I buy Debauchery #15 only because I like girl/girl rimming, and Vivienne Laroche stars. Well, yeah, it appears to have great scenes, but because of all the dark shadows, about impossible to see. WTF? Isn't lighting a basic knowledge requirement for making videos? (Slur removed.)
(edited to remove slur)
Edited by - DenverDon on Jul 2 2004
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DenverDon Benevolent
Firmly Embedded in Depravity 5914 Posts 7/02
Posted - Jul 2 2004 : 5:34PM
One would like to think that lighting basic knowledge would be a requirement. Doesn't always happen though.
(please refrain from unnecessary slurs that don't help the point you are trying to make.)
Light is, in fact, the most subtle and difficult to master aspect of photography; whether you're using a 35mm SLR, a Panavision Gold, or a prosumer video camera. In fact, the more "idiot-proof" your camera, the more important it is to understand the behavior of light; both on surfaces and on chips/emulsions.
Also, many professional photoshoots or film/video shoots have at least much, if not more money on the set in the lights and grip equipment than they do in camera equipment. To achieve a pleasing result, this should nearly *always* be true when using a $3,500 prosumer camera. In porn this is rarely the case.
This is in no way directed towards Tony, but alot of people in porn always make everything out to be harder than it actually is. I notice when fans make suggestions, there's always a comment like, its not that easy or it takes such and such skill to do this. It's porn people! It's not like your splitting atoms. People have sex and you film it. If one of your movies is too dark, use more lights in the next one. I'm not saying that people in porn aren't good at what they do, but come on, sometimes it seems overblown.
Talent/Resources: the more you have of one, the more easily you can get by with less of the other. Typically talent attracts resources, which produces a compounding effect. Porn is thin in both talent and resources. Gonzo all the more so.
For example: yes, more lights would be a good solution to under lit sex scenes. But unless they are the right sort of lights, they will make as many problems as they solve.
If I were shooting run and gun gonzo, I would want to have about 4 large and 4 small Lowell Refa light. They produce a smooth even light that is flattering to nearly everything they shine on, are nearly shadowless, deploy quickly, and store compactly. But they cast about $500 each for the small ones and $750 each for the large ones; a total investment of about $5,000. Most gonzo producer/director/cameramen think this is too much to spend on a camera, so don't expect them to run out to Barbizon and drop $5K on lights anytime soon.
I have seen lots and lots of scenes ruined by lazy directors who just won't hire an extra guy to man the sun reflectors or buy fill-in strobes. There was an interesting scene where a girl stuffs a pantie inside her vagina in Knockin’ at heaven’s Backdoor, but it was ruined because the camera's sport meter hit the sunlight outside the picture window. Result is a rare event missed. Shooting around swimming pools and during high noon sunny days will play havoc to shadowed areas. Take some lessons from Skeeter called Fill-in lighting 101. Finally, if you're gonna film interracial scenes, do like the cameramen in Pickup Lines series. Mount a lightbulb on top of the camera and hang a white handkerchief in front to diffuse the light. You guys should know all this stuff. You think we stupid customers?
Thanks Tonyc, you obviously know your business. The lighting problem sounds more like a quanity over quality. But that's porn...what are you gonna do...?! It's not like people have to buy it.
Daylight Savings Time, is it really Necessary? 972 Posts 3/04
Posted - Jul 2 2004 : 7:16PM
LOL...yeah most customers are! But come on Tony, does one really have to spend so much for decent lighting. I've see film from a video camera in a home that was better lit than in some gonzo releases and I'm sure they didn't spend hundreds or thousands of dollars on lights. Though I won't disagree that lighting can be expensive but really, does one need to go that far for decent lighting?
Half of what I shoot (or more accurately, what my DP shoots for me) is shot under existing light. So no, you don't need a nickle to achieve decent lighting. The first and most important ingredient is the ablity to recognize good light, the second is understanding the difference between how your eye sees and how your camera sees.
What spending money on fixtures does it let you excersise more control over your circumstances. If you only shoot existing light, then if the light is bad your only choice are to shoot crap footage or shoot nothing at all. The more equipment and knowledge you have, the more you can create the look you want, rather than waiting for nature to provided for you. The kit I've outlined would let me quickly and efficiently set up low-contrast, nearly shadow free interiors in small and medium sized spaces and still have a chance of not blowing every breaker in the house. If I were shooting gonzo scenes day in and day out I think it would be money well spent.
It has been repeatedly suggested to me that my approach would not be cost effective in the world of gonzo porn; that an extra $200/shoot for better cameras and lighting equipment would not realize a meaningful return on investment.
Six months ago I probably would have agreed. But as sales of M&J continue to grow, I have come to believe that production quality may indeed be the new DAP, i.e. the gimmick that can separate a director's/studio's work in an ever increasingly crowded market.
None of my suggestions are rocket science or voodoo. They do require some money, but nothing that anyone with a money-making business would balk at, not if there was a halfway decent chance of seeing a return. I'd think that anyone who took pride in their work would be happy to spend the money simply to make the work that bears their name look better, but maybe that's just me.
If you have the correct equipment, lighting a low ratio/soft shadow interior need not be a particularly time consuming task. Same with creating a lighting sceme that does not necessitate moving the lights.
As your ratios get deeper and your shadows crisper, this becomes more difficult, but neither deep ratios nor hard shadows are particularly important and the gonzo lighting pallette.
..after reading your post all I can think about TTBoy is that the guy is a genious then. Because Evasive Angles is the only porn company I know that manage to show well lit porn; scene after scene, video after video, series after series. Or he just care for his product??
I think Tony is refering to his experience in feature films lighting, no gonzo porn. ..What is annoying is that those guys keep repeting the same (bad lit) mistakes over and over again. ...I mean how hard is it!? you watch your own videos, you see that you fucked up. You fix it next time.
A.) They either don't see the poor quality, or B.) they simply don't care enough to spend time learning the craft of making technically solid videos.
It's just like cooking. The skills necessary to create a well-balanced, tasty meal are well within the mental capacity of your typical high-school graduate.
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Jul 4 2004 : 5:48PM
I don't like seeing bad lighting in porn.
We should not see consistently bad "almost impossible to see the action" lighting. There are a few directors who do it on purpose, blowing out their shots by harsh lighting or using silhouettes and such. But unless it's intended, there shouldn't be more than the odd shot that's lit a little less than good.
There are a couple of trends I've been noticing in gonzo porn. Some consumers have been very excited to see their favorite performer start directing. Do we really expect a person with no technical experience to be able to accomplish good lighting. Sure, shoot in natural light as much as possible, but as Tony said, if the natural light is bad that day, then the person needs to have some knowledge. Fill lights are helpful, but even those can be used badly and make the shot look overblown or crappy.
So then you say, well, have the director hire a lighting person or at the very least an assistant to help out for the day. An assistant is $200/day, a full-blown grip is $500 - $1000/day. It's not much, but at 5 days per movie, that's $1000 - $5000. Again, not a ton, but some of these 'directors' jump at the chance to direct and accept some unimaginably low budgets. Unbelievably, the studios sometimes won't accept spending an extra $1000 on the movie to get better lighting or production values.
I'm not saying this is how it should be.
Finally, here's the scenario that throws in a hitch that I actually can kind of defend. Many times, a gonzo director shoots with noone other than himself and talent on set. This brings the intimacy in the scene better, but production values do suffer.
I've always believed in quality over quantity. I'm just trying to give a different POV.
Since you have the industry perspective, maybe you can educate the average porn fan around here. I know there's no specific recipe for success and certain film genres will require more gear, etc. than others, so I'll keep it focused.
What does Jules Jordan do for his Ass Worship/Flesh Hunter/Weapons of Mass Destruction series? What camera? How many mikes, lights and reflectors? Personnel? Computers and software? How much time does he use to set up a typical gonzo scene for one of the aforementioned series?
Am I way off base guessing that he has a $5K camera, schlepping around $10K of auxiliary gear, maybe a $1K-2K per day on crew, and using an editing bay with $20K of hardware and software?
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Jul 5 2004 : 2:50AM
I don't know how much Jules wants to "give away", but I can tell you that he doesn't spend that kind of money on a crew. I just know that Jules cares a lot about his product and learning from his experiences.
I'll give you John Stagliano's "recipe" though. Him. Maybe a light or two. and him. Camera? A $2500 - $3500 Sony. Edit bay? Media 100. Joey Silvera? He has Kevin Moore there. Some KinoFlo lights. and himself. Edit bay? Final Cut Pro4.
Colour me cynical , but I'd assumed that these people were often only directing in the spiritual , and boxcover copy , sense . I don't want to get anyone's feathers ruffled , but some erst while directors operate camera on a number of flicks for which they're not then credited as 'director' . Quite what the different is in their actions from one release where they are considered director , to the next where they're just camera man , is a mystery to me . If he/she's not physically holding the camera during a gonzo scene is there a huge amount that a 'director' can actually influence . Preparation , and editing I guess .
As a sense of budgets , I found this posted by Viv Thomas on his forum . It's his rough idea of the sort of costs likely to be involved in making a gonzo style porno . I guess lighting is covered by props ~
Female models £700 to £1.000/day. Male models £300 to £500/day. Locations £750/day. Make-up artist £300/day. Props/wardrobe £500 to £1.000. BBFC £1.000. Editing/graphics £750/day. Music £500 to £1.000.
The reason why there's some movies with poor lighting is that most of us "directors" have had very limited if at all technical training whatsoever.
I can't speak for anyone but my training consisted of spur of the moment website shooting where lighting was never really a factor. Generally, I shot whenever I felt like it and didn't have the time to set up lights, etc, or I just didn't have any. Other than that, I never had any training except what I saw on sets. I suppose my stint at UCLA didn't help much in practice because it was all theoretical in nature.
I'm also aware that many current directors share the same limited technical training. The general Modus Operandi tends to be "It if looks good enough, it is good enough". Not sure how much richer a good technical base would be for the final output but this is gonzo after all.
Personally, I think natural lighting and a good fill light is the best, richest light source around.
I shot for the high side, so I'm pleased to hear that the boys are using minimal resources to make quality product, but I'm not surprised.
The point of my question is that even if one had every single piece of equipment that Jules has, it's not going to turn that person into Jules Jordan.
The general public is totally obsessed with equipment and think that's what makes the pros good. I tell them they're wrong. They say, "B.S." Then I say, "Go ahead and give your crappy point-and-shoot camera to a pro at a party for a few snapshots; I bet they take photos that are ten times better than yours with your lousy consumer gear".
Another eye-opening lesson is when a really good cook visits someone else's kitchen and basically makes the best meal ever prepared in that kitchen, using the same tools and ingredients. That drives the same point home.
Joey and I bust our ass to get the lighting right. Sometimes I wish there was a camera there just to see how hard we work with it. In features it is acceptable to have shadows. The shadows are created for effect and mood. Gonzo doesn't work the same way. The whole key to great gonzo lighting is lighting it well enough where the consumer never thinks about the lighting. It looks all even and natural. It is way harder then you think because it is easy to blow out skin tones or having very dull skin tones.
We use a variety of lights: Kino's, sometimes an HMI, Natural Day Light and a C-Light.
I think Christoff is another Evil director who does a great job at lighting his stuff.
You can have all the best gear in the world... but you still need the eye for it.
The solution to the lighting dilemma for many in the gonzo game seems to be to set the camera to "automatic" and VOILA - instant lighting crew. Nevermind that the result is nearly identical to that accomplished by a soccer Mom at a playoff game or a father of 3 at a church picnic.
It doesn't take much to learn the very basics of lighting yet it's seems it's too much for some.
Actually, many folks with decent kitchens have the same sort of knives you'll find in a good professional kitchen. Much of the stuff in a professional kitchen is simply more suited for the wear and tear of daily professional use. With crappiest equipment, it simply may take longer to do the same task; the slower speed of execution of home cooking is simply useless for a professional kitchen in terms of volume, customer satisfaction, and staying in business.
Kevin Moore, You and Joey Silvera are doing everything right in your Service animals and She-Male Adventures series. Your lighting and camera angles are always right. You are truly the best in the business along with Christoph's Beautiful Girls. Want a tip to excite us more? Do some Behind the Scenes videos of both of your titles. We would really like to know what it is like on the other side of the lenses. Talk to us about the kinds of problems you encounter, what Fabio does to help secure actresses/actors, costs involved, etc. Entertain us and kill 2 birds with one stone.
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Jul 5 2004 : 11:35PM
Kevin - if you could get Joey to do some BTS of you and him during the shoot, I'd give you the biggest kiss ever!
I just re-read my earlier message, and I hope it came off the way I meant it - just that there isn't shitloads of equipments and a full grip and lighting crew. But that with having several well-chosen professional lights and a great eye, the lighting can be done well and so natural that people think that you didn't even work on it, that somehow things are always just not crappy looking.
Patience is a virtue, but who wants to be virtuous? 4283 Posts 4/00
Posted - Jul 5 2004 : 11:38PM
Tony - I hope the amount of time you're spending here giving the rest of us tips on how to make a better movie isn't cutting into your time of making your own. It's kind of depressing that I have only one of yours to look at so far.
While I agree that knowing what you're doing helps you get the most out of what you have, I don't agree that means you don't need a good kit. To use your rather inexact analogy, if the ingredients in your hypothetical kitchen aren't good, then the dish is going to suffer no matter what I do. In fact, while I might have the necessary ingredients, I'm going to avoid making certain dishes simply because those ingredients aren't up to snuff.
However, you and I are residents of coastal California. Even the marginal crap at our local supermarkets (Safeways, Vons, Albertsons) is better than produce in 90% of America's markets.
Admittedly, my analogy is poor, which I apologize for, but I needed something recognize to the majority of readers here. I should have picked my analogy more carefully.
This goes WAY more in depth into the basics of how natural and artificial light works than is required to create good ligthing on a porn set. Because I never finished the series (I just didn't think anyone was interested), it also is very much LACKING information on some of the essential things that porn directors must consider when lighting a scene, but for those who are genuinely interested, it serves as a fair introduction to the complexities of light.
As others have said, good lighting is the result of knowledge and experience first, and the proper equipment second. Natural light can work. Artificial light can work just as well, but they both require the eye, and experience to know how to utilize it. It is very often (but not always) the case that the most natural looking and unnoticed lighting takes the most effort to achieve.
Let me be clear though. People who have to light for a camera are a completely different breed than the people who light directly for the human eye, and I'm one of the latter. So take that as you will. ::shrug::
I just thought I'd add my two cents as a professional for anyone who might be interested.
From a photographer's point of view, the biggest difference between how the eye sees and how the camera sees is contrast. Between the eye's "auto iris" and the superior receptors of the rentina, you have to do a lot of work to bring a typical scene into the relatively narrow range that the camera can see. When shot reversal film for print work, I would typically keep the range from the blackest black to paper white at 7 1/2 stops.
With video, I don't know that you can really hold more than about 4 stops before things start looking bad. That's one of the reasons that noir-style lighting looks so terrible on video. It's also why brightly lit outdoor scenes often look bad. Midday might have 10 stops of contrast, and video just can't hold the highlights or the shadows in that kind of contrast. OTOH, hazy early morning light is soft, directional and somewhat low contrast (add a while card), and can be quite pleasing, even on a DSR-PD100.
To a degree you eye can be trained to see these ratios and make an interal translation. Add a light meter and you'll be fooled less of the time. But the still photographer's secret weapon is polaroids, just as the videographer's secret weapon is a monitor on set.
Introducing Lady LorReign
Posted - Jul 2 2004 : 5:31PM
