Infinity Movie Hollywood
Daisy Hughlett
One of the largest natural amphitheaters in the world, with a seating capacity of nearly 18,000, the Hollywood Bowl has been the summer home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic since its official opening in 1922 and plays host to the finest artists from all genres of music. For a century, the Bowl has been a Los Angeles County public park, operated in partnership with the LA Phil to welcome visitors from all over the world. It remains one of the best deals anywhere in Los Angeles; to this day, $1 buys a seat at the top of the Bowl for many classical and jazz performances. This past February, the Hollywood Bowl was also awarded the Outdoor Concert Venue of the Year award at the 35th Annual Pollstar Awards, an honor bestowed 16 previous times. For millions of music lovers across Southern California, the Hollywood Bowl is synonymous with summer. hollywoodbowl.com
I have a short coming up that has some interesting shots to achieve. The biggest thing I'm trying to achieve is this infinity mirror effect. Example when you have a mirror in front of you and a mirror behind you. It creates the visual effect that has multiple refections as far as your eye can see (tunnel like).
My first thought to achieve this is have one of the mirrors be a two way mirror. This way I can shoot through the two way mirror but the other mirror wont have camera reflections that would have to be removed in post. My thought is to build a wall that has a two way mirror and I can shot behind this wall. Giving me a variety of angles and specific shots we need with out having to worry about the mirror seeing me.
Here are some screen grabs from a test we did today. We just used a mirror hanging on a C-stand to achieve the effect but the goal is to create a way to be behind the mirror and shoot through it to make this happen practically. There are not images for this but did tests shooting through plexi glass that had mirror tint on it. However the quality just was not up to par The affect did not work as well as the actual glass mirror did.
I'm supposed to be interviewing the director and VFX supe on HIGH-RISE this week (that is if Magnolia's PR dept. can reach them -- apparently DP is unavailable, maybe from shooting s3 PEAKY BLINDERS?)
That is an awesome shot! I knew there was a way to achieve this effect practically. Now the tricky part is finding a two way mirror to test before we purchase one. Ideally it would be great if this is something we could rent but, more than likely I will bite the bullet.
I tested Mirror window film like this on plexi and it does not give the effect like the actually glass mirror does. It gets kind of muddy and is not very sharp in terms of the multiple reflections. However i did not test the Mirror Film on clear glass. Not sure if putting the film on glass would change the quality of the effect or not. Below is a screen grab from the test with the plexi and the mirror film.
I think the low-budget way of doing this is to give yourself more space between the mirrors, back up the camera and shoot with a long lens. That way you can minimize your own reflection a much as possible. Additionally, light with enough contrast so that the walls drop off into shadow and make a black drape for the camera or get black showcard with a cutout for the lens.
Ohhh I see what your saying here. basically I would be in the mirrors but fall off in the shadows? Then in post bring the blacks down a tad and I would be gone. The only issue this brings up is, for a couple of shot the angel has the actor in center frame which means we are looking down the barrel of the infinity reflection effect But to achieve this the two mirrors have to see each other and i could not be in front so was thinking two way mirror is the solution for those shots.
Yes, if you have to be centered then there's not a whole lot you can do. Other options would be to fill the frame with the actor in a close-up so that the mirror is barely visible, or to shoot the centered shots against a green screen so you can put in a clean background plate later. Usually for scenes with trick photography like this, using multiple techniques on a per-shot basis and cutting them together works well.
Think of how they sold the hobbit-scale effect in 'The Lord of the Rings' films - some shots with human-sized hobbits and very tall stunt doubles, some with normal-sized humans and very small stunt doubles, sets and props of different scales, forced perspective, greenscreen. Cut them all together and you have a really convincing illusion.
Hopefully, with enough space to back up and a long lens you and the camera can be out of the reflection entirely. Longer focal lengths have a narrower field of view so even with the same shot size on your actor you won't see as wide behind them.
Awesome to know this concept works! Thanks for the info Tristan. I think that is the route we will go. Build one wall with two way mirror. My task now is finding a place with that has two way mirror in LA.
One last thought. This may be out of budget if you don't have insurance, but DC Stages (just east of downtown LA) has a lot of the old sets from Law and Order still standing. I gaffed a commercial there recently. I'm pretty sure they have an interrogation room set up with a two-way mirror. Then it would be bringing flats for walls and to place the real mirror on. May be worth giving them a call to see if they have one standing.
Nice good to know! Unfortunately on this one the budget is small. I think we will be building one wall in an existing bathroom that has a two way mirror on it. I wish we could rent the two way mirror to save a few bucks.
If there is a factory near you that manufactures mirrors they could probably sell you couple of coated mirrors without the protective layer. or you could also have one made in a optical company (may be expensive though)
the one way mirror is based on that the observer side has lot less or no light at all compared to the subject side. you will see through to the observer side as well if there is enough light on that side. same principle than how a normal glass window behaves at night but the partially reflective metal coating (just like in ordinary mirror except no protective lacquer on the surface) enhances the effect
c80f0f1006