USING WINDOW FILM FOR FILM, VIDEO, AND PHOTOGRAPHY SHOOTS

The human eye is a remarkable thing. With your eye and brain working in concert, you will perceive colors in their true form regardless of the lighting around you (provided there is enough light to see colors at all, of course). A clean white piece of paper will look white to you whether you are holding it in a sunlit field, are out on a dark, cloudy day, or whether the paper is sitting on the desk of an office lit by fluorescent lights or on a kitchen table lit by warm incandescent bulbs. In each scenario, the paper is reflecting different types of light and in fact is reflecting a slightly different color/shade. If you used a camera to film or video that same sheet of paper in all those locations without stopping to resent its white balance each and every time, then you would see those different variations on the screen later. The same would be true for the skin tone of your actors or models, or of the label of the product you were trying to sell during a commercial production. In short, lighting is a big deal, and it can be hard to get right!

But window film can help keep your colors looking true.

Because cameras aren’t as advanced as the human eye and brain, filmmakers, videographers, and photographers have to help them out by taking control of the lighting of their shoot location whenever they set up indoor scenes (we can’t help you much with outdoor shots – we know window film and window tinting through and through, but we can’t control the sunlight outside!). One way to do this is to apply the right window films, usually called gels in the production world, to the windows and/or lights used in your shoot.

One of the hardest set-ups to get right is a scene where there are windows letting in natural light as well as artificial interior lighting needed to illuminate the scene. Without window film and gels on the lights he exterior may end up looking blown out and oddly blue, the interior may look strangely orange, the shot may be too dark: in short, it will look neither natural nor all that good!

Some photographers choose to use HMI lighting, as these lights put out the same blue color temperature (referred to as CTB) as the sun’s light, which is usually in the neighborhood of 5600K in color temperature appearance. But those light kits cost many thousands of dollars and require expert knowledge of handling, placement, and adjustment. A much easier solution is to let LA Window Tint help you select the right window gels and films for your production and apply window films that will change the sunlight into the more common CTO (color temperature orange) that is cast by most lights. Most indoor lighting is considered tungsten lighting, and is closer to 3200K and below in color temperature, so the gap is notable. You simply can’t have an evenly lit shot without addressing that gap, so just call us up to talk about window film before your next movie or TV production or photo shoot.

BREAK HERE?

We are Los Angeles’ one-stop shop for all your film, video, and photography window film/gel and lighting gel needs. We cater both to local Los Angeles production crews and fulfill orders for lighting gels and window film treatments nationwide.

What Can Window Tint LA Do for Your Next Shoot?

Window Tint LA can help with more than the basic color temperature blue vs. orange window tinting dilemma, so don’t worry if you have a complicated production design facing you! We stock and source special window films and gels for all types of lighting issues. Film, TV, and photography crews come to Window Tint LA because they know the folks with years of experience helping residential, commercial, and governmental clients with window film needs are the right ones to help production crews with their window and lighting gel needs, too.

Color Temperature Blue / Orange Film

We can supply sheets of orange-tinted or blue-tinted window films in most any size for the tinting of even the largest windows. We will make sure you get films of the density (AKA “thickness”) you need to get just the scene you want.

Fluorescent Lighting Gels

We also supply specialty gels such as minus green and plus green gels, which are used to either mitigate the green cast of a fluorescent light or to add the same shade to tungsten lights or natural/HMI lighting, ensuring your shot is even. These can be especially helpful when shooting in large locations lit by multiple fluorescent lights that would require great time and expense to

Neutral Density Films

If you simply need to cut down on the brightness of a window or a light, using ND (neutral density) gels can remove brightness without changing the color temperature of the light source. Window Tint LA can source ND gels that remove as little as half a stop or up to several full stops (a term referring to the amount of light reaching the subject, in short).

Diffusion Gels / Frost Window Film

If a light source is to direct, such as a sunbeam falling across your scene in a certain way, our frost window films can diffuse the light while still letting its brightness help your lighting scheme.