BTS of “ Love Letter ”
“Love Letter”
“Love Letter” was originally supposed to be a small section for a larger documentary for a local earring shop calls Around The Ways Girls. For this piece, the team and I wanted to capture and show the warm and cozy feeling of a beautiful mother and daughter relationship. When I think about this piece, I saw a lot of warm, sunset, light through the windows imagery and I think we were able to achieved a lot of those ideas through careful preparation, and hardwork from the team.
If you have not already see the video, you can watch it here:
Then I’ll go into the behind the scenes, gears I used on this shoot, lighting diagrams and final results.
Camera: Blackmagic Cinema Pocket 6K Pro
Lens: Sigma 18-35mm f1.8
Editing Software: Davinci Resolve Studio
Lighting:
1x Aputure 300D
2x Aputure 300X
4x Aputure B7c
2x Aputure MC
2x Quasar
Then a few lighting modifiers that I don’t remember to well, some floppy and 4x4 silkframes.
The location
We ended up not having the 2 practices, but I needed more fill for the inside of the room so I had a 300 bounced into the ceiling to provide some fill. We had 2 type of mood for this scene. In the first set up I had the 300 outside on 5600K to mimic morning sun and in the 2nd set up I had it on a warmer temp for a more sunset feel.
Original Diagram
Final result
The Location
There was 2 scenes that we shot on this location, but the idea was just having a light outside shining through the window with the blind slight open just to high and blend the light in a bit. I wanted to have the feeling of a sun setting between the mom and daughter. Then we just had another light bounced into the ceiling on the inside to bring in some fills. We also a small practicle under one of the counter, but it was too bright. So I had my gaffer taped a piece of thick paper towel over it. We can see it in the shot but it just looks like an under the counter light so I didn’t mind.
Original diargram
Final result
The location
This was my favorite scene for a few reason.
First it was around 7-8pm, but we wanted to emulate the feeling of sunset so of course we needed to light both windows, and I think it turned out well.
We did not have access to a 600d as I planned, so we used 2 300x instead. However, on the right hand window, I added a diffusion to blend the light out a bit more so it doesn’t look like there are 2 suns outside the windows. Then we use a couple aputure b7c bulb for the filling inside. We put on near the washing machine for one scene, and we hung one up opposite of our subject on the next scene.
Original Diagram
Final Result
The location
This scene was lit quite simple with the use of practical.
We had an aputure b7c bulb in the closet to act as a closet light. Then I had my friend hollywood(hand hold) another aputure b7c bulb near camera to bring some fill into the shadow of the subject’s face.
Hindsight, I could have more fill on the end of the bed left side of subjects.
Original Diagram
Final Result
Overall, this was some of my first DOP project and although I think I did well for the resources that we had, I wish I exposed the images a little bit better because a lot of scenes was too dark and I couldn’t recover a lot of details in the shadows due to it being too noisy from under exposure.
I had a great time and a great crew. Thank you everyone.
BTS photography: PJ De Leon
