Daylight film with Tungsten Lights

[bob carnie]

quick question ,
I have ton's of daylight film Fujicolor pro 160C colour negative film, but I want to use hot lights (tungsten) .
Do I need to use lets say 80a filter on lens and adjust the iso to 50 . Or can I just do the correction in PS or Lightroom.

My preference is for no filter. Up till now I have been using strobe or daylight so no problems but I have this small home set up of tungsten lights and cool backgrounds that I would like to work with.

any help would be appreciated

Bob

[vinny]

Bob, I've done it with fuji 250D movie film without the 80a and correction was successful in telecine. You could put 1/2 ctb gel on the lights and do the rest in the computer. That way you don't lose 2 stops on the lens. Getting some 20"x24" gels from the movie expendables shops in your area shouldn't be a problem at about $6 u.s. each.

[Helen Bach]

Bob,

It depends a lot on the quality of results that you want. The aim is, of course, to avoid underexposure and graininess in the blue-sensitive layer. The best way is to balance the lights to daylight (full CTB gels) or use an 80A or 80B (not critical with neg film) on the lens. (You end up with about the same exposure whether the filters are on the lights or the lens). This full correction maintains the usable dynamic range of the film.

The other end of the scale of options is to 'overexpose' by up to two stops, without the filter (ie the same exposure as you would give if the 80A filter was used - as if the film was rated at around ISO 40 or 50) and fix it in Photoshop. The latitude of the film should cope with the exposure of the red-sensitive layer as long as the brightness range of the subject is not too great.

The inbetween option is to use a half CTB on the lights (or an 80C or similar on the camera), give a little extra exposure and correct in post.

If you are OK with poor detail in the shadows in the blue-sensitive layer, and in the green-sensitive layer to a lesser extent, you can simply correct in Photoshop - no extra exposure, no filters. The more exposure, the better the representation of blues in the shadows.

You can get dichroic daylight filters for many tungsten lights. These are a lot more expensive than gels, but they don't lose quite as much light. I suspect that it isn't worth getting them in this case, however.

Best,
Helen

[bob carnie]

Thanks for the responses Helen and Vinny

I am not so caught up with critical colour balance as the idea is a series of very abstract images using a vibrant colour pallette.
I will look into the gels for the lights, and not worry too much about the accuracy of colour.

Bob