in this video I'm going to show you how

I like really big spaces like this gym

behind me and turn it from a dingy

looking cave to something like this that

looks a little bit more polished when it

comes to lighting massive spaces there

are three main things you'll want to

consider but that could look different

depending on what you're actually

shooting which is exactly why I

challenged myself to hang an entire grid

of 1200 DS now for reference I've been

hired to photograph a competition at my

local gym and if you ever shot in a gym

you'll know that the lighting is usually

less than optimal typically you'll find

high Bay industrial LEDs that have

terrible color and these ones

specifically are probably only 40 WTS so

they're super dim and since I'm doing

just Stills for this project it's really

important that I have a high enough

shutter speed so I can freeze the action

without any em motion blur I could

theoretically just take the easy way out

and crank up the iso but I know we can

do better okay so just for reference I'm

walking around with my meter and just

the regular house lights are giving me

like 12T candles obviously not a ton and

they also have these uh kind of

temporary uh boost mode gym lights here

which are these kind of just LED floods

and so if I meter this now I'm getting

around 80ft candles you know around

eight times more light but obviously the

quality of light is a little bit hard

color not great so hopefully we can just

improve the overall Ambience now if I

was just shooting video with a 800 base

ISO and 180° shutter I'd probably be

fine but again since I'm shooting Stills

my goal is to freeze the action so I

need a much faster exposure and 12T

candles just ain't cutting it so the

first thing that you'll want to consider

when lighting a large area is Direction

now I've lit this space plenty of times

before but it's usually been in some

sort of commercial context and I'll

usually just take the biggest frame I

have and send some fixtures through it

but keep in mind that this is a live

event so having a bunch of stands and

Frames all over the place isn't really

an option and since the athletes are

going to be spread out across the entire

floor it would be nearly impossible to

light them evenly because of the inverse

Square law so that leaves me with one

option and that's overhead this way

Spectators aren't forced to dodge stands

and I also won't have to constantly move

fixtures around for different workouts

and to do this I'm using nine aperture

1200 DS on the main floor and three 600

x's in a secondary workout area to mount

the lights I'm using what are called

Junior C clamps which are basically

these super heavy duty clamps that have

a junior receiver welded to the ends and

in between the clamps are these small

pieces of wood called cribbing which

help give more surface area to the

clamping force and also protect the

surface that you're actually biting to

how long do you think it's going to take

me to let all this got feel the

music feel the it's all it's all in the

hips chubs you jump out of planes easier

enough oh

I originally planned on using 600 DS but

it turns out it's a lot easier for me to

Source 1200s which admittedly is a bit

Overkill but having this many units also

brings another huge benefit to overhead

lighting and that's room tone now

traditionally room tone is the 30

seconds of ambient audio that we capture

at any location for post-production so

that any sound edits are smooth and and

audible but it actually serves the exact

same purpose but for lighting it's a

base level of ambient exposure that

creates a believable atmosphere and in

the same way that light would just

naturally bounce around a room in most

instances room tone is used as a sort of

directionless fill but in this

application it's actually our key since

it's our only source of exposure and I'm

just trying to lift the overall Ambience

of the event there's inherently more

contrast as you walk towards the edge of

the floor but simply just hanging a

bunch of fixtures in the sky isn't

enough and this is where the Nuance

comes in uh don't mind the background

I'm watching the Oscars the next thing

you have to consider when you're

lighting big spaces is shape this is how

we manipulate where and how the light

travels where it falls where it doesn't

fall is it soft is it hard when you're

lighting big spaces from overhead it's

really important to consider why the

light is coming from that direction are

you trying to replicate Moonlight with a

soft overhead glow or is the mood more

of a hard Spotlight coming from above in

this case we're simply trying to

increase our ambient levels on the

competition floor that led me to this

which is is essentially a $50 plastic

bag and it's something you see on much

larger film sets this is called the

space light because it literally lights

a space it's omnidirectional so it

spreads light over a broad area and they

work best when you have an entire array

of them at this distance the light

appears really soft because it's really

large relative to the subject but once

the light's actually in position it very

quickly becomes a much harder light

source and doesn't end up looking any

better than the house lights that's

until you have an entire array of them

they start filling in the cracks and you

start to get this really soft

directionless fill because the light

sours ends up becoming larger and larger

and sort of starts acting as a singular

Source take this incredible scene from

Blade Runner to light it Roger deak used

a 300 watt Fel which even at close

distances is a pretty hard light but

Roger used 256 of them they were

programmed in a Chase pattern but still

appeared soft because of the width of

the active units and the same principle

applies when using a bunch of smaller

space lights deacons often uses this

technique because it creates this

beautiful volume of Light which is why

room tone is so cool it can be used to

emulate a desert Wasteland in Vegas or

entire oil field that's caught on fire

or really anything that's on fire

another one of my favorite examples of

beautiful room tone is when DP e and

Bolter used 400 quazars to create large

scale naturalistic Moonlight on the Last

of Us while still allowing the audience

to see what's going on the main issue

was finding a solution for extreme winds

in Calgary so since our are so many

individual units you get that really

soft directionless fill to bring up the

natural environment which is essential

whenever you're trying to make your

lighting feel as invisible as possible

early on in my career understanding

shape really helped inform a lot of my

lighting decisions and in da on me that

the absence of light is just as

important as the presence of light for

this project it would have been really

nice to have a teaser to help kill some

of that spill on the walls but given our

crew and resources it turned out just

fine I also want to note that I'm pretty

confident that these modifiers are not

heat rated for the 1200d so the only

reason that I was using them was because

I only planned on using the fixtures at

a maximum output of 40% so be smart and

if you are interested in getting some

space lights for yourself do yourself a

favor and go with the angler brand they

end up having a much nicer shape than

apertures version the skirts are

separate if you want to control the

spill but links are down in the

description the brutalist just one best

in rography so there's one more elephant

in the room whenever you're talking

about lighting big spaces and that's

power which has some obvious

implications since we're lighting from

above with over nine fixtures first off

we need to think about how much power

we're actually pulling obviously this is

pretty location dependent but one quick

end diry formula I usually use to

calculate loads for 120 volts here in

America is to to take 10% of your total

wattage and use that to figure out how

many amps you can expect to pull so a

1200 wat light can pull around 12 amps

or a 300 WT light can pull around 3 amps

now it's not exact and the true amperage

will actually be a bit lower but it does

kind of build in some overhead padding

so that you're not overloading the

circuit and tripping the breaker plus

it's really easy math we're running

1200s up in the ceiling and I don't plan

on running them at max power just to

distribute the load a little bit more

evenly so I only really plan on running

them at half power 50% cuz I kind of

budgeted for 600 WTS all around so 600

watt time 9 lights should be more than

adequate it'll obviously be easiest to

have some sort of power source near the

ceiling for a clean run but if you don't

you'll want to consolidate your lines

and then run them along the Grid or

ceiling with some sort of cable

management so are not just droing onto

the set you also want to make sure that

your cables are red properly if you're

using generic extension cables from

Walmart they're probably going to

overheat which is why proper Stingers

like these ones are a must these are

made from 123 sjl cable and have a

really nice thick jacket so they're

super durable I actually made these

myself so if you're interested on a

video on how to make them let me know

down in the comments below I got really

lucky since one of the gem owners is an

electrician so we were able to install a

gang box up in the rafters so we had

three dedicated circuits just for

lighting I ended up running three units

off of one line using a cube tap so I

really only needed three Stingers to

power the entire ceiling on the day we

ended up getting around 200t candles

worth of Light which is 16 times more

than when we started which means I was

able to lower my ISO from

12,800 all the way down to 800 sort of

like going to a low Bas ISO for Stills

but I added a ton of lighting another

thing we're thinking about is actually

how you're going to control all your

lights because breaking out a scissor

lift mid event isn't really an option

but since we're using all aperture units

I'm just using cus link which is as far

as I desire to go in the World of

Wireless lighting control I don't have

blackout I don't want blackout I want a

super easy to use app which was actually

a huge factor into why I chose these

units in the first place speaking of

units special shout out to Hunter over

at Fuego Industries they're supplying

all of these units for this little

project of mine he's my go-to gaffer

here in town and has five trucks full of

gear so if you're ever shooting in Vegas

and have any g& needs Hunter's your guy

there's obviously a million ways to skin

a cat but this is usually a pretty good

starting point whenever I'm thinking

about lighting big Interiors the overall

goal is to just get a decent overall

level of Ambience again which could look

different depending on your goals