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How to recreate the lighting setups for six scenes in Stranger Things 4

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I don’t know about you, but I find movies and TV shows a great source of inspiration. And I don’t mean the story, but the technical side of things. The blocking, the lighting, the editing, the grade, the music used and more all set the tone for what we’re viewing and it’s fascinating to try to reverse engineer and figure out not only how but why they made the decisions they did.

But here, we’re looking at lighting. And specifically, the lighting for certain scenes from Stranger Things 4. Bangkok-based photographer and filmmaker MIXXPST, along with his friend Gift Lee, decided to have a go at recreating some of the scenes from the popular show as they’re both big fans and I while they’re not pixel-perfect replicas of the originals, they illustrate some of the principles very well.

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Lighting setup: Indoor swimwear shoot

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Shooting swimwear outside in natural light is nearly always the best solution, after all, the bright, crisp sunshine is an easy-win when it comes to making swimwear look good. But what if an outdoor shoot simply isn’t practical or even possible due to location and of course weather?

In this article I’ll discuss a simple indoor setup that can be created in almost any sized space and with standard kit. This setup isn’t trying to synthesise daylight indoors like I’ve done before, but it is about recreating that feeling of an outdoor shoot and I’ll share a couple of tricks I employ to do just that.

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Lighting setup: Modifying the sun for natural light portraits

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I live in the U.K., so offering natural light portraits to my clients is far from a smart choice. We have almost no clue when or even if the sun is going to come out and help us on a shoot here in Britain, but for those rare moments where the sun does bother to show up on set, it’s definitely worth having a few techniques up your sleeve to enable you to work with it, rather than against it.

For those of you living in parts of the world where the indigenous population don’t have the pallor of wet tissue paper, the sun is probably a staple light source in your workflow. But whether you live in Norway or L.A., we all need to modify that sun in some way to either avoid washed out and flat images, or the dreaded squinting model. This article looks at a popular light controlling technique often used in the studio and brings it outdoors to give your daylight portraits a more refined look.

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Use this simple two-light setup for gorgeous and consistent portrait lighting

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When shooting portraits in a studio with artificial lighting, the possibilities are endless. But if you’re looking for something simple, beginner-friendly, yet very effective, look no further. In this video, Manny Ortiz shows you one of his favorite beauty lighting setups. It uses two lights, a single light stand, and gives you beautiful and consistent lighting in every shot.

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Lighting glossy metallic surfaces is tricky, but here’s how to nail it every time

Lighting glossy metal objects can be really tricky when you incorporate them in photos. They don’t only reflect light in a pretty harsh way, but they also reflect the scene. In this video, Jay P. Morgan teaches you how to light shiny metal objects so you make them look their best in your shots. He guides you through his setup and gives an example of lighting a BB gun in a studio.

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How to photograph glass like a pro

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Photographing glass can seem tricky and difficult to do right. But in this video from Adorama, photographer David Bergman shows you that it’s easier than you might think. In only two minutes, you’ll see the lighting setups and a few tricks that will help you create different looks of your images and end up with professional-looking results.

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How to light two interview subjects with only three lights using cross key lighting

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Interviews can be a fun lighting challenge, especially when you need to go back and forth between two subjects; The interviewer and the interviewee. There are all kinds of elaborate lighting setups you can use to light two subjects and have them both looking great on-camera.

Sometimes, though, you’re limited on gear or space or setup time. In this video, filmmaker Rubidium Wu shows us a simple three light setup that gives short lighting on two interview subjects to great effect.

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Introduction to three-point interview lighting

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The three-point lighting is the basic and the best-known setup for portraits, but it’ also the bread-and-butter of interview lighting. Coming to you from Spiffy Gear, this video will show you the basics of three-point interview lighting in a clear and concise way. There’s a breakdown of the setup, and then you’ll see some small additions to the setup that make a big difference.

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6 Light Beauty and Fashion Lighting Setup

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I know it’s extremely trendy right now to say that ‘one light is all you need’, and although in certain situations this is true, a of the time extra lights will likely look better, or at the very least make your life easier.

Now before you rush to the comments section to proclaim the purity and simplicity of a black and white headshot being lit by a single light as being the very essence of great photography, I’ll just add that I agree. Sometimes, complicated lighting and over-lit portraits can certainly get in the way of a subject but conversely, a more visually interesting shot can also be achieved with the addition of more lights to draw in and engage a viewer.

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Here are 17 quick and easy off-camera lighting recipes to up your flash game

If you want to learn more about lighting setups, here is a fantastic, comprehensive and above all fun video to help you learn. MagMod shares Trevor Dayley‘s class at WPPI 2018 where he teaches as many as 17 different lighting setups.

This video isn’t just useful for those who learn more about flash photography. Trevor is also a fantastic speaker and he shares a rather crazy memorization story to help you remember these lighting recipes. You’ll have fun watching this video and definitely learn some setups that will help you improve your photography.

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