With the explosion of digital cameras in filmmaking in the past decade and a half, there also appears to have been a bigger push for more natural lighting on film and TV productions than in times past.
There’s also been the rise of new TV technology including not just 4K and OLED (and now QD-OLED) sets but more importantly the arrival of high dynamic range formats (HDR10, Dolby Vision) which impacts level of detail when it comes to light and shadow.
Added to that mix? The rise of streaming services which offer the convenience of watching film and TV anywhere with an internet connection, albeit at the cost of some visual and audio compression and artifacts.
When it’s all working great, shows and films can look amazing. Trouble is things don’t always work out for the best – poor quality connections, cheap and/or more often uncalibrated TVs, rushed production schedules and varying equipment and standards can all impact the final visual quality of a work.
This has led to complaints of some shows being simply ‘too dark’ to watch, most famously highlighted by the infamous “Game of Thrones” episode “The Long Night” which drew criticism for some viewers not being able to see much of anything.
Another is a popular meme going around on social media comparing just how darkly lit each subsequent iteration of the “Batman” films have become to the point that the next entry could simply be a screen of pitch black.
The recent Marvel Studios series “Moon Knight” doesn’t really have this problem, and that’s due in part to cinematographer Andrew Droz Palermo who worked on the second and fourth episodes.
Speaking with Slashfilm, Palermo discussed the challenges of dark scenes and how one kind of has to accommodate for both the best and worst way those scenes can be viewed:
“I think under exposure is [laughs], it seems like it’s a point of contention for a lot of people and like, ‘How dark is acceptable?’ I have a nice TV at home and I can see it in a way that is bright and I know that in the 4K HDR, it looks like it should.
So you kind of just worry about how underlit can you get, what’s acceptable for everyone’s TV. Because I’m in a good environment when I’m in the post-production facility, it’s as good as it’s going to get there.
Everything’s calibrated, the monitors are incredible, but you have to remember not everyone has this experience. Not only in the environment that you’re coloring in – which is quite dark, there’s no windows – but also their TVs aren’t as nice.”
Palermo says his methodology is a tendency to over-light a scene at first: “Do a little more and then bring it down, just so I don’t paint us into a corner where you can’t see anything.” He also says it’s frustrating when he hears people can’t see things:
“As I’ve mentioned, the viewing experiences in post-production are so good. I know that you should be seeing something. And I know I push things to their limit sometimes, but I know when I’m watching something, I know exactly where I am. So maybe sometimes it’s compression. Maybe it’s sometimes a streaming service, or one’s TV, but it can be frustrating to not have a unified, everyone is seeing it the same way.”
Palermo’s episodes are now available on Disney+ and head over to Slashfilm for the full interview.
