Ideas for use of lighting

1. Ideas for Use of Lighting
Lighting in a horror filmcan depict the entire mood of the scene, dimly lit rooms will convey
a darker and scarier mood, whereas a room lit with high-key lighting is not as effective for a
frightening scene as it ultimately reflects happiness and will be used during the equilibrium.
The lighting can foreshadow upcoming events, for example a shot during the middle of the
day in comparison to at night will not make the audience expect anything frightening as they
would for a dimly lit night time scene. Shadows can be cast by different light sources,
making the surrounding environment seem more eerie, it can also hide certain parts of the
frame, creating an enigma code for the audience who are wondering what is hidden in the
shadows. Backlighting can be used to create silhouettes around a character, we will be
doing this for our villain who will appear more menacing and scary to the audience who will
only be able to see his shadow.
In our trailer we plan to take the lighting of our shots seriously and carefully plan how each
scene will be lit as it can have a huge impact on not only the mood that is portrayed by also
how professional the finished product it. This is why we feel that the existing ceiling lights in
many of the indoor shooting locations won't be sufficient, we have chosen to purchase 2
soft boxes; this will enable us to have white light that does not cast any shadows and we can
film from whichever angle without having a glare or reflection of light. We will also use a
reflector to give the effect of the 3 point lighting design used in many professional existing
films.
The setting in which the killings will happen we aim to give the effect that it looks like a
lab/basement setting, therefore for the majority of shots in this setting we will be using
both soft boxes and a reflector to fill the space available with soft light. There will be some
scenes that are shot outside, for example some of the equilibrium shots and some scenes
where the antagonist will be chasing the victims. We are unable to use anything but natural
lighting, so we will chose to do these shots when we feel the lighting is as good during the
day. For any close up shots outside we can use a reflector to slightly increase the intensity of
light on the characters face. One of the scenes we will shoot outside we will chose to do in
the evening, just after the sun has set, therefore the natural light will not be intense but it
will still be existent, allowing us to create an eerie environment and scary feel to the scene.
One of the shots that will be shot inside, is a back lit shot of the butcher smoking a cigar,
now as this is a close up shot we don't want to give any details away about his identity;
therefore this close up shot will also be a profile shot, and on the opposing side of the
character's head will be a softbox, the softbox will be the only light in the room and will be
very close to the character's head, therefore the background of the frame will only be filled
by the soft box, meaning it will just appear to be white. Creating a very harsh silhouette
around the head of the butcher. This will be a difficult shot to achieve, however if

2. successful, will be very effective. Any of the close up shots of the victims before they are
killed will be dimly lit, potentially with one softbox facing the opposite direction so the light
fills the room, and the lighting on the face is very subtle, this is conventional and makes the
scene seem more sinister, as darkness has connotations of evil.