Tuesday, July 31, 2012

                  Lighting Your Horror Film



    The first thing that separates the men from the boys in the film making world is good lighting. Learning the basics of what is called 3 point lighting should be the first step you learn if you want to become a good film maker. The 3 point lighting rule is one that you will break from time to time and when shooting a horror movie you will break this rule on purpose more often than in your standard drama or comedy film.

    I say that you will break it because you will want deeper shadows or a character lit from only one angle to achieve a certain type of effect. But you will need to learn the rules before you will want to break them. Let us begin with a fun little basic tutorial on the 3 point lighting set up.


    Okay while shooting your no budget horror film you will want to know the basics of good horror film lighting. Just keep one rule in mind here, that is the things that you don’t see are more important in a horror movie than the things that you do see. Some times you can not afford the best effect or creatures and that is what shadows and darkness is for.   Think of movies like The Descent and Alien and The Grudge. Darkness and shadow is as important as light in these films. Learn to control the light and you may someday be able to rule the darkness.


    Okay we have come to the end of another post. Remember to tell a friend about this Blog, leave a comment and to stumble us on Stumbleupon or add us to your Google plus.

    At the end of each future post I am going to try to add a trailer for a lost or hard to find horror movie. I think that all of us love the idea of seeing a really good horror movie as much as becoming a horror filmmaker. Here is the trailer for the legendary Cannibal Holocaust. This first of the found footage movies was band for many years for a reason. It is brutal to living things.

No comments:

Post a Comment