“We had several challenges to face, shooting the Mark Woollen-directed ‘Everlong’,” he explained. “The story takes place in a single hotel room, following five couples at different places in their relationships. Each of these contrasts the other. It is really a piece of visual poetry. Ultimately, the entire room and our couples are consumed by nature.”
To shoot this visual diary, Williams decided to capture the entire video from a remote head on a jib arm, using Phantom Flex cameras. With primary lighting from tungsten pars bounced into unbleached muslin over the set, he found that he needed a consistent fill light source. His only choice were his MiniPlus LED fixtures from Litepanels, (a Vitec Group brand). “When you shoot at high speed you need to use a flicker free source. Even tungsten lights flicker during a normal power cycle,” he explained.
“The Litepanels don’t flicker. And, being DC powered, they are ideal for high-speed work, as DC power provides consist output during a power cycle. I mounted two MiniPlus fixtures on the camera with the bracket Clairmont made for me and attached this with an Israeli arm. This way I could get the lights near the lens to act as very subtle fill for our actors. At times, I would use the Litepanels onboard gel pack and diffusion for a little more subtle adjustment when needed. This allowed me more flexibility in getting the lights to match my bigger tungsten sources. I love the quality of light that I get from Litepanels. A subtle dial in or out, a bit of diffusion, and the blend is so imperceptible, you don’t notice them. And, when the camera traveled close enough to the actors to create shadow, Litepanels mitigated it, as well as creating a nice soft fill for the actors.”
Williams says he bought his first set of Litepanels four or five years ago. “I use them all the time. I do a lot of car commercials for Mitsubishi, Audi, Infinity, Lexus, Toyota and more as well as major campaigns for everything from Coca Cola to Walmart, Jenny Craig to Puma and Converse. I started using the Litepanels on the car commercials and found them super helpful in interiors. Now I use them everywhere I need to add a small soft source. Being cordless, allows me to place them anywhere with little fuss. They are always within an arm’s reach on set. We just drop them in wherever we need a little light.”
Williams’ video for Scala’s single “Everlong” is in heavy rotation in Europe and was recently released in the U.S.
