Copy Me Lighting Thread #21 - Re-creating Window Light

Michael Sewell

Michael Sewell

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Michael A. Sewell
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This was from a lighting course I ran a little while ago. The intention is to recreate a window light and infer a little drama.

It's actually taken in one of our room sets at the studio, and normally you would simply see the corridor beyond the window. So, with that in mind, let's start with the window light.

What you can see through the window is a large white Styrofoam board, or “flat”. It's used to reflect the light from a stripbox towards the window. Using the flat causes the light to be even, and means we didn't have to use the biggest softboxes of 6'x4', which would have been cumbersome in the corridor.

The stripbox was 2m tall by 30cm wide, nicely lighting the flat, which was stood upright at a 45-degree angle to the wall. This ensured that any of the window within the framed shot would be lit by the light, and would ultimately light our model accordingly.

The light was a 600Ws studio head, firing at 1/8th power.

I'm not worried about the slight overexposure on our models fingers along the edge of the curtain. The most important factor was to ensure the models face was lit correctly.

Frame right is a fill light, ensuring our model's left cheek didn't go to black. I used a 300Ws studio head mated to a 70x100cm softbox and placed about four feet away from her with an output of 1/16th

If you look to our model's hair, you can see a touch of highlight, basically stopping the back of her head from disappearing into the dark room. It was another 300Ws studio head, firing at ¼ through a gridded standard reflector. It was placed on a stand at a height of around seven feet and angled down towards our model.

I've just noticed the extra splash of light on the curtain, which clearly comes from our hair light. Bad form! As I should have noticed this, and either switched to a snoot or changed the angle of the head so it didn't hit the curtain to the same degree.

Very simple to recreate, but do watch for errant patches of light... ahem!

Nikon D4 1/200th sec ISO100 24-70mm f8
 
Interesting. When I've done this I've tended to use a standard reflector rather than a strip box, biased towards the top half of the board in an attempt to mimic the fact that the sun is overhead and the light source still above the model rather than on the same level. I suppose it depends on what sort of exterior light you're trying to simulate.
 
juggler said:
Interesting. When I've done this I've tended to use a standard reflector rather than a strip box, biased towards the top half of the board in an attempt to mimic the fact that the sun is overhead and the light source still above the model rather than on the same level. I suppose it depends on what sort of exterior light you're trying to simulate.
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Your approach is rather good to mimic sunlight, although you would also need to possibly tweak the white balance or gel the reflector to approximate the time of day etc.
When I've done the same, I've actually found it to be much more of a faff than it should have been, mainly because it's just far too easy to blow out the hotspot where the reflector is aimed at, leaving you with possibility of banding around it. Of course, it depends on how much post processing was had in mind or required.

I find the use of a flat and a large stripbox negates a lot of the challenges when using a standard reflector with a flat
 
pjm1 said:
This is an interesting one!

I'll confess I had a crazy idea to put a softbox flush against outside of a window so as to remove an obtrusive background... but this might work better.

Thanks for sharing, Michael.
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I have occasionally used the large softbox approach, and it does work. I just find the strip and flat gives a better result. At least in my own experience.
 
Interesting use of a strip box. I was idly eyeing them at the Photo Show on one of the stands and had not realised they came in quite a variety of widths.
Would you recommend any particular width for general use?
Do studios bother having a significant variety of widths and heights?
 
MidnightUK said:
Interesting use of a strip box. I was idly eyeing them at the Photo Show on one of the stands and had not realised they came in quite a variety of widths.
Would you recommend any particular width for general use?
Do studios bother having a significant variety of widths and heights?
Click to expand...

A lot are around the 30cm mark on the width, and not a great deal of variation beyond that other than two or three centimetres. A grid is a necessity, tbh.

I wouldn't say the studios bother to stock several widths, at least not the studios I am aware of.
We have a few different lengths
 
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