When I set out with the role of lighting the film, I thought it would be much easier than anticipated because our film is shot entirely with green screen. While it didn't take long to work out how to make the lighting work for the film, there were still a lot of technicalities to it. The most important aspect that I had to perfect were shadows. Shadows as well as the gradient of colour that the green screen was presented in. In order for the green screen to work perfectly, it was imperative that the green was a solid colour that the lighting didn't affect or else the green screen effect would not transfer properly.
I am glad that the green screen we used was a hard surface with no chance of creases because then we would have to deal with shadows blocking out certain parts of the screen. On the topic of shadows, it was important that there weren't any visible on the screen itself. There are a few on the actors however they don't carry over to the screen. When we first entered the room, the first thing I notice (as the production lights were off) was that there were two giant shadows across the screen and sought out the correct lighting to deal with this. It was a simple process as all we had to do switch on the two lights closest to the green screen. As there were only two actors, we were able to simplify the process even further by having them closest to the left (stage left) of the green screen and therefore have on light focusing on them from an above angle. The light is ahead of them and above them meaning that it almost acts as a spotlight.
Something I learnt and briefly mentioned before was how to light the actors and the screen. It's important to focus on them separately. I found it easier to light the green screen first as it required the most accessible and immediate lights and was simply a case of switching on the aforementioned lights. When working with the actors were more about making sure their shadows didn't get into shot. As I was one of the actors, I had to make sure everything was fine before stepping onto the green screen as having only one would be able to tell us how it looks.
Looking back on the footage, it looks like the lighting is fine although I feel that there could've been less shadows made my the actors' faces but, overall, the effect should work perfectly. However, upon reshooting in order to do some more close ups, there were a change of lighting arraignment that was out of my hands due to a previous project earlier in the same week. At first this was a good thing as the green screen was lit up for evenly and allowed the actors to work in the middle of the screen rather than be forced to the side. What didn't work out so well were the new shots themselves. They are significantly darker than the previous shots. There is now a switch between high-key and low-key lighting that looks jarring. However, we managed to incorporate this into the film as the low-key shots came in when the tone of the piece took a dark turn.
While not my first time with green screen, this is the first time that I've had to worry about how the behind the scenes aspect of it to make sure it looks fine and works properly. I would gladly use it again and had a very positive experience with it.
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