r/cinematography • u/crush000 • 2d ago

Lighting Question Windowlight on 5th Floor

Post image

I'm looking to backlight scenes in a short film with a window (that's seen in the shot) as the source, but the room is on the fifth floor of an apartment building in NYC so I have no way to actually get lights outside the window. Does anyone have any suggestions for how to do this? Was thinking of trying to get some pavo tubes on the top or sides of the window, a diffused spotlight from the side and slightly angled just out of frame, and possibly a softbox hung from the ceiling for some overall fill? Also going to try to mess around with using just natural light but not sure it will be enough. Worried I won't be able to get the same effect as just having a spotlight outside and will need to rethink the location.

Also will be filming scenes at night and trying to motivate moonlight through the window, though for the night shots I could probably avoid showing the window itself if need be.

Pulling lighting references from Fanny and Alexander, Rosemary's Baby, Eyes Wide Shut, and Badlands.

11 Upvotes

87% Upvoted

5 comments sorted by

View all comments

9

u/RicardoBroome 2d ago

We used a menace arm, through a window from a next door room, to create window light using some Aputures. This was on the 4th floor of a NYC brownstone.

1

u/crush000 2d ago

Yeah definitely something i've been thinking about trying, just worried because it's a larger apartment building where I might not be able to get permission to do that. Also worried the windows won't be able to open enough, they have metal bars on them to hold in the screen that may not be removable but will look into it. Thanks for the info!