American Cinematographer - June 2010 - 78

Tricks of the Trade
I
Using Red’s False Color By Claire Walla Like most cinematographers, Chase Bowman measures light for relative exposure values and adjusts his iris settings accordingly. But he doesn’t use a light meter. “I’m kind of embarrassed to say it because I was brought up on film, but I leave my light meter at home now,” he says. Instead, he uses False Color, a function on the Red One digital camera, which he has been using since 2007. With the click of a button, False Color covers the onscreen image with a multi-hued overlay, using a scale that ranges from Purple (1 IRE) to Red (108 IRE), with Green (44 IRE) balancing out the two extremes at 18-percent gray. The concept is not so different from other cameras’ built-in light meters, like the histogram (which displays temperature values via bar graph), or a zebra pattern (an overlay of slanted lines that lean left or right, depending on whether the image is over- or underexposed). However, Bowman maintains that color representation is more direct with False Color. “I’ve even had my script supervisor pick up on it and give me exposure advice,” he reports. “Really, it’s that easy.” While shooting the feature Second-Story Man in January, Bowman not only set all his exposures using False Color, but also communicated on set with color-coded instructions. “We were doing a lot of day-for-night shots, and we didn’t have enough money for [lighting] balloons or other nightexterior lighting tools, so it was all about exposure level,” he explains. “My gaffer and I came up with a [rubric] for how we were going to establish moonlight, and it was all color-coded: purple for things that didn’t need any detail [straight underexposed], light blue for the majority of the shots, and essentially no color [the midtones] for specific highlights.” If an actor was standing in the snow amid a cluster of trees, for example, Bowman set his exposure so that the leaves in the trees were purple, the snow was light blue, and the actor’s face was no color. “I knew that as long as there was ‘no color’ on the actor’s cheek at any given time, it wasn’t totally underexposed,” he notes. Bowman is quick to add that there’s nothing wrong with using a light meter with the Red. However, he believes it makes sense to follow a digital-specific method when shooting a digital format. Part of this has to do with the way digital technology has impacted the production process. In the same way that digital cameras allow filmmakers to maintain the momentum of a shot by
78 June 2010

False Color allows an instantaneous light reading without venturing away from the camera.

eliminating the frequent need to stop and reload, False Color allows the cinematographer to get an instantaneous light reading without venturing away from the camera. “I would do a quick flash [of False Color] during a take, and as soon as the director yelled ‘Cut,’ my gaffer would go right into fixing the problem because he knew exactly what I was referring to,” recalls Bowman. “It got to the point where we didn’t even have to talk about it, and that made production more fluid.” Another reason Bowman likes False Color has to do with its ability to quickly capture the whole scope of light within a frame. He points to a car-mount shot from Second-Story Man as an example. In a medium shot, the camera looks through the rear window of a car onto a young girl who’s peering back toward the camera. “The girl’s skin is very dark, but there was also the reflection of the trees and the glare of the sun to consider when setting the exposure,” explains Bowman. “A light meter wouldn’t do much to get an overall feel for exposure — the angle of incident of the reflected light would be one problem.” But False Color could capture everything within the frame at one time, allowing Bowman to see exactly how the character’s skin responded to the speckled veil of sun and shadow that complicated the shot. False Color also helps when motion is a factor. This is the case for settings overrun by intelligent lights that constantly move and change, but it’s also true for more basic action shots. If a scene calls for someone to throw a baseball, for instance, the cinematographer can set the camera to False Color, watch the ball move across the screen, and mark exactly where the light affects the object while it’s in motion. “You can take an instant reading with a light meter and get a feel for the space,” adds Bowman. “But you can’t spot-meter a moving baseball.” Bowman attributes the great benefit of False Color to the inherent differences between film and digital. “Film is a much more forgiving medium. If you blow out a highlight on a car, it looks great because it looks natural. But with digital, as soon as the highlight goes, you know you’re watching digital. “For me and a lot of the cinematographers I know, using the Red has been all about trying to create the illusion that it’s film,” he continues. “We’re trying to find something we can maybe call ‘Digital 35.’ Without question, the key to that [with the Red] is protecting highlights, and that’s a big part of what False Color does for me.” ●

American Cinematographer

American Cinematographer - June 2010

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of American Cinematographer - June 2010