Preparation for shooting green screen

In the next session of Nuke we are going to shoot a green screen footage in order to integrate it to the following given plate:

 

To ensure the quality of the shooting, we need to know the action we at going to make and the lighting that we need.

First of all we will choose the action:

Script

A GIRL approaches the shore of the lake with a DUCK FOOD BOX, and contemplates the horizon. At the same time, A MAN THAT BEHAVES LIKE A DUCK approaches from the side, with careful not to be seen. He is carrying a CEREAL BOWL and a SPOON. The girl approaches and feeds the ducks. Before the duck food falls into the floor, the man that behaves like a duck jumps quickly and puts the bowl right behind the duck food, catching all the oats in the bowl.  The girl looks at the man that behaves like a duck with surprise, while he is eating the duck food.

Characters

• The girl: Carola Martos
• The man that behaves like a duck: Adrian Gongora

Atrezzo

• A bowl of cereals
• A spoon
• A duck food box
• Duck food (or something similar, as oats)

Costumes

There is no need of any special costume but is mandatory to avoid any green tone  and ensure both characters are dressing for the same weather.

Lighting

The lighting of the scene is really diffuse. As the space is an outdoor environment, the light source is the sun. Over more, the day is really cloudy so the sunlight is really diffuse and it does not generate strong shadows. Therefore, we will need a really general lighting with a lot of diffuse. We can have diffuse light by having translucent paper filters. We will leave a bit of stronger lighting in the right side, since we can notice a more intense source of light in the front right. All the lightings should come from a high area.

When working with a green screen, the first thing we need to go is lighting the screen. For that, we will use two sources os light with same intensity pointing to each half of the screen. The scheme of the green screen will look like this:

Then, we will need to light the elements to follow the lighting of the plate. This scheme might work. 

 

As the light of the cloudy day is white/bluwish, we should set the warm of the lights into neutral white with cold tendencies. Also, we might need to edit the green screen lighting after applying this lighting.

Lens

We can use the same lens length as in the real back plate, which is 35mm focal lens.

Camera settings

We should keep the ISO low to avoid noise and make the key easier. We can eventually add more noise in postproduction. We can use a wide aperture in order to blur the background and make more contrast with the subjects. If we ses the subjects are moving really fast, we can increase the shutter speed in order to avoid any blur movements.