How to light an INTERIOR SCENE - Day & Night - CINEMATIC LIGHTING with NANLITE FORZA 720B

In this video I'm going to show you how to light for interior scenes, both day and night. I'll be using examples from a recent Nanlite commercial I did, so if you haven't seen it yet, you know what to do. Cinematic lighting is pretty simple once you have a workflow, but in order to get there you first need to understand the language and that's my goal with this tutorial. Working with the new Forza 720p is an absolute dream, opening up new potential for my shoots going forward. We'll start with this opening shot in the kitchen from the memory flashback. First thing to note is that we're shooting from the shadow side with the brightest light source behind our talent, in this case the window. To motivate the window light I'm using the Forza 720p with the standard reflector dish to fill the entire room, imitating morning sunlight coming in with a nice warm feeling coming from the bi-color set at 2700 Kelvin, most prominently seen on the edges. For a more balanced skin tone but still retaining the overall warmth I set up a small Forza 60B at a cooler temperature on a 90 centimeter parabolic softbox to fill in the face but still motivating the window light. The strong light coming in from the 720 was bouncing a bit too much light from the white walls back into the shadow side, so I used a 5-in-1 reflector on the black side for negative fill to take the edge off. Next we have this patch of dappled light over here and that's coming from the Forza 500 with the projector mount. By playing around with the blades it's possible to create a custom streak of light fitting to your scene, in this case adding more realism by simulating a patch of sun hitting the cupboards. We pretty much copied this setup in the quarrel scene in the bedroom. Switching on the 720p fills the entire room. This light is so strong that again we just used the standard dish included in the kit. On the inside we've got the 60B on a softbox again to motivate the 720p and to add more fill to the face but we're still shooting from the shadow side. Because the curtains are diffusing the 720 quite a lot I felt like we needed a bit more separation so I intentionally left a gap in the curtain so that a bit of hard light will hit Marijke every now and then as she moves around and I love how it ends with this scene where the dappled light creates a beautiful room with some hot patches but we still have the soft light on the face coming from the 60B. Throughout the entire video the actors did a brilliant job and both the director and I were moved by the realism in this scene. Next we have the living room. Looking at the before you can see what a massive difference the lighting makes. Step one was to bring in the light ray coming through the small window at the top. This was done with the Forza 720B using the projector attachment again at 2700 Kelvin for warmth. Even with the room filled with haze the only way to create a visible ray through such a tiny space was by using the projector mount because it creates a more focused light. To add light to the curtains we used the Forza 500 on a big open softbox but the only way to match the warmth of the 720B was to use a tungsten gel and this is where having a bi-color light starts to get really handy. The ability to jump around between low and high Kelvins eliminate the need to use extra gels. To bring in full was a challenge because there's no space behind this wall to set up a stand or a bigger light so I opted for a power tube standing vertical against the fireplace. I prefer my tubes horizontal for softer light but since it's a wider scene it doesn't really matter because we're not lighting for the face but for the overall space. Again dialing it a little cooler keeps the skin tone more balanced. Lastly we had the light dirt coming through the front door and this was done with the Forza 60B also on 2700 Kelvin to match the warmth of the warm light coming in from the side. Moving to the close-up we were able to soften the light on the face by using the Forza 60B on a 90 centimeter softbox closer to Marijke's face so basically replacing the power tube. This is such an important principle to understand between wides and close-ups. For wides the overall lighting in the scene is more important than the face so you can get away with harder light like in this example in the bedroom. For the wide it wasn't possible to have the 60B in the shot fulfilled but the face is tiny in relation to the overall image and only when we go closer that's when we soften up the face. Now let's switch it up with the night scene. You can pull this off with pretty much just one light. All you need is a projector attachment. Our key light is the bright spot that motivates the lamp shining from above bouncing full into the faces. We used the standard combo boom with the Forza 500 and projector mount. The only reason I didn't use the 720B was because it was already set up outside for the next scene and we didn't need the extra strength but because the 500 is only daylight balanced we had to use a gel to match the lamp up top. A step we could have skipped on the bicolor 720. Starting from scratch we motivate the lamp but the background still feels a little dull. To create some color contrast in the scene we put a cooler pavo tube in the scullery and to sweeten the image even more adding this practical lamp on the right. I love how it creates two colors with the light coming through the side and the light shining out from the top because it stands against the wall. Moving to the close-up the bounce was creating too much fill so I simply cut it in half with the blades so the light comes more from the left side helping to shoot from the shadow side again. Another simple setup is this fun shot in a hallway using only the 720B. We set it up on a 1.5 parabolic softbox against the window from the outside giving us a nice soft source and again shooting shadow side creating depth. I use the same softbox outside the window in the studio scene and even though there's already a lot of daylight coming in the Forza 720 is strong enough to create this beautiful rim on the face adding depth to the image. A tricky sequence was this moment Marijke switched off the lamp and the air quotes sunlight goes on initiating the memory sequence. To keep things simple we used just one tube light to motivate the lamp because it was easier to switch it off at the same time as the lamp. For the opening shots I wanted to go for a cooler and moodier feeling because Marijke is alone but transitioning to the final scene we add more light and warmth to signify the happy ending. These small subtleties add to the overall storytelling process. For example we've got Marijke by herself for the first few seconds almost a bit underexposed but as she walks into the light we reveal Dirk and the fact that they're moving on together. Looking at the BTS you'll notice that we're using a small crew and I think it's pretty amazing that we pulled it off in just one day. The crew consisted of the following, Mia's director of photography, Yana undirecting and wardrobe, Fraser playing gaffer and Quivers his best boy and on BTS my good friend Andre. If you have any more questions feel free to drop it in the comments below and I'll do my best to answer. Thanks so much for watching and I'll see you in the next one.