinguish night scenes from sun scenes.

In terms of color selection, blue dye is usually used to color scenes that need to be presented as night. Indoor scenes illuminated by fire generally use red dye. This method of distinguishing scenes through coloring was widely used in the 1820s. Movies that are completely presented in black and white are rare.
With the introduction of sound, the coloring process began to become rare, part of which is because the dye used for coloring at that time would affect the recording of the sound signal by the film, resulting in poor quality of live recording.
The most important thing is that coloring is just a symbolic expression method for the characteristics of movie scenes, which is not consistent with the new standard of aesthetic realism established with the arrival of sound. After that, people turned to express night scenes through lighting, and various methods of simulating night scenes appeared.

In early black and white movies, the overall visual feeling of the night was mainly expressed by increasing the shadow range and light contrast in the picture.
When lighting objects or characters in the picture, it still reflects the "modelity" of the light. Most of the lights in the night scene are only used to brighten the outlines of the characters or scenery in the foreground, so as to separate the front and back scenes of the characters and the picture.
back scene will use various small lamps to create a sense of depth in the picture. At the same time, use soft light mirror in front of the lens to soften the overall picture to imitate the effect of moonlight.
In the movie "One Night of Romance", this method is used extensively to create a romantic night scene effect. The photographer used a frontal main light to illuminate Ellie to reduce the shadows of the character's face, making Ellie's face look softer, while the intense backlight provides highlights to the character's contours, and the use of soft light mirrors brings extra brilliance to the highlights.

This highlight can also soften the transition between the bright and dark parts of the picture, showing people's feelings about the main light in romantic nights. This method is the most commonly used night view lighting method in romantic romance dramas in the 1930s.
This night scene lighting method based on the effect of light shaping has been used in early color movies, mainly using light of different color temperatures to express the night.
In the night scene of " Gone with the Wind ", high-color temperature lights are usually used to simulate moonlight to outline the outline of the characters, and fill light with the same color temperature makes the picture soft. These early classic methods of night view lighting are still in use today.
In addition to using the light modeling to create a visual experience of night scenes, when shooting conditions are limited, we often use day and night to shoot outdoor scenes. During the shooting process, we need to use a photography filter to filter warm light and reduce exposure. When lighting, we must deliberately simulate the light feeling that only exists at night.


70s Before the age of the age, because the film's sensitivity was not enough to be exposed under general night scene illumination, a large number of color movies used this method to shoot night scenes. In " Musical Voice ", Julie uses the day and night shooting method when she leaves the mansion and walks to the lake.
Photographer arranged a row of high-power incandescent light bulbs opposite the lake to simulate it as lighting lamps in the park at night, and at the same time to improve the overall brightness of the picture as the basic light of the scene. These lamps are very powerful enough to overwhelm the original sunlight and can cast beautiful reflections on the water, giving a cool night feel.
In the later film washing process, the film is reduced by one level of exposure, making the particles in the picture more delicate and solid. Although the outline of the background Zhongshan can be seen in the picture, it also gives people the feeling that the story is happening under the moonlight.
This night scene shooting method has high requirements for the selection of early scenes and lighting, as well as exposure control during later film washing. If you accidentally shoot the white clouds on the sunny day into the picture during framing, or if the early picture is too bright and generates a lot of noise, it will affect the presentation of the night scene effect.

As the color film becomes more and more sensitive, it can be shot in real night, gradually forming a fixed night light method: use high-power dysprosium lamp or soft balloon lamp as the main light of the scene to simulate moonlight or sky light. Most artificial light sources in the picture use low-color warm colors to distinguish them from night.
In order to make the picture more profound and layered, smoke is usually released in the backlight scene and the smoke particles in the air are illuminated from the angle of backlight.
fundamentally, this method is to create the night view experience in people's minds through light, which is more of a "conceptual" night, which is very different from the real night in our lives. It was not until more and more movies began to shoot with digital cameras that the night scenes in the movie began to become different.

2, Real Night Color
The night scene in digital movies is different from the past. On the one hand, there are two main reasons why the night scene in digital movies are different from the past. On the one hand, the current movies now use logical light sources to avoid the artificial feeling of unfounded light sources.
On the other hand, the sensitivity of digital cameras to dark light provides technical convenience for the attempt to break the routine when shooting night scenes. Many film creators present dark nights different from previous by simplifying the large amount of artificial lighting in night scenes.
David Finch 's film " Zodiac " was one of the first many films taken with digital cameras at that time in Hollywood . The famous photographer Harris Savedes was the photography director.
The lighting style of the entire film follows the principles of nature and truth, and a large amount of illogical styling light is omitted.


video opens with a grand aerial shot of the National Day celebration, and then switches to a long horizontal shot taken from the car. The car passes through the dimly lit suburbs, and the bars being celebrated, children playing and fireworks adorn ordinary scenes. This opening shot quickly establishes the overall tone of the film related to the night. Most of the scenes in the picture are in the shadows, but also retains a lot of details.
When shooting, only a small tungsten filament light bulb was used in front of the house and in the garden as a logical light source for lighting. There was no light inside all the houses. When the lens movement ended, a 20k dysprosium lamp was placed on the left side of the camera to outline the edge of the entire scene.
There was no other light source other than that. When the couple drove the car to the uninhabited suburbs, they used an floodlight simulated street light to shoot the night scene inside the car, and another 10k dysprosium lamp was placed in the distance of the scene as the street light in the distance of the scene.

The large number of night scenes in the video simplified the traditional night scene lighting. The design of light sources is largely based on the existing light sources in the environment, maintaining the real feeling of night to the greatest extent.
" Hunting Bin Laden " is another film that has made the biggest breakthrough in the night scene effect in recent years. The film records the ten-year pursuit of bin Laden , as well as the secret hunting operation carried out in Pakistan in 2011. The shooting location and plot determine that the scene of the film will be in two extreme light effects:
One is the dazzling light of the sun scene in the Middle East, with a large number of highlights in the picture; the other is the night of the raid, without any extra ambient light, and the picture is extremely low.
In order to capture such a large dynamic range of light, photographer Greg Fleiser used an Alisa camera with a greater tolerance to shoot. When lighting for the raid night, two light boxes were hung on the scaffolding above the yard. 24 Kinoflo fluorescent tubes were placed in each light box, and the light was softened using a soft light cloth to imitate the dim top light under the moonlight at night, creating a "illusion of zero artificial light".

When entering the indoors from the yard, some small LED light sources and fire light are used as logical light sources to guide the audience's sight, and no other artificial lighting is used. In this way, the film presents a night scene effect completely different from day and night shooting or a large number of artificial light sources, giving people a real night viewing experience, which is impressive.
In addition to the above two films, the films such as "Borrowing a Knife to Kill", " Miami Storm " directed by Michael Mann , etc., all use the characteristics of digital cameras to be more sensitive to light at low illumination. When shooting night scenes, only use the existing light in the environment to shoot, and only fill light on the face when the actors are close-up shots to reduce noise, completely abandoning the previous concept of deliberately lighting the night scenes.
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