The Cine Technician (1939)

lh ig THE C INE-TEC HNH'I A N 59 to light the whole house. Opposite the gate I put a 700 mm. Also at the four corners of the set I placed a 700 mm. for emergency. Between these suns I put 3 kos. A night staff of carpenters was ordered to build the set and a night staff of electricians to rig the lamps. As the set w.is wanted by 9 o'clock the following morning, I had to be there by 6 o'clock in order to check that my guesswork of the positions of the lamps was correct and also to blend and direct all the lights. I arrived the following morning at 6 o'clock. The electricians had not completed the cabling out to the lamps, so I collected a camera and set it up for the best long-shot. I remembered that in the preceding shot, taken in back projection, the ponv and jaunting car were travelling from right to left of the screen. The set was constructed with the gate on the left of the set, so I decided to start the car inside the barn and cover its entrance with a tree. Then, as the foreground was empty, I placed a row of palings and added spindly trees to break up the picture as we panned across. While I was doing this the electricians had clone their job and I commenced to blend the lights. (At tins stage <i reel of the film containing the farmyard and interior of the farmhouse was projected). You will have noticed in the background of the farmyard, on the left, a white barn with an overhanging roof. I decided to make this my outstanding section. The face of the barn was white. I had a 700 mm. arc, burning 150 amps, trained on to this from a fairly high angle. The overhanging eaves made a natural shadow which caused a lot of contrast. Haying got my key-point, or brightest section, the next job was to light the next bit of set, blending the light with that of the barn. This I did with a 700 mm. arc. This business of blending is very simple. Every lit portion of the set must have a source of light and every light source must cause a shadow. Now "blending" is the name given to the business ol lighting a set evenly from two or more light sources, with only one shadow. Blending on ,1 sel with a fairly brokenup surface is simple, as one can arrange foi the junction of the light to be at the angle ol a wall or along some r and if nothing is there then it is easy to have the property master place a tree so as to cover the overlap. The next step was to light the farmhouse. I had the 1000 mm. arc 300 amps lit. This illuminated the whole house with one lamp, which was what 1 wanted, but I found out that the difference ol intensit} between the near wall and the wall with the door was too great, so ] increa ed the lighting of the door portion with one of my emergency 700's from the side rail. I lit the pigstyes with a ground glass 700 from the centre rail and then continued lighting round to the righthand side of the set with soft 700's, as this side is the shadow side of the set. All this time I picked out various parts of the set with 3 kos., such as the wall, chimney stack, tree, and so on. From the front rail above the camera I had two 700's with ground glass in to flood the set, and along the camera limits I placed a row of 1500 flood lamps, silk-screened to give a soft, even light. On the scenic backing I put more silk-screened banks of light to give an even flood of light. From the back rail I put three 700's to flood the set with back light to make the actors stand out. When I had lit the set and blended the lights I checked them over through my camera and was satisfied, so I told Mr. Lee to carry on and rehearse his action. There is one thing 1 must tell you about set lighting before I go on to the next part. When going on to a fresh set one usually starts with a long shot. Now one might light a set most naturally and run into a lot of trouble when doing mid-shots and close ft; # \-"V Kathleen Mavourneen." Argyle British Productions, Ltd. The Farmhouse.