-
Got any tips for day to night in post?
What do you guys do, using just FCP and Motion, when you’re trying to make late day footage look like night?
-
6 Replies
-
I use Motion because I can utilize Motion’s Lights. In the photo in this post I added a light in three places to give it a more convincing look. Use the Levels filter to make it darker. The Saturate filter to take some of the color out. The tint filter to make it more of an overall color you want. Hope this helps.
Check out my Motion Training DVD
Check out my Motion Tutorials
-
That’s a nice example!
A good tip for exteriors is to keep the sky out. If the shot is already made then add a gradient mask to the sky to make it look like dawn.
If the sunlight is going to be the moonlight then you can add a blue tint to the scene. Shooting with the sun in the front or as a back light can be helpful too, but that’s not a rule.
I remember the old “El Santo” movies (in Mexico), where night scenes where shoot in midday with low exposure. You could only see the bright sky trough the trees and the action was completely dark. Not a good “day for night” technique.
*Always share a link to your site and rate the posts. This is a free service for you and for us.
-
Biased recommend here:
Movie Color with the Day For Night preset does a pretty good job, but Motion does do a great job with the Lights…
Patrick
-
-
I know this post was a while ago, but in case you’re still working on projects like this or in case someone stumbles across it later I thought I’d pass on some other resources.
Try a search for Day for Night on the After Effects forum here on the COW. You’ll find several techniques that you could translate from AE into Motion. And, at the very least, some good shooting tips too. This recent thread is a good read. I did a long post in there with quite a number of tips from my own experiences.
Here’s something I didn’t mention in that thread: Try to do things practically if at all possible.
For example; the fake lights put in with Motion in that nice example from Stephen, while helping sell the night-time look of the scene, look a little fake especially on the left where the 3-dimensional letters on the side of the building aren’t casting the proper shadows from the false light. (The other fake lights actually look pretty good, probably because they’re more subtle and are placed in better locations.) If it’s not too sunny and bright outside, you may be able to do it practically with some really bright lights. Or you can return to the “fixing it in post” idea and put in some fake shadows.BTW, Stephen, I like that you didn’t go blue with your scene; the yellow color is much more realistic for suberbia.
– The Great Szalam
(The ‘Great’ stands for ‘Not So Great, in fact, Extremely Humble’)No trees were harmed in the creation of this message, but several thousand electrons were mildly inconvenienced.
Reply to this Discussion! Login or Sign Up